Chris Roach, AIA, MAUD, LEED AP

Co-Founder and Principal, Studio VARA

Christopher is an architect and urbanist with over 30 years of experience and a deep commitment to both the craft and the intellectual ambition of architecture. His professional work and academic design research extend beyond the boundaries of architecture to encompass an expanded field that ranges from exhibition design, graphic design, and art, to civic space, urban agency, and the design of practice. As a 20+-year resident of San Francisco, Christopher is an active voice in the architecture community and an advocate for design agency in the urban environment.

He holds a Bachelor of Architecture with Honors from the University of Texas at Austin, and Master of Architecture in Urban Design with distinction from the Harvard Graduate School of Design. Christopher received several awards for his work at Harvard, including the Urban Design Thesis Prize and the Gerald M. McCue Medal.

Christopher served as a Senior Adjunct Professor at California College of the Arts (CCA) from 2012–2024, where he taught housing studios and other courses in the MArch and BArch programs. He is co-founder and Director of the Urban Works Agency at CCA, where he has co-produced exhibitions such as The City & the City: Housing the Next 100,000 and Urbanism from Within, as well as the symposium series Domestic Affairs.

Christopher's most recent research and lectures have focused on Wildfire Resilience and how architects must embrace an expanded field of practice and new territories of agency in the Anthropocene era.