Nikole Bouchard

Nikole Bouchard's antidisciplinary research and design work straddles the space between art, architecture, and landscape to discover ideas that stimulate ecologically sensitive and culturally relevant design interventions. Her professional and pedagogical work lies at the intersection of the conceptual and the corporeal; with specific interests in the fine line between abject and opportunity. Bouchard engages in projects of all scales and media that explore contextually driven methods of design where experiments embody a unique sense of fantastical pragmatism; and are playful, yet intentional, well-informed, and environmentally sensitive.

Bouchard is an Associate Professor in the School of Architecture & Urban Planning (SARUP) at the University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee (UWM). She has most recently taught at Yale University (Fall 2020, 2019 + 2018), and prior to joining the UWM faculty she taught at Cornell University, Syracuse University, the University of Waterloo, and the University of Toronto. In 2021, Bouchard was 1 of 2 architecture faculty from across the country selected to receive a 2021 Association of Collegiate Schools of Architecture (ACSA) Creative Achievement Award. In 2019, Nikole was 1 of 3 faculty awarded an ACSA New Faculty Teaching award.

Professionally, Bouchard has worked as a Junior Architect at Steven Holl Architects and Skidmore, Owings & Merrill LLC in New York City. While teaching in Toronto, Bouchard was a Lead Designer at Lateral Office. During this time, one of her primary projects, The Arctic Food Network in Iqaluit, Canada was awarded a Holcim Foundation 2011 Gold North America Prize of $100,000.

In 2015 Bouchard was a Fellow at The MacDowell Colony in Peterborough, NH, and an Artist-in-Residence at Baer Art Center in Hofsós, Iceland. Her residency work regarding the reciprocal relationships between people and place was an extension of her ongoing In-Situ Sensibility research that began when she was awarded the $30,000 Steedman Travel Fellowship Prize from Washington University in St. Louis. As the Steedman Fellow, she traveled to 14 countries and 87 cities around the world to investigate the way various cultures live harmoniously with the landscapes that surround them. Bouchard focused on native material research, growth and decay, temporal structures, passive design strategies, affordable construction techniques, and settlement patterns.

Bouchard edited and contributed to the book WASTE MATTERS: Adaptive Reuse for Productive Landscapes published by Routledge in January 2021.