Gibbs Alumnus Brings People-Centered Design to the International Stage

Gibbs College of Architecture (GCA) alumnus Tony Wu has spent nearly two decades at Pelli Clarke & Partners, rising to Senior Associate and leading projects on an international scale. His recent work, a transit-oriented development in Yibin, China, earned national recognition in China and was featured on ArchDaily. The GCA Communications Team sat down with Tony to reflect on his path from the University of Oklahoma (OU) to the world stage.

Tony Wu graduated from OU in 2007 with dual degrees in Architecture and Mathematics. Originally from Taiwan, Tony moved to Edmond, Oklahoma, as a middle schooler and went on to spend six years at OU before launching a career that has taken him across the globe.

His path toward architecture began well before college. As a freshman in high school, Tony's woodworking teacher handed him a book on drawing floor plans and asked him to design a new woodshop. Little did he know that by the end of that summer, the 30-by-40-foot structure, complete with an upper-level apartment, had been built from his drawings.

"You start thinking you can be an architect one day," he recalls. "Little do you know what architecture is other than just a little shop."

Shortly after graduating from OU, Tony secured an opportunity to work in the Tokyo office of Pritzker Prize-winning architect Shigeru Ban, a formative three-month experience that helped position him for a role at Pelli Clarke & Partners, where he has worked for 18 years. He currently serves as an Senior Associate, managing large-scale international projects from his home base in Maryland.

Connecting Studio Work to Professional Practice

Tony points to his fifth-year architecture studio at OU, led by Dr. Khosrow Bozorgi, as an experience that directly shaped his approach to design. Architecture school can be resource-intensive, and Tony found a practical workaround. Rather than purchasing materials for the large-scale models the studio required, he collected scrap pieces discarded by other students from the studio floor. The result was one of the largest models in the studio, built entirely from leftover materials.

"I didn't have money to build the giant models," he says plainly. It was an early demonstration of the resourcefulness that would serve him well throughout his career.
 

The studio itself focused on a partially earthquake-damaged bazaar district in Kerman, Iran, asking students to think critically about public space, urban circulation, and cultural identity. Tony's assigned site sat at the periphery of the main planning axis, but rather than treating that as a limitation, he focused on its role as the primary entry point into the broader development. Recognizing that every visitor to the broader development would pass through his site first, he put pedestrian circulation at the center of his design thinking. That foundation was later reinforced during his graduate studies at Columbia University, where he engaged deeply with ideas around activating public space and “designing the void.”

Yibin High-Speed Rail Station Gateway Development, China

Among Tony's most recognized projects is a large-scale transit-oriented development in Yibin, China, completed in roughly three years after the firm's proposal beat out several internationally prominent competitors. Tony served as project manager across the multi-phase effort, which includes a central park, retail pavilions, an art museum, civic buildings, and a network of elevated pedestrian infrastructure connecting a high-speed rail station to surrounding residential and office development.

The design draws inspiration from the natural landscape of the Yibin region, which is home to numerous species of bamboo. The team was drawn to the way most bamboo grows, not as individual plants, but as one connected system spreading outward from a shared root network. That idea carried into the project, with the central park functioning much like those roots, connecting the towers, pavilions, and surrounding neighborhoods into a single cohesive place.

The design also separates pedestrian and vehicular traffic throughout, allowing visitors to move from the rail platform through the park and into the broader district without crossing a single signalized intersection. The central park, approximately 60% open outdoor space, incorporates everyday programming such as studio space, tech facilities, and small retail rather than functioning as purely ornamental green space. "It's about making a statement that this is a place you want to live and work," Tony explains. "The park is not just a giant green space — it has a ballet studio, an IT lab, little convenience stores. It's your everyday thing."