EDUCATION:

  • Bachelor of Science – Architecture University of Illinois (Highest Honors, Bronze Tablet Award), 1977
  • Ecole des Beaux Arts, Versailles, 1976; studied under Felix Candela
  • Northwestern University, Infrastructure Technology Institute 1994-1996

CERTIFICATION:
  • Registered Architect
  • NCARB Registration: licensed for reciprocal registration throughout the U.S.
  • Self-Certification Approved, City of Chicago
  • Registered Energy Professional, Chicago
  • LEED Certified Professional, since 2006

PROFESSIONAL AFFILIATIONS:
  • American Institute of Architects
  • American Planning Association
  • USGBC - LEED AP
  • International Conference on the Research of Modern Architecture, Jyvaskyla, Finland
  • Chicago Architectural Club
  • Metropolitan Planning Council
  • Chicago Architecture Foundation
  • Former Faculty Member, School of the Art Institute of Chicago
  • Speaker, Tongji University, Shanghai, China "Systems Building"; Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan "The Arc of Nature." China; Low Carbon Earth Summit, Hubei, China, "Working with Sustainability." Xi’an Jiaotong-Liverpool University, Suzhou, China: Sustainable Cities lecture series, "The Arc of Nature."
  • Speaker, Chicago Build; Real Estate Investing Group, Chicago; American Bar Association, Chicago; IHDA, Chicago; SCUP, Pittsburgh, PA; EDSpaces, Kansas City. Chicago History Museum.
  • Former Board of Directors, Pleasant Home Foundation, National Register Historic Landmark, Oak Park, Illinois; Collaboraction Theater Chicago
  • Selected for service as a Fulbright Specialist by the J. William Fulbright Foreign Scholarship Board, on behalf of the Bureau of Education and Cultural Affairs of the U.S. Department of State, and the Council for International Exchange of Scholars.

John W. Clark
Principal
AIA, APA, LEED AP

John Clark is a Chicago based architect and a founding partner of the architectural firm Cordogan Clark & Associates. The firm, which now has five offices in multiple states, has an extensive project portfolio including municipal, institutional, commercial, residential, and master planning projects. John maintains an active, daily involvement in the development of the firm's projects, focusing on architectural design, planning and construction technology. Together with his partner, John Cordogan, John has been responsible for the architecture, design, and construction quality of the firm's projects.

John has designed a wide range of projects. These have ranged from large-scale municipal, institutional and educational facilities to high-rise, multi-use complexes. He has completed a wide variety of significant projects involving urban planning, municipal design, and historic and contextual design.

He has won national and international design and design/ build com-petitions for a variety of projects, including the new for the 41st and 43rd street bridges over Lake Shore Drive for the City of Chicago; the bridge based Pavilions for the Illinois State Toll Highway Authority; and the Florida Oasis redevelopment project. John has completed a wide variety of significant projects involving urban planning, municipal design, and historic and contextual design, including significant projects in China.

John has served on design award juries for The American Institute of Architects and has been a visiting design juror at the University of Illinois, Illinois Institute of Technology, and at the Art Institute of Chicago, where he also served on the design faculty.

His architectural work has been widely published and exhibited and is included in the permanent collection of the Art Institute of Chicago, the Chicago Historical Society, and the Chicago Athenaeum Museum of Architecture and Design. His work has received awards from the American Institute of Architects; construction trade institutes; community beautification awards, and international design awards.

John maintains an active, daily involvement in the development of the firm's projects, focusing on architectural design, planning and construction technology. Many of these projects have been recognized for their sustainable aspects, which has been a special interest since his work with Great Lakes Solar Engineering in the 1970s. Various more recent sustainable projects by Cordogan Clark have won LEED Platinum, Gold, and Silver Certification, various other Green Agency certifications, and include completed mixed-use net-zero designs.

The mixed-use restaurant, theater, and artist's loft residential complex Aurora Arts Center for which John was a principal on received the Driehaus Award for Historic Preservation; the Landmarks Illinois Driehaus Preservation Award; National Association For County Community & Economic Development Award; a Multifamily Executive Award; and an American Institute of Architects Award for Excellence in Adaptive Reuse. This transformative project revitalizes two National Register Historic buildings in downtown Aurora.

John's design for the signature 41st and 43rd Street Bridges over Lake Shore Drive, Chicago won the City of Chicago's international design competition called "Bridging the Drive." These new signature bridges connect Chicago's Bronzeville neighborhood with the lakefront with iconic structures that create a dynamic, welcoming, and memorable experience for its users. Completed with AECOM engineers, this project has won numerous national and international awards including: the 2021 Rethinking the Future Global Architecture Design Award; the 2019 Global Future Design Award from Urban Design & Architecture Design; the 2019 Merit Award for Infrastructure from Chicago Building Congress; the SEAOI – Structural Engineers Association of Illinois 2019 Excellence in Structural Engineering Best Bridge / Transportation Project; The 2019 ASCE Outstanding Civil Engineering Achievement Award; the ENR 2019 National Best of the Best Project Award 2019 Project of the Year – Landscape/Urban Development, the 2023 IDA International Design Award; 2020 Chicago Athenaeum: American Architecture Design Award; the 2024 National American Institute of Architects (AIA) Honor Award for Regional and Urban Design and others, and has been widely published nationally and internationally. Recently, the Hemmens Cultural Center renovation and addition was awarded a 2025 AIA "Divine Detail" Design Award.