Denise Rebecca Arnold

Denise Rebecca Arnold AIA (57) passed away on November 8, 2024. The daughter of Hugh B. and Sandra L. Arnold. She was a distinguished architect, designer, and researcher who devoted her life to inclusive design and advocacy for fairness in development.

Denise attended the University of Michigan, where she earned a Master of Architecture (1991), held a second Master of Urban Design from Columbia University (1994), and most recently earned a PhD in Disability Studies from the University of Illinois at Chicago (2024). Denise was also awarded the Harvard University Graduate School of Design Loeb Fellowship (2007) in which she served initially as resident, and later as collaborator, until her death.

Denise served several departments of the City of Chicago government until 2005 before going into private architecture practice. As an architect, Denise lectured and wrote widely on accessible design, advised, and served on public boards – most recently in the city of Highland Park, where she served terms on the zoning and housing committees, as well as the planning commission. Her life work, which underpinned the founding principles of her architectural practice DRALLC (2006), and associated non-for-profit – to design and research environmental impacts on people with cognitive disabilities like autism – continues under the leadership of her partner and husband Gerardo Fitz-Gibbon AIA.

She was a beloved daughter, wife, and mother. In addition to her husband, she is survived by sons Benjamin Arnold Fitz-Gibbon and Lucas Arnold Fitz-Gibbon; her mother Sandra Arnold; and sisters Sharisse Rehring, Paige Farber, Andrea Arnold, and Susan Freel.

A virtual memorial service in Denise’s honor will be held on January 11, 2025.