MJ Neal Architects

"There is tacit wisdom of architecture accumulated in history and tradition. But in today’s panicked rush for the new, we rarely stop to listen to this wisdom. Architecture needs slowness to re-connect itself with this source of silent knowledge. Architecture requires slowness in order to develop a cumulative tradition again, to accumulate a sense of continuity, and to become re-rooted in culture.

In order to create an experiential background for grasping and understanding the dialectics of permanence and change, I believe that we need an architecture that rejects ephemerality, speed, and fashion; we need an architecture that slows our experience of reality."

Juhani Pallasmaa - Melancholy and Time

MJ Neal's work is based on a lifelong involvement and association with design. His great grandfather was a contractor, his grandfather was an architect and contractor, his uncle is an architect and his father is a contractor.

MJ Neal Architects is dedicated to the enhancement of humankind through design.

Architecture exists for people, not for itself alone. Architecture should be viewed as a long term endeavor that addresses the needs of the client, immediate user, and specific environment while responding to the cumulative history of building, art, technologies, society, and global environment.

Truthful architecture manifests itself to satisfy the ever changing needs of people. As everything is in motion, life itself is a continuum. Mr. Neal seeks to recognize and respond to this In his architecture by expressing the basic elements earth, water, fire, wind, and sky. These elements are the fundamental building blocks of life itself and should not be ignored.

MJ Neal Architects is one of the most awarded firms in Austin, holding six state awards, two national awards, two silver medals for design and honorable mentions and other placements in international design competitions, all aquired in the last eight years. Our work has been published all over the world, including GA, Dwell, Architectural Record, Interior Design Magazine, and many others.

Our main office is in Austin, Texas with an interdisciplinary film production company sharing our space and soul, Barcelona Films. We design interdisciplinary projects all over the world, not just the US, and we have recently established collaboratives with firms in Barcelona, San Francisco, and Sydney

We've been practicing sustainable architecture since 1992, we consider it a given and a non-negociable priority, MJ Neal, AIA was on the advisory committee for Austin’s Green Builder Program at its inception and was a Sustainable Building Coalition charter member.

Please visit our blog, started in 2004: http://mjnealblog.com.