Rodney Leon

Rodney Leon, founder and principal of Rodney Leon Architect PLLC has an architectural background as a designer on a diversity of building types in the U.S. and abroad. Mr. Leon has made the design of public spaces the focus of his professional career. Over the last 25 years his architecture practice has developed expertise in Memorial Design, Sustainable Urban Development, and Master Planning. He is an advocate of “Culturally Contextual” contemporary design. 

Mr. Leon is the designer of the African Burial Ground Memorial in New York City which is the first National Monument in the United States dedicated to the contributions of people of African descent. The monument situated north of City Hall features a “symbolic spiritual space where one can interact and be transformed. The memorial provides visitors the opportunity for acknowledgment, contemplation, meditation, reflection, healing, education and prayer.”

Mr. Leon is also the winner of the international competition by the United Nations to design the Permanent Memorial to the Victims of Slavery and the Transatlantic Slave Trade. Mr. Leon’s work was selected from among 310 design proposals from 83 countries in a competition launched by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO). Mr. Leon’s winning entry entitled “The Ark of Return” was unveiled at the United Nations Plaza by Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon on March 25th, 2015.

In 2020, Mr. Leon’s team was shortlisted in the competition to design and reconstruct the Haitian National Palace. In 2023, he completed the design of a 7,000 SF museum exhibition space for the Cultural Museum of African Art, Eric Edwards Collection. Currently, he is developing a Master Plan and Feasibility Study for a Memorial Park and Garden to be located at the historic Mt. Zion Cemetery in Georgetown, Washington, DC and designing concepts for the Landmark Underground Railroad home of abolitionists Harriet and Thomas Truesdell in Brooklyn, NY.

Mr. Leon received his Undergraduate Architecture degree from Pratt Institute in 1992 and Master of Architecture from Yale University in 1995. He has served as a professor of Architecture for both Pratt Institute and Yale. He is currently on the DEI Board of Pratt Institute, the Board of the Haitian Roundtable and Board President of the African Burial Ground Memorial Foundation. He currently resides in Brooklyn with his wife and 2 daughters.