About Sierra
Sierra is a Franco-American atelier specializing in the design and construction of creative, cultural architectures adapted to climate(s).
Sierra is a French-American architecture atelier focused on creative, cultural, and climate-responsive design and builds. We’re based in Paris / Saint-Germain-en-Laye and Bordeaux, with outposts in Reunion Island & New York.
We design unique spaces for artists and activists, makers and creative entrepreneurs, nature lovers and adventurers. From breweries to bakeries,jewelry ateliers to cycle repair shops.
Carrie Wilbert and Eléonore Levieux founded Sierra after years of experience in renowned international architecture and urban design firms to better respond to the community and climate sensitivity and awareness that was so important to forward-thinking clients.
Today, they lead a diverse team of builders and technical experts, from craftspeople and cost consultants, to bring a globally aware and locally sensitive perspective.
We understand that our environment impacts how we live today and the next generation. We work with clients and collaborators that share this sensitive & hopeful spirit to make successful built projects.
Our story:
Tropical islands to the great plains.
While Eléonore was learning to swim in the lagoons of the tropical Reunion island (FR), Carrie was learning to tend to tomatoes amongst the backdrop of the immense agricultural plains of Kansas (USA).
From two geographically opposing environments and culturally contrasting lifestyles the two trained architects met, as graduate students in Urban Design at ENSA Paris-Belleville, where they started working together out of a mutual interest to integrate imminent climatic changes in their project methodology.
Since then, Eleonore and Carrie have refined their craft: practicing architecture, urban design and landscape design in large international firms in France, Côte d’Ivoire, and the United States. Their awareness moved beyond issues of energy use and efficiency, to begin holistically designing for social change as well.
Their empathy for cultural differences and international insight inspire a sensibility for diversity and the human experience in every project. It even earned them the ‘Emerging New York Architects’ Award for the design of a socially and culturally inclusive neighborhood park in Queens. They continue to use their architectural and urban design skills and understanding of global issues to shape projects in a new way.
From the difference and the similarities of our two stories, Sierra was born. Sierra represents this meeting of our two experiences. Named for the Sierra Leone Rise found at the geographical midpoint in between the plains of Kansas and the beaches of Reunion Island. It represents our profound respect for nature and culture, and the word embodies the harmony we search with every new project we actively approach.
Our team
Sierra works with a collaborative local network, or “ecosystem’’ that grows with each new project.
Carrie Wilbert
Carrie Wilbert is an architect and urban designer educated and trained in the licensed and registered in the United States (New York & Kansas) and France. Today, proudly an “American in Paris”, she is originally from Kansas City.
Prior to founding Atelier Sierra, she worked in Paris and New York on projects, from the very big to the very small, specializing in urban regeneration and resilience. She has developed a dual cultural perspective building bridges between different social, geographic, architectural, and urban nuances.
She started her career working on large-scale international projects, from Santiago to Cotonou to Wuhan, at Arte Charpentier Architectes based in Paris. Little by little she centered her focus on more local Parisian projects specializing in cross-cultural relationships-– such as a brewery for the Scottish craft brewer, BrewDog, an urban re-activation development along the “péripherique” as local architect for Heatherwick Studios, and even a hindu temple and cultural center for the BAPS denomination. In New York, at AtelierTek, she continued this cross-cultural expertise and multiscale approach to design cultural and community hubs from art galleries to waterfront masterplans.
She has led design, coordination, and documentation efforts for many creative, ambitious projects at all scales. At Sierra, she brings a deep commitment to bioclimatic and contextual design allowing work across cultures, climates, and scales with both rigor and sensitivity.
Carrie is a thought leader on (likes to talk about):
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Abridging French-American cultures in architecture
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the business of design and designing architecture businesses
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the “inbetween” realm of architecture and urban design
Eléonore Levieux
Eléonore Levieux is a Bordeaux based architect and urban designer educated and trained in France. Her childhood on Réunion Island shaped her vision of the city and the land. Through her journey, she developed a sensitivity to tropical vernacular architecture and the relationship between architecture, its territory, and the landscape.
A graduate of ENSA Paris-Malaquais, she obtained her HMONP in 2012. She also holds a specialized master's degree in urban planning and territorial design from ENSAPB. She worked at urban planning and landscape firms in Paris, then in Abidjan as a project manager for the internationally renowned firm Koffi & Diabaté Architectes. She moved to Bordeaux spent two years as a project manager at Atelier King Kong, a well-regarded Bordeaux-based architecture firm. She also contributes as an artist within the artistic collective Neotravelmakers. She co-founded with artist and doctoral researcher Vincent Rauel, with whom she pursues a research-action approach exploring how artists create while traveling in the 21st century.
Éléonore brings a deep understanding of tropical vernacular architecture and territorial design, rooted in her upbringing on Réunion and sharpened through projects spanning Paris, Abidjan, and Bordeaux. Her experience working across climates and continents — combined with her artistic practice exploring place and movement — gives Sierra a rare sensitivity to how buildings and cities relate to their landscapes and communities.
Eleonore is a thought leader on:
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Tropical architecture
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Mobile architecture
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Reunion island craftsmanship
Festival Échelle Un 2025 • Table Ronde Belleville - Échelle Un 2025 • Table Ronde Belleville - Podcast
2025 • Juries HMONP Malaquais
2025 • Juries Columbia Urban Design (CW)
2014 • Belleville
2014 • Kent University
2014 • Academie de la Chaumiere
2014 • ENYA
2025 • Neotravelmakers (EL)
Créatrices de « Making Good Architecture »
Florian Caro, Titouan Sorbier, Mitya Vautrin, Saveeda Seegoolam, Clémence Augendre.
La Bouée
Atelier Copo
Restaurant Mets Tissés
Volcaroc
Tephra
Atelier Mains Libres
Bonsoir Architectes
MOB Architectes
Arc-en-Scène
Co-architectes
Johanna Grégoire
etc.