Apply to the School of Architecture

Hermona Tamrat

Assistant Professor Adjunct

Hermona Tamrat is the founding principal of hgt studio, a Brooklyn-based structural engineering practice rooted in supporting the design of public, community-centric architecture, in the responsibility to advance social equity through the built environment. She obtained her Master’s in Structural Engineering from U.C. Berkeley and Bachelor’s in Civil Engineering from Carnegie Mellon University. During her years practicing structural engineering at Silman (previously Robert Silman Associates, now T.Y. Lin), she collaborated with Herzog & de Meuron on the award-winning Powerhouse Arts Workshop. hgt studio has provided structural engineering support to artists Torkwase Dyson for her large scale outdoor sculptures at the Whitney Biennial 2024, and currently to Kenseth Armstead on various works including a forthcoming public sculpture in downtown Brooklyn.

Hermona is also an adjunct professor at Yale School of Architecture and Columbia Graduate School of Architecture, Planning, and Preservation.

Hermona's CV is available here. 

  • Founded by inventor, industrialist and philanthropist Peter Cooper in 1859, The Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art offers education in art, architecture and engineering, as well as courses in the humanities and social sciences.

  • “My feelings, my desires, my hopes, embrace humanity throughout the world,” Peter Cooper proclaimed in a speech in 1853. He looked forward to a time when, “knowledge shall cover the earth as waters cover the great deep.”

  • From its beginnings, Cooper Union was a unique institution, dedicated to founder Peter Cooper's proposition that education is the key not only to personal prosperity but to civic virtue and harmony.

  • Peter Cooper wanted his graduates to acquire the technical mastery and entrepreneurial skills, enrich their intellects and spark their creativity, and develop a sense of social justice that would translate into action.