High-level synthesis implementation of data structures in hardware can include detecting, within a design and using computer hardware, a data structure and a compiler directive for the data structure. The design may be specified in a high-level programming language. Using the computer hardware and based on the compiler directive, a modified version of the design may be created by, at least in part, generating a modified version of the data structure based on the compiler directive. Using the computer hardware, a circuit design may be generated from the modified version of the design by creating, at least in part, a hardware memory architecture for the circuit design and mapping the modified version of the data structure onto the hardware memory architecture.