Ken 'Niya M.L. Dennard
Graduate Architecture Student | Designer | Creative Strategist
As a second-year Master of Architecture student at Florida A&M University, I am driven by a passion for creating restorative, community-centered spaces. My design practice is rooted in memory, sustainability, and cultural storytelling — with a strong focus on adaptive reuse, green infrastructure, and architecture’s power to heal.
To me, architecture is more than construction — it’s a form of care. It can preserve history, reimagine forgotten spaces, and cultivate joy in the communities that need it most. My work explores how design can be a vessel for both emotional connection and environmental resilience.
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Design values
Architecture as Healing
I design for emotional restoration — prioritizing comfort, safety, and joy in spaces that serve historically marginalized or traumatized communities.
I design for emotional restoration — prioritizing comfort, safety, and joy in spaces that serve historically marginalized or traumatized communities.
Sustainability as Social Justice
I view green design as a tool for equity. My projects often include modular rainwater systems, passive strategies, and carbon-capture interventions that work in service of both people and planet.
I view green design as a tool for equity. My projects often include modular rainwater systems, passive strategies, and carbon-capture interventions that work in service of both people and planet.
Adaptive Reuse and Memory
I’m drawn to transforming underutilized and abandoned buildings — especially commercial structures — into vibrant anchors of community and culture.
I’m drawn to transforming underutilized and abandoned buildings — especially commercial structures — into vibrant anchors of community and culture.
Urban Interface, Human Scale
I think beyond the building, designing at the scale of streets, courtyards, and neighborhoods. My interventions aim to reconnect people with their environment, their routines, and one another.
I think beyond the building, designing at the scale of streets, courtyards, and neighborhoods. My interventions aim to reconnect people with their environment, their routines, and one another.
Culture and Storytelling
My design language centers Black identity, intergenerational connection, and cultural memory — weaving celebration into every detail, from spatial programming to materiality.
My design language centers Black identity, intergenerational connection, and cultural memory — weaving celebration into every detail, from spatial programming to materiality.
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Design Philosophy
I believe architecture is a quiet but powerful force — one that holds the ability to heal, reconnect, and restore.
My design philosophy centers on the conviction that space should not only function well or look beautiful, but should also speak to the emotional, cultural, and environmental contexts that shape it.
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I design with the intention to preserve memory, promote justice, and elevate everyday life.
Whether working with an abandoned plaza in a small Southern town or crafting a parametric structure for carbon capture, I begin with people — their rituals, routines, joys, and wounds.
Whether working with an abandoned plaza in a small Southern town or crafting a parametric structure for carbon capture, I begin with people — their rituals, routines, joys, and wounds.
Architecture, to me, is not just a response to form or function; it is a response to feeling.
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I gravitate toward adaptive reuse not only for its sustainable potential, but for its capacity to honor what came before while giving it new meaning.
I believe in designing softly, with care — creating environments that are innovative and aesthetic, yet non-invasive, always in dialogue with their surroundings.
I believe in designing softly, with care — creating environments that are innovative and aesthetic, yet non-invasive, always in dialogue with their surroundings.
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My work lives at the intersection of urban scale and intimate experience —
where courtyards meet porches,
where streets become stages for memory,
and where structures become vessels for Black joy, resilience, and belonging.
where courtyards meet porches,
where streets become stages for memory,
and where structures become vessels for Black joy, resilience, and belonging.
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In every project, I strive to balance the practical with the poetic,
the technological with the tactile,
and the urgent with the eternal.
the technological with the tactile,
and the urgent with the eternal.
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