Jo Noero

Jo Noero is principal at Noero Architects and a tenured professor at the University of Cape Town (UCT).

Noero holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Architecture from the University of Natal, SA; a Masters from the University of Newcastle-upon-Tyne, UK; and an Honorary Doctorate of Science from Brighton University, UK. He was the director of UCT’s School of Architecture and Planning from 2000 to 2005 and has lectured at Wits, Washington University, the University of Oregon as well as presented numerous international seminars. Noero Architects was formed in Johannesburg in 1984 and renamed Noero Wolff Architects in 1999 when Heinrich Wolff became a partner in the practice. In May 2012 it became Noero Architects once more with offices in Cape Town and Port Elizabeth.

The practice has designed and built more than 200 buildings throughout southern Africa as well as the United States. The work varies in scale and type, ranging from individual houses to large-scale cultural and institutional buildings such as law courts and schools. These projects and built works have been published in journals including The Architectural Review, RIBA Journal, The Union of International Architects Journal, The Architectural Record, Harvard Design Review, Space and Society, Architectural Association Files, Swedish and Norwegian Association of Architects Journals and exhibited at MoMA in New York, the Venice Biennale, the Sao Paolo Biennale, the Singapore Biennale and the National Gallery of Art in Cape Town. The practice has won a number of architectural accolades including the competition for the design of the Museum of Struggle in Red Location, Port Elizabeth, South Africa. Noero has received international and national awards for architectural design including the Lubetkin Prize from the Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) in 2006, a RIBA International Award in 2006, the Dedalo Minosse Premio Internazionale 2005/2006 Award, and the Ruth and Ralph Erskine Prize from the Nordic Association of Architects in 1993; as well as 12 merit awards for Outstanding Design, six Architecture Project Awards, the Gold Medal for Architecture in 2010 and an Award of Excellence for the Soweto Careers Centre in 1994 - all from the South African Institute of Architects.