AEC News You Can Use Blog

David Childs, the lead architect of the One World Trade Center skyscraper that rose from the site where the Twin Towers collapsed in New York City during the 9/11 attacks, has died. He was 83.

Childs died on Wednesday in Pelham, New York, from Lewy body dementia, which had been diagnosed in September, his son, Nicholas Childs said.

While he was perhaps best known for his work on One World Trade Center, considered to be the tallest building in the Western Hemisphere, Childs also was instrumental in other important projects, including a new master plan for the National Mall in Washington, D.C., an expansion of Dulles International Airport in Virginia and the 7 World Trade Center building in Manhattan, according to his firm, Skidmore, Owings & Merrill.

“David’s contribution to the firm was extensive and profound, and we will always be grateful to David for his leadership, his impact, and his friendship,” Skidmore, Owings & Merrill said in a statement. “We will miss him dearly and extend our condolences and deepest sympathies to his family.”

A fond memory that Nicholas Childs has was when his father drew a rendering of what the One World Trade Center property would look like while they were out having lunch in New York, some years after 9/11 but well before the plans were finalized.

“He picked up a paper napkin, took out a pen, and drew what became the ultimate design of the building on the napkin for me,” Nicholas Childs said in a phone interview Friday, adding that he still has the drawing.

He said his father was a civic-minded architect who would often use a quote by 20th century American-German architect Ludwig Mies van der Rohe — “God is in the details.”

“He cared deeply about those details and making something beautiful,” Nicholas Childs said. “But he also wanted to..Read More

On Jan. 7, architect Greg Chasen rushed to his childhood home in Pacific Palisades, a well-off Los Angeles neighborhood tucked between the mountains and the Pacific Ocean, to remove any flammables and turn on the sprinklers. “You could hear exploding propane tanks and see the flames reflected in the smoke. I was sure that fire was going to tear through overnight,” he says. At some point, there was nothing left to do but go home and wait.

At dawn the next day, Chasen jumped on his bike to inspect the damage, bracing for the worst. While just a few degrees of wind direction had saved his parents’ home from the flames, other streets weren’t as lucky. Next, he went to check on a house he had finished building for a friend only six months earlier. As he got closer, the magnitude of the destruction hit him—almost the entire neighborhood was gone. “More houses were going up in flames, and everything had this acrid smell of burning plastic,” he says. But there it was, the newly built two-story house, remarkably untouched. While 120 houses farther down the street had been transformed into piles of ashes, Chasen’s fire—resistant design had withstood the heat from the flames.

The wildfires that ripped through L.A. in January claimed the lives of 29 people and destroyed more than 16,000 structures. These types of disasters are only set to become more frequent and intense as climate change drives warmer and drier conditions. According to NASA, parts of the western U.S., Mexico, Brazil, and East Africa now have fire seasons that last more than a month longer than they did 35 years ago. And the U.N. estimates that the number of wildfires globally will increase by 50% by the end of the century.

Last year marked the first year global..Read More

There’s much to be said about what an architecture award functionally does: The AIA Gold Medal recognizes cumulative impact; magazine awards provide opportunities for emerging practices by showcasing design talent or lesser-known projects. But the Pritzker Prize is a little different, better understood as a "Nobel Prize" for architecture that honors an expression of design values over one’s career. Recent awardees, for example, include Anne Lacaton and Jean-Philippe Vassal (2021), recognized for their devotion to adaptive reuse, and Frances Kéré (2022), whose focus on design and social justice has brought his practice significant acclaim.

This year, the 2025 Pritzker Prize has been awarded to Chinese architect Liu Jiakun, 69, founder of Jiakun Architects. He’s known for his process—understanding specific nuances of a particular site, including its social and material histories—and portfolio, which are defined by an ethos, not any particular style.

For many Americans, Jiakun’s work has flown under the radar. The Guardian’s Olly Wainwright notes that he is only the second Chinese architect to have won the prize in its 46-year history, working exclusively in China on cultural and academic institutions, as well as civic spaces, many of which inject dense, urban conditions with natural features. But what makes his work so unique is how each project cracks open the site’s unique heritage and challenges, producing buildings that, according to the award announcement, "philosophically [look] beyond the surface to reveal that history, materials and nature are symbiotic."

Perhaps this idea is most evident in his "Rebirth Brick Project" that began after the 2008 Wenchuan earthquake that destroyed nearly four-fifths of all buildings in the affected area. The research premise was simple: to reuse rubble as an aggregate mixed with cement and straw fibers in rebuilding after the disaster; since then, these bricks have been used throughout his work including the Shuijingfang Museum, which celebrates the world’s oldest..Read More

There’s nothing else like this architect-designed octagonal home, which dates from 1972 and is on the market for the second time ever.

The three-bedroom home is located just north of Milwaukee and was designed by local architect James G. Plunkett for his family. It’s said to be inspired by Frank Lloyd Wright and features a vast open-plan great room housing the living room, kitchen, and dining room. This space has soaring 20-foot-high ceilings with an oculus skylight, timber beams, and a huge brick fireplace.

The seller bought the 4,440 sq ft River Hills home in 2021 and has updated it to keep with its 1970s design. The kitchen has new porcelain counters, an infinity-edge island contrasting the exposed brick walls, and all new appliances. New bookcases have been installed, and the entire space is ringed by windows and sliding glass doors that offer views of the woodland.

Holly Swezey and Aly Swezey of Coldwell Banker Realty/B Real Co Team hold the listing for the Wisconsin property, with an asking price of $1.777m.. See More Photos Here

Frank Lloyd Wright often gets all the credit for being an architect with Wisconsin ties.

But that’s only because he’s the most famous architect from Wisconsin. Wright (1867-1959) was very prolific, designing more than 1,000 structures — of which 449 were realized, according to the Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation. In Wisconsin, they include several public sites you can visit, including Taliesin, Monona Terrace, Burnham Block, Wingspread, SC Johnson, and the Annunciation Greek Orthodox Church.

However, plenty of other architects were born in Wisconsin and designed projects within the state. For example, Erhard Brielmaier designed more churches and hospitals than any other architect, and dreamy Mediterranean-inspired estates designed by David Adler appear to be plucked out of Europe. Alexander C. Eschweiler’s innovation stretched from a Japanese pagoda-style gas station to a mansion built for Allis-Chalmers’ first president, which is now a Milwaukee art museum. Lastly, Alex Jordan Jr.’s House on the Rock has become one of Wisconsin’s top tourist attractions. 

Thanks to preservation advocates, you can see these architects’ works across Wisconsin.

Erhard Brielmaier (1841-1917)
This emigrant from Germany has an esteemed label: He’s designed more churches and hospitals than any other architect. Notably, he designed the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn.

Erhard Brielmaier moved to Milwaukee with his wife and 13 children in 1873, getting his feet wet by working as a carpenter and sculptor. He also built quite a few altars. Creating an architectural firm with three of his sons, the team designed more than 1,000 Catholic churches across the country, as well as in Canada.

His most well-known project in Wisconsin is the Basilica of St. Josaphat on Milwaukee’s South Side, which was modeled after St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome, Italy.

For another church project, he designed a Gothic-style chapel for the Sisters of St. Francis of Assisi in St. Francis, Wis.. Read More and See Photos Here

The 2024 Pritzker Prize, widely regarded as architecture’s Nobel, has again been awarded to a Japanese architect.
In an announcement from Chicago on March 5, Yokohama-based architect Riken Yamamoto was named the recipient of this year’s award, which is dedicated to “a living architect whose built work demonstrates a combination of those qualities of talent, vision and commitment, which has produced consistent and significant contributions to humanity and the built environment through the art of architecture.”

This makes Yamamoto, 78, the ninth Japanese person to be awarded the prestigious honor. No country has produced more laureates than Japan in the prize’s 45-year history, an indication of the high regard that its architects and architecture are held in globally.

The Pritzker’s jury citation identifies Yamamoto’s sustained focus on engendering human connection through built space as being his defining contribution to architecture.

“In his long, coherent, rigorous career,” the Pritzker jury writes, “Riken Yamamoto has managed to produce architecture both as background and foreground to everyday life, blurring boundaries between its public and private dimensions, and multiplying opportunities for people to meet spontaneously, through precise, rational design strategies.”

Unlike many other laureates, Yamamoto is not a household name. But his work and approach have long been admired within the Japanese architectural scene. His work is unostentatious, devoted to the plan rather than the concept or the image, and ultimately most concerned with that most fundamental “material” of architectural space: social patterns and human connection. His colleague and sometime collaborator, the late Kazuhiro Kojima, once wrote of his astonishment at hearing Yamamoto state that “museums and public halls do not excite me. ... Collective housing and schools are more interesting.”

Private and public
This interest in what the Pritzker citation calls “the responsibility of the social demand” can be seen from Yamamoto’s earliest works, which, as is the case for most young architects, were inevitably.. Read More Here

Lebond is an unusual brand for a number of reasons, but possibly chief among them for the reason that famous architects design each of their watches. Although it is not new to have an architect design a watch, making this element the core of a brand’s DNA certainly is.

Founded by Asier Mateo— an architect himself— Lebond’s first watch, launched in 2023, was designed by the Portuguese grand master of architecture, Alvaro Siza. He took inspiration from the Leça swimming pool he penned down in 1966 when he was 28. It is a very charismatic watch with an unusual diamond-shaped case and captivating hands and hour markers. The second watch, launched this month, is from renowned architect Eduardo Souto de Moura, who is just like Siza, Portuguese and also a recipient of the renowned Pritzker Architecture Prize. His design for a watch, however, couldn’t be more different.

Souto de Moura opted for the traditional round shape to keep the watch, known formally as the Lebond Souto Moura, as pure as possible, but gave it a literal twist as he turned everything 30 degrees clockwise. The result is an architectural drivers’ watch where legibility is key. However, Souto de Moura didn’t become one of the world’s leading architects without plenty of signature touches. Like with his buildings, he is a master in making a difference with just a few details. While the hour and minute markers are relatively common, he changes the perception of the design with two clever details. The first is the size of the hour hand, which is much smaller than usual. In a twist, this increases the legibility, as there is more distinction between the two hands. Souto de Moura opted for a longer hour marker for the twelve o’clock, putting the two beside it. This makes twelve o’clock a magical time with this Lebond— as then.. Read More Here

Researchers and architectural historians from UWM’s Cultural Resource Management program are documenting the work of Alonzo Robinson Jr., the first registered Black architect in Wisconsin.

Robinson’s career spanned over four decades and included public buildings, churches and projects for members of Milwaukee’s African American community. Several notable buildings include Mr. Perkins Restaurant at Atkinson Drive and North 20th St.; the Kosciuszko Park Community Center; and the downtown Milwaukee Fire Department headquarters at 7th and Wells, which was renamed in 2021 to honor Alonzo Robinson’s role as designer of the building.

The UWM team is partnering with the Robinson family, the Wisconsin Black Historical Society, and Docomomo Wisconsin, a nonprofit dedicated to modern architecture and design. The team will unveil a website this summer dedicated to Robinson’s life and architectural projects.

“Robinson’s buildings are unmistakably modern while also remaining sensitive to the scale and appearance of their surroundings,” said Justin Miller, UWM architectural historian. “We’re excited and honored to help share these buildings and the stories they tell about African American achievement and resilience.”

The project is funded by a grant from the African American Cultural Heritage Action Fund, a program from the National Trust for Historic Preservation. UWM is one of 40 organizations to receive a total of $3.8 million in grant funding to advance ongoing preservation activities for historic places that represent African American cultural heritage. With more than $91 million in funding, the Action Fund is the largest U.S. resource dedicated to the preservation of African American historic places. Since 2018, the Action Fund has supported 242 projects through its investment of $20 million.

“The Action Fund’s investment in and celebration of 40 historic African American places illustrates our belief that historic preservation plays an important role in American society,” said Brent Leggs, executive director of the African American Cultural Heritage Action Fund and..Read More Here

Cedarburg High School alumnus and Grafton native Matthew Clapper has been honored by the American Institute of Architects with the National AIA Young Architect of 2023 award. The award is given to individuals who, in an early stage of their architectural career, have shown exceptional leadership and made significant contributions to the profession and community at large.

Clapper was selected due to his efforts expanding the AIA Small Firm Exchange (SFx) to be more inclusive in regard to gender and race and to represent all 50 states so small firm architects could readily share information and find support, according to the AIA.

Clapper was National SFx Chair in 2021, increasing membership through Zoom meetings during COVID and supplying support to small firms struggling during a trying time. His volunteer efforts included directing the Wilson Underline, a marketplace beneath the L elevated train in Chicago. Clapper is also a mentor to aspiring architects/students in the Wing program.

Clapper is principal and founder of Modern Architecture & Development (MAD) based in Milwaukee since 2013 with an extension in Chicago. He grew up in Grafton, where he owns a farm and is president of Country View Development, a residential subdivision selling 1-acre lots that share a pond and trail through the woods off Lakefield Road.

He believes being multifaceted can provide a balance between social good and financial aspects, according to AIA.

"Rather than tract housing squeezing into every foot of land, each quality home must be of a different design and has space to encompass the true country view of sunsets beyond fields," according to the AIA award. He personally oversees all aspects of the development from wetland studies, engineering drawings, to contracts while pushing the architecture profession forward. Clapper also received the state AIA Wisconsin Young Architect Award in 2022.

Clapper received his Master of Science in Architecture and Urban Design from Columbia University in New York City, his Advanced Professional Certificate in Real Estate Development from NYU and his original Master of Architecture from..Read More Here

A Polish architect has been awarded the title of world’s best architect for his James Bond-style mountain-top ski centre in Silesia’s Beskid mountains.

Przemek Gawęda clinched the title of Architect of the Year 2023 at the prestigious international Architecture Community awards for his multifunctional Biathlon Stadium in Kubalonka, which once  completed  will provide Poland with the opportunity to host World Cup and even Winter Olympic events.

According to the international jury, the Biathlon Stadium represents a harmonious blend of modern architecture and functionality.

The plans aim not only to create an excellent venue for athletes but also an appealing facility for fans and architecture enthusiasts.

The state-of-the-art ski center in Istebna, near Wisła, is poised to become a hub for comprehensive training in cross-country skiing and biathlon, offering athletes unparalleled comfort and cutting-edge amenities.

To conceptualize the design, Gawęda and his team of architects embarked on several international trips, studying similar facilities and conducting a thorough analysis of the infrastructure needs.

Gawęda explained that the design includes "a built-in hotel function with approximately 100 beds, a large underground car park with approximately 240 parking spaces, regeneration and wellness facilities, gyms, training rooms, social and conference facilities, along with facilities for organizing sports events such as the World Cup or the World Championships and Olympic Games in the future."

Simultaneously, Gawęda received the "Sports and Leisure Facility of the Year 2023" award for his cutting-edge design of a shielded tunnel on the inrun of the Wielka Krokiew ski jump in Zakopane, addressing the problem of icy and snow-covered tracks for jumpers.

The delighted architect who is the owner, and chief architect of the Archigeum studio in Zielonka said: “This award is a nice distinction not only for me, but above all for the entire design team that we form. [...]

“The design topics that we implement result from our interests, which is an advantage, but also a value in itself. Architecture, that we create is not the result of plebiscites or surveys - it is an.. Read More Here