Who Your friendly neighborhood architect?

Justin Brazier didn’t always know that his path in life would take him right back home.

Brazier grew up with two brothers in a tight-knit family in Randolph, Massachusetts, two cities south of Boston. His parents, who are Haitian immigrants, had also grown up in the Boston area and met each other there.

From a young age, Brazier loved to draw. But when it came time for college, he didn’t think he could get a viable job as an artist. Instead, he searched for other exciting careers, hopping between colleges in and out of the Boston area and cycling through numerous majors, from engineering to business to chemistry. But he had no luck with finding a match.

Finally, after years of searching, “I bit the bullet to pursue art,” figuring that even “if I don’t make any money, at least I’ll be happy,” he says. Brazier returned to Boston to study at the Massachusetts College of Art and Design. At first, he pursued industrial design with the goal of designing sneakers. But then, some of his professors encouraged him to look into architecture, where he could develop a broader skill set. “I took some classes and everything clicked,” he says.

Brazier’s interest in architecture solidified during his undergraduate studies when he joined the Farmers Collaborative, a Boston-based group that works with city officials to turn vacant lots into urban agricultural centers. Brazier started off designing garden grow beds for the collaborative’s projects, working with co-founders CJ Valerus and Leon David. These grow beds became a food source in the Boston community and helped ease food insecurity. Through this work and his studies, “I realized the ability architects have to shape the environment. The design of greenhouses and farming structures can connect people with their history and culture,” he says.

After graduating, Brazier continued to work with the Farmers Collaborative, while keeping a full-time job. With only a bachelor’s degree in architecture, though, he was limited in how far he could push projects forward. To fully realize a project on his own, he would need a professional license. Because of this, “I always knew I wanted to go to grad school to become a full architect,” Brazier says. After taking a couple of years off from school to work, he joined MIT’s MArch program.

Brazier plans to use his expertise as a licensed architect to help communities, especially those of color, transform neighborhoods through urban agriculture and food sovereignty. This goal, rooted in his childhood and family background, is “really important to me,” he says.

Brazier is happy that he’s in a place where people feel comfortable asking him for design help that he can provide. At the end of the day, all he wants to do is “empower people to develop their own environments and put their fingerprints on their own neighborhood,” he says.