2022 Honor Awards for Design Excellence

Jurors

Juried by: AIA Austin

Nicole Blair AIA
principal + founder
Nicole Blair

Ada I. Corral AIA
principal
Jobe Corral Architects

Philip Keil AIA
principal
Furman + Keil Architects, PLLC

Josh Leger AIA
project architect
Forge Craft Architecture + Design
co-chair, AIA Austin COTE

Michael J. Peterson Assoc. AIA
designer II
BOKA Powell
Chair, AIA Austin Emerging Professionals Committee

Jury Overview

This was an impressive collection of submissions! There were many notable and successful projects, and the jury struggled with determining the intention of this award category. Focusing on the principle of design excellence sharpened our focus. Collectively, we asked, “What is the most important aspect of a successful project?” We assessed projects through a lens of cohesiveness and compatibility, responsible innovation, equity in terms of environments and communities, and performance.

Throughout the process, we also considered which values awards should represent and where architects have the opportunity to be creative—as well as the question of where budgets come into play.

We were surprised by the amount of library projects, both new and adaptive reuse. While adaptive reuse is an important concept for sustainability, many of the new construction projects were more successful.

As a jury we were hopeful to see more HUBs (MBE, WBE) represented, and encourage more diversity, including in terms of firm sizes. Our recommendation is for the BSA to adopt the AIA Common App—while not without its imperfections, it helps to level the playing field for submitters and jurors alike.