Founded in 2002 by Benoit Jallon and Umberto Napolitano, LAN (Local Architecture Network) was created with the idea of exploring architecture as a subject at the crossroads of several disciplines.

This methodology enables the agency to explore new territories in search of a vision that involves social, urban, ecological and functional issues.

The agency's projects embody this spirit of openness and cover a very broad spectrum of scales and programmes. The extension to the MAXXI Museum in Rome, the transformation of the Rive de Seine tower, the Maillon theatre (Équerre d'argent 2020), the Rue Pajol student residence (BigMat national first prize), the Euravenir tower, experimental housing in Bègles, the EDF departmental archives , the Neue Hamburger Terrassen (International Architecture Awards in 2014) are just some of the iconic projects that the agency has produced over the last two decades. LAN currently works in Europe (France, Belgium, Germany and Slovenia) and is opening up internationally through experiments in the Middle East and Asia.

In addition to architectural and urban design, the agency is actively engaged in disciplinary debate and is developing a significant theoretical output in the form of exhibitions and conferences. Since 2019, two new projects have been launched in the LAN ecosystem: the Architecture and Reality Research Laboratory (RAAR) and the Pianoterra gallery restaurant.

Teaching and transmission are also part of the transversal and transdisciplinary vision. Umberto Napolitano has been a professor at Columbia University GSAPP in New York (USA) and at the AA (Architecture Association) School of Architecture in London (UK), and currently teaches at the TU in Vienna. He has been a member of the Académie Française d'architecture since 2016.

The agency's two partners were appointed Chevaliers de l'ordre des Arts et des Lettres in 2018.

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