9 September 2026
Fall 2026 Newsletter
Autumn in New York: Coming Full Circle
Fall is when New York remembers how good it is at being a city. The air gets crisp, the sidewalks get crowded again, and everyone gets back to school or work. Around here, that means jobsites humming toward their winter deadlines, drawing boards crowded with next spring’s projects, and a trophy shelf that needed rearranging.
Trophy Season: Four New Awards
Apparently, we’re doing something right. This fall, Sherman Architects picked up four new accolades:
- BUILD Magazine gave us a superlative honor: Best Residential Architecture Firm 2026 – New York. The editors cited our specialty – modern additions to historic buildings.
- Global 100 – Best Architecture of the Year Award. Global Media’s awards program celebrates the achievements of leading firms across 163 countries: “This organization has earned distinction among peers worldwide. They represent the benchmark that others measure themselves against. Congratulations to the team on this well-earned recognition.”
- BUILD Magazine also singled out our Upper West Side Brownstone for Best Historic Residential Renovation & Extension Project 2026 – New York, noting its glassy additions at the rear yard and rooftop.
- Global Design News gave its 2026 Future House award to that same brownstone, a project also just featured in ELLE Decor.
We’re always a little sheepish about awards. Architecture is a collaborative business, after all, and no building is a solo project. But we’re also not going to pretend we don’t enjoy the occasional pat on the back.
So thank you to the juries, but especially to our clients, consultants, contractors, and wonderfully obsessive team. We’ll take the trophies—and get back to work.
A Second Chance for a Park Slope Brownstone
When a project ends, we usually roll up our drawings for deep storage. This one came back to life.
A dozen years ago, we were hired to renovate a Park Slope brownstone–but only for our design work, not for our construction oversight. Now, anyone who works with us knows we’re all about the construction process. But we tailor our services to meet our clients’ needs, and these clients wanted to manage construction on their own. So we developed the plans, sent them out for bid, and never saw the results.
Cut to eleven years later. The property had changed hands, and the new owners looked us up. They loved the house and loved our design, but the building needed a total overhaul. The damage was from water infiltration from every conceivable direction: down through the roof, up through the ground, sideways through the deck, dripping from a humidifier, overflowing a fan coil unit, and spilling out of a potted plant. Could we help?
We said yes before they finished the sentence.
Who doesn’t love a do-over? We finally got our chance to build our design. The best part may be the strange feeling of walking through a finished house and recognizing drawings you made over a decade ago.
By tearing the roof off a low attic, we created a roof deck that floods the top floor with sunlight. We opened the kitchen to a wide deck overlooking the garden. Clearing out a rat-infested front yard, we repaved it in impenetrable bluestone. Best of all, the house is bone dry.
Brownstones outlast us all. Apparently so do good floor plans.
Making it in Brooklyn
Every city has institutions that make it more interesting simply by existing. In Brooklyn, three stand out:
UrbanGlass
Around the corner from BAM on Fulton Street, UrbanGlass is a nonprofit devoted to experimentation with glass as an artistic medium. It has been nurturing artists and makers since 1977 and today operates a remarkable 17,000-square-foot studio, along with a gallery, store, classes, and public programs.
We love the combination of bad-ass craftsmanship and serious artistic experimentation. There are furnaces, kilns, torches, molds, grinders, and enough molten glass to make you reconsider every childhood warning you ever got about touching things.
UrbanGlass gives working artists access to facilities they could never create on their own, while giving the rest of us a chance to join in, take a class, shop for a gift, or visit their gallery.
Loop of the Loom
Just down the block from our Dumbo office is a Zen oasis devoted to textile design. Yukako Satone opened this weaving studio in 2019: “Step into a space where your hands move freely, your mind finds stillness.”
Everything at Loop of the Loom is peaceful, meditative, and beautiful: the traditional Japanese looms, the skeins of colorful yarn, the hanging tapestries, the barefoot weavers. They offer classes in weaving, spinning, felting, dying, and stitching. What’s surprising is how often visitors mention “healing.”
-
Craftsman Ave
Ever want to try your hand at blacksmithing? Down in Industry City, there’s a hands-on DIY workshop with tools for nearly every craft. At Craftsman Ave, you can learn how to make your own custom leather bag, light fixture, stained glass, skateboard, or hunting knife. “Nestled in the heart of Brooklyn, our DIY workshop classes offer a unique blend of urban adventure and artisanal skill-building.”
In an increasingly digital world, there’s something wonderfully reassuring about places where people actually make things with their hands. These three studios restore the connection between our bodies and our art.
Stay Connected
Whether you’re thinking about adding a floor to your building, renovating a loft, or simply wondering what might be possible, we’re always happy to talk architecture.
And if you know someone who’s been staring at their house thinking, “There has to be a better way to do this,” send them our way.
Here’s to a beautiful fall in New York.