What makes an architect's CV different?

An architecture CV foregrounds licensure and a selected-projects portfolio rather than a long job history. Recruiters and licensing boards want to see registration status, project scope and role, and software proficiency alongside experience.

Should I include NCARB and state licensure?

Yes. List your state registration with license number and year, and your NCARB certificate if you hold one. These confirm you can legally stamp drawings and ease reciprocal licensure in other states.

How should I describe projects?

Give each project a name, your role and a scope detail like size or budget, and the year. Stating whether you were the lead designer, project architect, or contributor clarifies your actual contribution.

Why add a design philosophy statement?

A brief philosophy statement signals your design values and how you approach problems, which firms use to gauge cultural and aesthetic fit. Keep it to a few sentences so it complements rather than crowds the factual sections.

Does the tool save my CV anywhere?

No. Everything is generated in your browser with nothing uploaded. Copy or download the file before closing the tab, since the data is cleared when the page is closed.

What is the Architect CV Builder?

Build an architect CV with a design philosophy statement, state licensure and NCARB registration, professional experience, a selected-projects portfolio, education, software skills, AIA memberships, and awards. It runs free in your browser on Gera Tools, with nothing uploaded.

Architect CV Builder

Name: Architect CV Builder
Creator: Gera Tools
License: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

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An architect CV that leads with licensure and projects

Architecture hiring weighs registration status and a curated project portfolio far more than a dense employment list. This builder structures a design philosophy statement, licensure, experience, selected projects, education, software, memberships, and awards into a clean, consistent CV.

How it works

The header pairs your name with a professional title and links to your portfolio, followed by an optional design philosophy paragraph. Licensure is a free-text list so you can capture state registration with number and year plus NCARB certification. Experience and education render newest-first with the year range leading each line. Selected projects show the project name with your role and scope (size, budget, or type) and the year — the format firms scan first. Software and skills are entered comma- or line-separated and rendered as a single dotted line. Memberships (such as AIA) and awards are bulleted lists. Empty sections are omitted to keep the document focused.

What hiring firms actually scan for

Most architecture practices sort CVs by three signals before reading prose:

Registration status. Is the candidate licensed? In which state(s)? Does the firm need NCARB certification for interstate mobility? Put this in the header or immediately below.
Project portfolio. What types, what scales, what role? A five-line selected-projects list that shows building type, approximate size, and whether you led or contributed tells more than three pages of job descriptions.
Software. Revit, ArchiCAD, Rhino, AutoCAD, BIM coordination tools — firms match these to their stack before shortlisting.

Prose about design philosophy and awards reads only after those three pass. Keep each section tight so the scanning is quick.

Structuring the selected-projects section

Each line should answer: what was it, how big, what did you do, when?

Riverside Pavilion — Lead designer, 4,200 m² cultural centre — 2023
Harbor Edge Residential — Project architect, 48-unit mixed-use — 2021–2022

Keep it to six to ten entries. A curated list of diverse typologies (civic, residential, commercial, adaptive reuse) demonstrates range better than a long chronological dump of jobs at the same firm.

Tips for the design philosophy statement

Two to three sentences maximum. Describe what drives your design decisions — materiality, context, sustainability, social impact — and end with something that hints at method or process. Avoid generic phrases like “thoughtful” or “human-centred” without a concrete example of what that means in your work. A philosophy statement that says “I explore the relationship between light and threshold in civic buildings” is more memorable than “I design user-focused spaces.”

Practical notes

Write licensure precisely — Licensed Architect, California #C12345 (2019) and NCARB Certified #00123456 — so boards can verify quickly. The output is plain text; paste it into your design-forward InDesign or Figma template as the content layer, then apply your own typography and layout on top.