Joelle Jefcoat

Joelle Jefcoat, FAIA, Esq. is an architect, attorney, and Deputy General Counsel for the global design firm, Perkins&Will. For eleven years, she served as a Project Architect and Project Manager for large and complex projects in the Charlotte studio of Perkins+Will before joining Perkins+Will’s legal team in 2012. Her experience in leading higher education, K-12, and corporate commercial design projects gives her unique insight into the practical issues that challenge architectural practice and project team leaders day to day.

During her career, Mrs. Jefcoat received AIA presidential appointments in 2007 to serve on the AIA Diversity Committee, in 2008 as a member of the Diversity and Inclusiveness Board Strategic Initiatives Group, and in 2012 as a member of the AIA Board Community Committee. She was elevated to the AIA College of Fellows in 2020. She served for three years on the now sunset AIA Risk Management Committee and is presently serving on the AIA Documents Committee and as Chair of AIA North Carolina’s Fellows Committee. She is also an active member of the American Bar Association’s Forum on Construction Law and is the Immediate Past Chair of the Forum’s Design Division.

Joelle received a Master of Architecture from the University of Virginia, a Bachelor of Science in Architectural Studies from the University of Illinois, Champaign-Urbana, and a Juris Doctorate from Charlotte School of Law. She is a Lecturer in Architecture at the Harvard University Graduate School of Design and she previously taught graduate architecture design studio as an adjunct professor in the School of Architecture at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte. She is admitted to the North Carolina Bar and the bar of the Supreme Court of the United States and is a member of The Jefferson Society.