Story at a glance:
- Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton talked about the importance of purpose as part of the annual luncheon in Chicago.
- Studio Gang Founder Jeanne Gang shared her love of collaboration and giving people a chance to lead.
- The Chicago Network’s Women in the Forefront Luncheon is Chicago’s premier annual women’s leadership event.
Hillary Clinton, Jeanne Gang, and Ann Drake shared the stage in June 2026 as part of the annual Women in the Forefront Luncheon, an initiative of The Chicago Network that brings some 1,500 attendees together each year to hear inspiring voices talk about some of the world’s most pressing issues. This year’s trio discussed everything from protecting women’s rights to fighting for the environment to knowing when to “break the rules” and how to lead while collaborating.
“It is a challenging time for women in our country and around the world because there is a very well organized and, in many ways, well funded pushback on women both in real life, IRL, and especially online,” Clinton says.
The former Secretary of State emphasized that progress is possible, not guaranteed, sharing stories from her own past as well as truths of today. “How do we help younger women accelerate a learning process so that they can feel comfortable standing up against and maneuvering through some of these new challenges? They’re old challenges, but now they’ve been brought back,” Clinton says, adding that there is a concerted effort happening to undermine women’s authority and voices. “We really need to take it seriously because it drives women out of public spaces.”
Gang agrees. “We’ve always been trying to get more visibility and felt invisible in our roles, but this new visibility is now coming with more attacks and more risks.”
The Beauty of Collaborating
Jeanne Gang, Hillary Clinton, and Ann Drake at the 2026 Women in the Forefront Luncheon in Chicago. Photo by Susan Ryan Kalina Photography
There is strength in numbers, though, and part of the work that has been most enjoyable to Gang in her career has been collaborative, she says. While the leading architect has more than made her mark with the Aqua Tower and St. Regis Tower in Chicago, Solar Carve in Manhattan, Populus in Denver, and countless other projects, she cautions people against working in a silo. “You need to also listen to people and to collaborate with people. You have a dynamic where the more collaborative you are, sometimes people think you are not creative enough … I truly believe we make better architecture when it is collaborative. It does not affect the creativity or the beauty. It just makes it better,” Gang says.
Clinton echoes that sentiment. “We know diverse groups make better decisions. We have reams of evidence and life-lived lessons in that,” she says. “ And this idea that we’re going to eliminate the voices of women and minorities—the decisions are not going to be as good. They’re not going to be as effective, either in the strategic effort to produce them or in their implementation.”
I truly believe we make better architecture when it is collaborative.
As architect and Studio Gang founder, Gang is currently working on two projects with the leaders she shared the stage with. The Women’s Leadership Center at Williams Bay, of which Drake is chair and president of, was scheduled to open this summer and includes bird-friendly design strategies—another area close to Gang’s heart. “I see her genius at work,” Drake says of working closely with Gang on the project in Williams Bay, Wisconsin, and getting to see how the firm works up close and personal. “The center is going to be a very special place for women where we’ll come together to collaborate, create, and innovate,” Drake says.
The Women’s Leadership Center at Williams Bay, designed by Studio Gang, is targeting LEED Gold.
Rendering courtesy of Jeanne Gang
Gang is also working with Clinton to design the new expansion of the Clinton Presidential Center in Little Rock, Arkansas. The proposed expansion will include the new Hillary Rodham Clinton Institute, a dedicated home for Clinton’s personal archive as well as a hub for her nonprofit and advocacy work.
Finding Your Purpose
Photo by Susan Ryan Kalina Photography
Clinton also underscored the importance of finding purpose and allowing that to evolve. “It’s critical to everybody’s life—whatever you do, however you define your interests, your goals, your values. Being open to the potential for change and new opportunities remains something I still try to do today. What else can I do? What else can I learn? Who else can I work with? How can I better collaborate to bring people together to solve a problem?” she says. “I think it keeps you going, and it gives you a village of people you can learn from and really trust and be supported by as you make these decisions.”
She calls life a “constant learning opportunity,” with opportunities to take lessons from a mix of idealism and realism, setbacks and successes. “ We’re learning organisms, and when you stop learning, when you stop being challenged and you stop being curious, that’s the moment when it really becomes unlikely that you’re going to be with the level of energy and effectiveness that you would want.”
It takes a village, she reminds the packed ballroom in early June, and progress is possible, not guaranteed. “Think about that. It certainly is possible; we’ve seen it, but there’s no guarantee. There’s no guarantee even that the rights we have won and the positions that have been opened up to us and the opportunities that are now available that were not available when I was young, that that will stay, that that will continue, unless we have a sense of urgency on behalf of our values and our ideals and our common purpose in this country,” Clinton says.
