American Institue of Architects: The Latest Architecture and News

The American Institute of Architects has elected Evelyn Lee as the 2025 President-elect. During the AIA annual meeting, Lee has been selected to take the position of 2024 First VP President-Elect, and afterward to become president in 2025. AIA has also elected Heather Philip-O'Neal to serve as Treasurer between 2024-2025, and Latoya N. Kamdang as the elected At-large Director.

Evelyn Lee is the Global Head of Workplace Strategy and Innovation at Slack Technologies, Founder of the Practice of Architecture, and Co-Host of the Podcast Practice Disrupted. She is also a member of the National Organization of Minority Architects (NOMA). From 2020 to 2021, she served as the first female Treasurer to the AIA National Board. She is also widely published, having managed a monthly column for Contract magazine, in addition to various other online publications, where she developed recurring content on the business of architecture. Additionally, Evelyn Lee has been featured as a speaker, panelist, and moderator at national design and architecture conferences, including AIA National Convention, Dwell on Design, and Women in Green.

The American Institute of Architects has elected Kimberly Dowdell as the 100th president of the organization, making her the first Black woman to hold the position in AIA’s 165-year history. Delegates at the AIA’s annual meeting voted Dowdell to serve first as vice president for 2023. Afterward, she will become president in 2024.

During her campaign for president, Dowdell has expressed her support for minorities, while also making clear that she wants to be an AIA president for all. Her platform is based on four key areas of interest: supporting architects in practice, creating a sense of belonging and ensuring access to the architectural profession and education, addressing climate concerns, and designing for the future, considering rapid technological advances. “I firmly believe that the AIA has the power and potential to better serve our profession” she declared in a video made prior to the election.

Seventeen projects chosen by the American Institute of Architects (AIA) have been selected for this year’s Institute Honor Awards for Architecture, an award known to be the profession’s highest recognition of works in America that exemplify an excellence in architecture, interior architecture and urban design.

Out of 500 submissions, the 17 recipients will be honoured with the award at the AIA Conference on Architecture in New York City in June.

We are starting the new year with an announcement from the American Institute of Architects that there will be no winner for their Twenty-five Year Award in 2018. This will be the first time this has occurred since the award was officially established in 1971. The AIA award recognises buildings that have “stood the test of time for 25-35 years and continues to set the standards of excellence for its architectural design and significance.”

Over the 46 years of the award, it has celebrated buildings by of Frank Lloyd Wright, Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, Louis Kahn and Charles and Ray Eames. Last year it was awarded to the Grand Louvre – Phase I by Pei Cobb Freed & Partners for its iconic stainless steel pyramid that “rivals the Eiffel Tower as one of France’s most recognisable architectural icons.”

The American Institute of Architects (AIA) College of Fellows has selected a team of three faculty members from Northeastern University’s School of Architecture and Resilient Cities Laboratory as the winner of the 2017 Latrobe Prize, for their study of “Future-Use Architecture.”

Awarded biennially for “a two-year program of research leading to significant advances in the architecture profession,” the Prize honors its winners with $100,000. This year’s winning study of “future-use architecture” focuses on the balance between flexible and fixed building systems to respond to unforeseeable circumstances and changes.

The AIA Home Design Trends Survey is out for the second quarter of 2013. Since early 2012, business conditions have steadily been trending upwards, and within the past year alone, residential architects have reported a recovery in nearly every residential construction sector. Taking into consideration the "strong levels of inquiries for new projects, the growing levels of project backlogs, and the uniformly strong readings from firms across all regions of the country," workloads for residential architects are predicted to stay strong for the next quarters and future market conditions will only improve.

For more on the AIA's findings, keep reading.