Jesse JW Selman, AIA, CPHC
Partner
Jesse has been with C&H since 2006, applying his experience as a builder, farmer, and educator to the profession of architecture. He enlivens C&H with his passion to restore, re-build, and transform the built environment in the Northeast. As a designer/project manager, and project architect, he has been involved in projects of all scales at the firm, while staying active in education, farming, and small building projects in his free time. Jesse joined Tom and Garth as a partner in 2017.
In 2003, Jesse created Small Farm Builder, a design-build firm focused on mission-based projects employing green building and sustainable agriculture principles. His clients included nonprofit organizations, small farms, businesses, and industrious individuals. Jesse worked with his clients to develop a pedagogical building experience where the construction process involved the supervision and education of interns, volunteers, and crew on sustainability principles and green building techniques. During this time he completed a wide range of projects from root cellars and pigsties to full farm master plans and a LEED Platinum-Certified housing co-op.
From 1998-2003, Jesse co-managed Sprout Creek Farm – a 200 acre, non-profit / educational, dairy, meat, and vegetable farm in the Hudson Valley of New York. He was responsible for a diverse eco-system of organic gardens, pasture, hayfields, woodlands, wetlands, ponds, floodplains, and creeks. He helped oversee the creation of a regional food source with new barns, milking and creamery facilities, housing and community space employing green design and building practices, as well as new educational programs to meet the needs of a changing society.
Jesse Graduated from Vassar College where he studied rural sociology with a focus on the interplay between the natural and built environment. He grew up in Massachusetts where he spent his summers farming and doing building maintenance. He currently lives with his wife, Lisa, and two children, in Amherst, MA, where they are part of an emerging neighborhood food system.