Meet Steven Braun of BROSROMANBRAUN

Today we’d like to introduce you to Steven Braun.

Steven, we appreciate you taking the time to share your story with us today. Where does your story begin?
Growing up in Miami, Florida, weekly beach visits usually meant walking by the Art Deco buildings that line Ocean Drive. I loved their forms, massing, and style. I was there in the 80s while they were being renovated with Gloria Estefan leading that charge. I was taken by them but didn’t really decide I wanted to go into architecture until in high school after we had moved back to the Tennessee Valley to be with family.

I wanted to go to the University of Miami but the cost of the school was beyond attainable so I chose the School of Architecture at Auburn University. My father had passed away suddenly when I was fifteen years old so when I got to Auburn and there were project briefs that asked us to create a narrative for our “imaginary clients”, I always used a member of my family as inspiration. These projects became a way that I could address the trauma of losing my father and making some sense of it, whether real or imaginary. In Architecture school I led initiatives on experimental 3D work utilizing video game engines to present a project’s narrative. This idea was a little ahead of its time in 1995 but now most rendering software for architects is based on a video game engine if it’s not AI. I shared those methods with other students and began to develop an interest in teaching. I was a teaching assistant for a few professors and really enjoyed that aspect of architecture.

I worked as an architect for a few architecture firms in the Chattanooga area working on award-winning projects like the Outdoor Center, The Block (High Point Climbing), Baylor Humanities Building, Stoveworks, and Lucas Art Workshop for Covenant College on Lookout Mountain in Georgia.

My love for teaching and learning was truly cemented from years of teaching Architectural History at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga. I enjoyed talking to students about architecture and its rich history and I made a point to tell some very specific stories so that the students would remember an architect or movement.

In 2018, after marrying, I moved from the Tennessee Valley to Milton, Georgia and went to work for Dwell Design Studio. Dwell is a company filled with super talented people and I met some great friends there but I still felt like there was this artificial constraints put on my work by others in between me and the client. I left there and started a company with my best friend from Auburn University who had recently gotten back to the United States after working for years in China for Neri & Hu. We started in 2020, right when covid hit and that was a time of taking projects and reinventing them to work with what has become a new normal of planning for a future outbreak. This year (2026) I have accepted a position with Kennesaw State University teaching architecture studio. I have enjoyed the balancing of the two worlds of academia and professional projects. I have been energized by both environments and hope to continue with both.

I’m sure it wasn’t obstacle-free, but would you say the journey has been fairly smooth so far?
It has not been a smooth road. I was dealing with a lot of personal trauma during my years at Auburn, which was healed a bit by the people I met there. I think this led me to believe I could always do something better and it drove me in the early years of my professional career.

I was typically pigeon holed as a designer creating imagery of other people’s designs. I had to force people to let me take a project from beginning to end. There was a time on the Outdoor Center project where the client hadn’t liked anything the firm had shown them and they asked me to take it over. It was a small renovation project with very low budget and I leveraged their need for me to redesign it into me taking the project all the way through the design process to construction administration. I was lucky that the Mayor (Ron Littlefield) and his team liked my initial design and we moved forward with my version and it was the first AIA award for that firm of 25 years. I think it showed that you can make the most of a low budget if you keep the design expressive and simple.

Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your business?
My best friend from college and I created BROSROMANBRAUN to pursue our design sensibilities.
Andrew and I have worked together as a team in different capacities dating back to 1994 at our alma mater, Auburn University. Where we were a part of a great class that changed the ultra competitive culture to one of cooperation & collaboration.

Our firm treats each project independently as it’s own personal narrative of our clients. We want to imbue the spaces with things that are important to them in a way that is new, fresh, raw, and refined. So we will start with research into the project’s site, the issues that are paramount to the client and their businesses. We look to develop a total brand experience and become and advisor for decisions they make down the road.

I’m most proud of our Olive Tree Greek Grill project which is a Greek restaurant in Viera, Florida. The project gives the customer and experience of discovery like walking through the streets of Greece without the cartoonish elements of typical restaurants. We treated the project with classical elements abstracted in a way that is unique, and tells the story of our client’s family history through the architecture. We were able to create a language that is specifically for them, our clients, and it is designed in a way that is of our time and that place.

Are there any apps, books, podcasts, blogs or other resources you think our readers should check out?
I have really enjoyed reading the book “Steve Jobs” by Walter Isaacson. This book is full of times in Steve’s life where he could’ve done better and times where he was the only one brave enough to stand for his values and beliefs. The book has been invaluable for me.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://brosromanbraun.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/brosromanbraun
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/brosromanbraun
• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stevenwadebraun/

Image Credits
Kina Fink, Photographer (Images 1,5,& 6)