Helpern Architects Associates with
Ronnette Riley Architect

During the summer of 2021, Helpern Architects joined forces with Ronnette Riley Architect [RRA], also a sole-owner firm, to better deliver design counsel and services to existing and future clients.

“Ronnette and I had already shared a client with excellent results,” David Helpern comments. “Both of us trained at Harvard Graduate School of Design, though a generation apart. We are both Fellows of the American Institute of Architects, which honored Ronnette for Design and me for Design as well as the special expertise that makes preservation possible financially and practically. We are both active in the design world and our local communities. That’s a nice combination of talent and skills.”

David fills in on the history of the two offices post-COVID: “With her signature vibrancy, Ronnette steered RRA through the pandemic with clients, projects, and staff intact, and the office was growing. For us, like many other planning/design firms, the pandemic walloped our project list, heavy with institutions and developers. Finally, many of our clients have resumed working. Sensing optimism, we each needed or had experience and resources from which the other firm would benefit.”

The Helpern firm now mostly works from RRA’s offices in midtown Manhattan, sharing projects and staff as needed. Recent shared projects include the Carnegie Hall Master Plan; a public assembly plan for a gym complex on the Upper East Side; a loft apartment in the Financial District; and the total renovation of affordable housing facilities in New Haven, CT.

Photograph by Sam Keeler