SUMMARY

This interview of Ana Miljacki explores her path to architecture through research and discourse. Miljacki grew up in Yugoslavia where she was introduced to architecture through her family. She continued this trajectory by attending a specialized architecture high school where she learned valuable technical skills that set students up for the workplace. Despite this direct path, Miljacki opted to move to the United States and study at Bennington College where it was an experimental liberal arts environment, meshing concepts of design, philosophy, and early technological tools. Financial aid largely shaped her decision in graduate school as she attended Rice University where she was exposed to architectural theory, critical urbanism, and post structuralist texts such as Deleuze, Foucault, and Barthes. Later, she entered Harvard GSD during a time where the school was heavily shaped by Michael Hayes. This program allowed Miljacki to focus on Eastern European modernism and socialism, a topic in which she continues to study. Throughout the interview, Miljacki’s experiences in Yugoslavia and the United States raised critical questions about those two worlds and these concepts of collectivism and equality continue to shape her work today. Her time in architecture evolved into a more historical lens and she argues that now more than ever, it is crucial to have historical research in architecture.