Lawrence Scarpa

Lawrence Scarpa (born October 28, 1959) is an American architect and academic, based in Los Angeles, California.

He is noted for his use of conventional materials in unexpected ways and was an early proponent of sustainable design.

Scarpa was born into a Jewish-Italian family in Queens, New York. After his mother's death from cancer in 1967, the family moved to Miami, Florida.

As a child, Scarpa became interested in architecture while helping his father after school with small construction projects that his father undertook to supplement his regular income as a mailman. While on job sites with his father, Scarpa would often build little buildings made from construction debris and other small scraps of wood found there.

He is married to American architect Angela Brooks.

In 1976, Scarpa's father moved the family to Winter Haven, Florida, where he opened a restaurant. While working in the restaurant as a senior in high school, Scarpa befriended a regular customer named Gene Leedy, an architect and member of the Sarasota School of Architecture. Leedy soon became Scarpa's mentor. Scarpa worked for Leedy and in his father's restaurant while attending the University of Florida.

Upon graduation from the university, Scarpa moved to Boca Grande, Florida, to work for Leedy as the foreman for the construction of houses designed by Leedy. Scarpa then accepted a job and moved to New York City to work for architect Paul Rudolph where he stayed for two years until he returned to graduate school at the University of Florida in 1984.

Upon graduation from the University of Florida, he moved to Vicenza, Italy for two years before returning to the U.S. to teach at the University of Florida where he met, Angela Brooks, whom he married in 1987.