ARCHITECT

In this second episode in our series on sound, architectural acoustics expert and educator Michael Ermann and CertainTeed Architectural national sales manager Steve Udolph help us understand the latest trends in architectural acoustics.

In this episode, architectural acoustics expert and educator Michael Ermann and CertainTeed Architectural national sales manager Steve Udolph give us a closer look at when architects should start thinking about sound and emerging acoustical trends.

As a new year begins, businesses across sectors are facing familiar challenges: COVID-19, experimental workplace models, economic uncertainty, climate change, and social inequity. Addressing these overarching issues in meaningful ways often falls off the everyday to-do list of architects, but for company executives, strategic, big-picture thinking is their priority, their task. In this episode, Shepley Bulfinch former president and CEO Carole Wedge and current CEO Angela Watson share their agenda for the future, lessons from their experiences, and insight into the executive suite of architectural practice.

Lumenance Consulting founder Nancy Alexander, Perkins&Will principal and director of global diversity Gabrielle Bullock, and University of Washington College of Built Environments dean Renee Cheng discuss common myths and questions about the role and place of DEI in architecture.

In this episode, ARCHITECT contributing editor Ian Volner talks with LMN partner Stephen Van Dyck and principal Scott Crawford on they coupled design thinking with fabrication know-how to create an ethereal landmark for the city of Everett, Washington.

Steven Holl discusses his firm’s recently completed project at Franklin & Marshall College in Lancaster, Pa., and reflects on how the COVID-19 pandemic will influence the design of future educational, institutional, and arts spaces.

Karrie Jacobs interviews the writers about their forthcoming book on the history of quarantine facilities, which they were finishing in March while on lockdown in Los Angeles at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Listen to Skidmore, Owings & Merrill partners Carrie Byles, Laura Ettelman, and Xuan Fu describe their paths to the top of the global firm and their goals during their appointments.

Listen to the founder of the Hip Hop Architecture Camp trace the influence of the cultural movement from Le Corbusier to his personal, ongoing projects.

Listen to the co-founder of 4RM+ULA, in St. Paul, Minn., detail the impact of systemic racism of black architects, call out the willfully ignorant, and explain the underpinnings of "Minnesota Nice." This episode references the 2019 NAACP report "The Twin Cities Economic Inclusion Plan." A link to the report can be found in the June 4 Washington Post op-ed "It’s hard to hear ‘Minnesota Nice’ without undertones of irony and despair," by journalist Michele L. Norris. Read more about Garrett and his three-step process for design firms to take tangible steps toward equitable and inclusive outcomes and the impact of the Twin Cities riots on 4RM+ULA's own projects in "James Garrett Jr. Lists Actions for Architects, Institutions, and Business Owners to Combat Systemic Racism," by ARCHITECT Mind & Matter columnist Blaine Brownell, AIA. This conversation also references a June 5 online forum organized by AIA Minnesota titled "Response for Damaged Properties in Minneapolis and St. Paul."

Listen to the father–son duo and respective past and current CEOs of Moody Nolan reflect on their road to success in a profession with disproportionately few people of color.

In this podcast episode, founder Tei Carpenter discusses her shifting approach to residential and public infrastructure design.

Jeanne Gang discusses her firm's recently completed project in Brooklyn, N.Y., and examines how creating supportive space for first responders can serve the community as a whole.

In this episode of our podcast, the founders of this Brooklyn, N.Y.–based firm share how they are navigating the COVID-19 crisis and what work is keeping them motivated.

In this podcast episode, founding principal and executive director Michael Murphy discusses his firm's Covid-19 response, as well as how architects can use design to help fight the pandemic.

Principal Keith Hempel describes how his firm became the largest to satisfy the most recent energy reduction goal of the AIA 2030 Commitment.

In this podcast episode, the Chicago-based principals Paola Aguirre Serrano and Dennis Milam discuss the firm's projects that aim to unify.

In this podcast, AS+GG partner Gordon Gill, FAIA, and sustainability director Christopher Drew explain the origins and methodology of their firm's newest study, Residensity: A Carbon Analysis of Residential Typologies, and discuss the questions that arose during their research—questions that often outnumbered the conclusions.

This podcast looks at the impact of WeWork and other vertically integrated companies on the design profession at large by asking three people who were key to WeWork's rapid ascension: David Fano, Federico Negro, and Steve Sanderson. The trio were the founders of Case Inc., a New York–based design consultancy established in 2008 to bridge physical architecture with digital technology.

In this podcast episode, Nash Hurley, principal of San Francisco–based architecture studio Vital, references colonial villages, Burning Man, and hovercrafts in discussing the past and future of cities, work, transit, and community, and offers a first glimpse at the firm's Joint Structures research.

As a female person of color, a Puerto Rican, and a member of the LGBTQ community, Yiselle Santos Rivera, Assoc. AIA, has beaten the odds. In this episode, Santos Rivera shares how she is reaching out to individuals and communities not already embedded in the equity, diversity, and inclusion (EDI)conversation; her efforts at HKS, a firm with more than 1,400 design professionals worldwide; and where designers can find support if their local community is not currently thinking about EDI.

In this podcast episode, Bhatia discusses the importance of collective form, a topic he also explores in his recently published monograph, his dream project, and advice on collaborating with other designers.

In this podcast episode, Inés Guzmán and Gregory Melitonov discuss how they manage projects across borders and their firm's annual design build initiative, Fundamental, which brings together volunteer designers from around the world for three months to conceptualize and build an architectural intervention in a public space.

In this podcast episode, Karen Braitmayer, FAIA, describes the roadblocks often faced by people with disabilities interested in architecture. At some point in life, she adds, many people will be affected by a disability, whether it be themselves or someone they know, such as their parents, partners, or colleagues.

In this podcast episode, firm principals Katie MacDonald and Kyle Schumann discuss their dual roles as practitioners and research fellows at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville.

In this episode, San Antonio, Texas–based architect Siboney Díaz-Sánchez offers ideas for designers to improve public outreach efforts and to challenge clients to go beyond their perceived obligations. She also elaborates how architecture and politics are intertwined.

In this podcast episode, Van Buren shares why she left her steady work at a successful firm to pursue her own ambition, what it takes to realize a restorative justice space in a community of doubters, and her belief that architects and designers can drive meaningful, substantial changes in society. In her op-ed "We Must Plan for a Decarceration Nation," in the May 2019 issue of ARCHITECT, Van Buren writes, "[Architects] have a unique way of thinking that helps us manifest complex ideas, concepts, and philosophies into real space and time—all skills that are desperately needed at the edge of social change. Together, we can steward and even lead a successful effort to decarcerate our nation and build equitable and just communities."

Until you're a member of a minority group, you likely cannot understand the visceral, day-in and day-out experience of life as a minority. From the passive, underhand comments and assumptions about your background or abilities to the blatant exclusion or derision of your presence, being a minority is challenging enough. Now imagine seeing the same people wielding the upper hand in the socio-economic lottery picking through your group's longstanding history and cultural practices for something they can leverage as their own. In this episode, Tammy Eagle Bull, FAIA, explains in clear terms why cultural appropriation is wrong, how it perpetuates in the architecture and design community, and her own experiences with preconceptions in her everyday life. A member of the Oglala Lakota Nation, Eagle Bull is a co-founder and the president of Encompass Architects, based in Lincoln, Neb. She is also the first Native American woman in the United States to become a licensed architect, and the recipient of the AIA 2018 Whitney M. Young Jr. Award.

In this podcast episode, OBAT Helpers executive director Immad Ahmed discusses the design constraints that faced the community and how the team leveraged local expertise to create long-term communities in largely temporary spaces.

Questioning the need for equity, diversity, and inclusion initiatives should not spark controversy or guilt, says Samantha McCloud, director of community involvement, diversity & inclusion at GastingerWalker& in this podcast episode.

New York-based CODA founder, Caroline O'Donnell outlines her emphasis on dialogue and with engaging with the context of a project, as well as her forthcoming book that connects architecture and the werewolf.

Shepley Bulfinch CEO Carole Wedge describes her path to leadership, starting from the mailroom, and why she wishes more architects would "stop talking" about revolutionizing the profession and "start implementing." And, yes, she also offers advice for how to respond to ignorant comments and actions on the jobsite and elsewhere.

Recent Next Progressives Ann Lui, AIA, and Craig Reschke, AIA, of Chicago-based Future Firm discuss their approach to design and when they'll know they've made it.

The profession would benefit from a workforce with a representative range of backgrounds and experiences, says National Organization of Minority Architects president Kimberly Dowdell.

In this podcast episode, the jury of the 66th Annual Progressive Architecture Awards—which included Paul Andersen, AIA, of Denver-based Independent Architecture; J. Frano Violich, FAIA, of Boston-based Kennedy & Violich Architecture; and Claire Weisz, FAIA, of New York's WXY Architecture + Urban Design—discusses how they each define progressive architecture, how it manifests itself in the industry, and how it has evolved over time.

In this podcast episode, ARCHITECT speaks with three experts with firsthand knowledge, insights, and opinions about the lure of smart cities: Paul Doherty, an architect and the chairman and CEO of the international company The Digit Group (TDG); Debra Lam, managing director of the Smart Cities and Inclusive Innovation initiative at Georgia Tech, founder of the Georgia Smart Communities Challenge, and the former chief of innovation and performance for the city of Pittsburgh; and Anthony Townsend, founder of New York–based Bits and Atoms and author of Smart Cities: Big Data, Civic Hackers and the Quest for a New Utopia (W.W. Norton & Co., 2013).

San Francisco's Office of Resiliency and Capital Planning recently commissioned a landmark study that offers preemptive actions for mitigating earthquake damage. In this episode, Danielle Mieler, principal resilience analyst at San Francisco’s Office of Resiliency and Capital Planning (ORCP) and vice president of the Earthquake Engineering Research Institute, in Oakland, Calif., walks through the salient takeaways and recommendations from the Tall Building Safety Strategy.

Designed by Bruner/Cott & Associates, Hampshire College's R.W. Kern Center is the largest higher education project to earn the green certification. This episode features former Hampshire College president, Johnathan Lash, and Jason Jewhurst, principal, Bruner/Cott & Associates.

Have any of the formal and informal initiatives intended to improve the performance of our building stock, including energy codes, the U.S. Green Building Council's LEED rating system, and the AIA 2030 Commitment, had an impact? In this episode, Barbra Batshalom, founder and CEO of the Sustainable Performance Institute (SPI) in Boston shares her thoughts.

Opsis Architects' Alec Holser and the University of Idaho's Michael Perry discuss how they are turning the vision for an iconic mass-timber arena from renderings into reality.

Chief building officials from Washington, D.C., and Arlington, Va., discuss e-permitting and single-day reviews to streamline code review for architects and builders.

Led by tech entrepreneurs, the 2000-person (and counting) pre-fabrication and construction company is investing heavily in R&D and mass timber, says Katerra Architecture president Craig Curtis.

After serving as architect-of-record on the largest wood structure constructed in modern U.S. history, DLR Group principal Stephen Cavanaugh and his team have been tapped to continue that model in other cities.

This episode continues our Dissecting the Code series, which highlights leaders in the AEC community tasked with ensuring the structures that we live in, work in, and design meet the evolving demands of today's world. Smartreview Inc. is taking on the task of digitizing the permitting process with its Automated Plan Review software. This episode features Mark Clayton and James Haliburton.

ArchitectChats is kicking off its third season with a continuation of our Timber on the Rise series, which highlights innovations and innovators in wood design and construction. In this episode, Perkins+Will senior sustainable building adviser Rebecca Holt shares insights from the inaugural design and construction guide for the mass-timber product.

This is the fourth and final episode of the ArchitectChats' "Dissecting the Code" series examining the intricacies surrounding a topic that every architect needs to know: building codes. Nancy Merrill, director of planning and development of Claremont, N.H., discusses how the 13,000-person town adapted zoning and code standards to encourage redevelopment efforts.

Andrea Leers and Tom Chung of Leers Weinzapfel Associates share insights on UMass Amherst's Design Building, the East Coast's first mass timber structure, as well as on forthcoming timber projects.

A run-through the industry's most common building codes can benefit any designer, from a budding intern to a seasoned architect. In this episode of ArchitectChats, Cheri Hainer, a certified building official, and permits and inspections administrator for the city of Virginia Beach, Va., breaks down some key building code lingo and acronyms that designers should keep in mind for all of their projects.

Thomas Robinson, founder of Lever Architecture, discusses the firm's Framework building, slated to be the first timber high-rise in the United States.

Benton Johnson of SOM in Chicago discusses the intricate and practical steps it will to take to make timber structures a reality.

Lucas Epp of StructureCraft Builders describes the science behind one of the newest mass timber products on the market, and how it could help change the face of timber construction.