Matthew Bernstine

Matthew Bernstine, AICP, LEED^AP, is the director of the Sam Fox School’s Office for Socially Engaged Practice where he leads socially engaged design initiatives and supports practices and scholarship for the College of Art, Architecture, and Kemper Museum.   

He is passionate about working at the intersections of creative practice and rooted processes that demonstrate how designers can serve as powerful voices towards social justice on global and local stages. As an educator at the Sam Fox School of Design & Visual Arts, he teaches core courses in urban design and interdisciplinary seminars where he develops creative pedagogy that integrates participatory design with applied creative and humanist practices. He emphasizes interdisciplinary, mutli-scalar thinking and a bias toward action within his projects and teaching.    

Bernstine previously served as the senior urban designer and planner for WashU at the Office’s of the University Architect & Real Estate. Before coming to St. Louis, he worked for over a decade in the private sector as an urban designer and planner on large-scale infrastructure and city building initiatives. He was named a Distinguished Young Alumni by WashU, Next City Vanguard, New Leaders Council Fellow, and regularly serves on local St. Louis planning and design boards. He holds a Master of Urban and Regional Planning from the University of Virginia and a Master of Urban Design from WashU.