Melody TangAIA, LEED AP BD+C, NCARB

A 2022 AIA Young Architect Award recipient, Melody is Technical Director and an Associate at LPA. She leads strategic planning and technical design expertise, mentors and guides project architects in producing exceptional construction documents, and oversees quality assurance. Previously, she was a senior project architect at the firm.

Over 20+ years, she has led a variety of award-winning commercial, civic and educational projects, from renovations to multi-phase, ground-up high-rise campuses.

Melody holds a Bachelor of Architecture from Cornell University, and believes that architecture lives at the intersection of the practical and the poetic, combining logical problem-solving with human-centered design. Growing up as a Chinese-American and building a career that blends complex technical execution with effective communication, Melody excels as a translator and bridge-builder across disciplines, generations and perspectives. She thrives on collaborating with interdisciplinary teams of designers, engineers, contractors and clients, and cares deeply about mentoring the next generation of architects.

Melody serves as the 2026 President of AIA Orange County, the third largest professional chapter in California. Her leadership at AIA OC began with co-chairing its Student Design Competition in 2016, which led to chairing the annual Design Awards committee and joining the Board as Director of Design in 2019. Her state and national contributions include serving on the 2025–2026 AIA California Board of Directors and its Strategic Planning Working Group, jurying the 2026 Regional & Urban Design Awards, and speaking at the 2023 AIA Conference.