Seven ways small firms can help change the world

According to the US Energy Information Administration, buildings account for 44.6 percent of United States CO2emissions. As the architects who design those buildings, how can we continue to protect the world we care about? And what can architecture firms do to help? Thomas Jacobs, AIA, has been working on those very questions. As the past chair…

Innovative ventures highlight opportunities and pitfalls for newer firms that can be mitigated with help from the AIA Trust.

Innovative ventures highlight opportunities and pitfalls for newer firms that can be mitigated with help from the AIA Trust.

Last fall, AIA held a two-day summit called the Practice Innovation Lab (PIL). Hosted by the Young Architects Forum, emerging professionals from around the country met to develop new models for architectural practice in intensive team-based charrettes that yielded surprising results. Chief among the conclusions was that the next generation of architects will not be content to settle for…

Rios Clementi Hale Studios Selected to Redesign Houston’s Jones Plaza

Rios Clementi Hale Studios Selected to Redesign Houston’s Jones Plaza

Houston First Corporation has selected Rios Clementi Hale (RCH) Studios to redesign downtown Houston’s Jones Plaza, unveiling one of the first specific transformations proposed by the 2015 Theater District Master Plan. The Los Angeles-based RCH Studios prevailed in a two-stage selection process, beating out a group of finalists that included Hood Studio (Oakland, California); Office…

Dallas Center for Architecture Moves Downtown and Rebrands as “AD EX”

Dallas Center for Architecture Moves Downtown and Rebrands as “AD EX”

In 2009, the newly established Dallas Center for Architecture was featured in Architectural Record. The article, by former TA editor Stephen Sharpe, Hon. AIA, discussed the challenge of attracting people to the space. The solution was a faceted glass wall facing the storefront and lit by an “enigmatic sequence of intense colored light.” The center…

Morphosis Tapped to Design Texas Tech Universiteum

Morphosis Tapped to Design Texas Tech Universiteum

With the exception of Marfa, it’s a tall order to find modernist architecture gracing the vast horizon of West Texas. However, an announcement from the Museum of Texas Tech University indicates that will change, at least in Lubbock to start. Museum leadership has selected one of the most innovative architecture firms in the country —…

Havel Ruck Projects’ Open House in Sam Houston Park

Havel Ruck Projects’ Open House in Sam Houston Park

A longtime Houston artist collective has struck again. Dan Havel and Dean Ruck of Havel Ruck Projects have been creating deconstructive art installations for more than a decade, utilizing neglected buildings destined for demolition. Their projects are artistic interventions into the architectural framework of derelict structures, warping their tectonic or material fabric to create interactive,…

Efficiency, Stress, and Opportunity: What IPAL Offers Aspiring Architects

Efficiency, Stress, and Opportunity: What IPAL Offers Aspiring Architects

Subcontractors USA News Provider The road to architectural licensure is long and rigorous. The minimum requirements include 3,740 hours of experience under a licensed architect’s supervision, 21 hours practical exams and graduation from an accredited architecture program of at least five years. Yet according to recent statistics from the National Council of Architectural Registration Boards (NCARB), it…

Important Downtown Dallas Restoration Project Looks Up For Green Power

Important Downtown Dallas Restoration Project Looks Up For Green Power

1808/GoodWork Project To Be Solar Powered by Sunfinity Solar By News Provider DALLAS, Nov. 16, 2017– A once-abandoned building on the edge of Downtown is being reincarnated as an eco-friendly, people-friendly mixed-use destination that offers coworking, loft living, green space, commercial office space and a coffee shop, and developers have been awarded a$300,000 grant to install a solar…

Ghafari Opens its Newest Office in Fort Worth, Texas

Ghafari Opens its Newest Office in Fort Worth, Texas

After designing projects in the state for many years, Ghafari makes it official with their first office in the Southwest By News Provider DEARBORN, Mich., Oct. 25, 2017  Ghafari Associates, an award-winning architecture, engineering, process design and construction services firm, announces the opening of its newest office in Fort Worth, Texas. James E. Jobes, AIA has been promoted…

Klyde Warren Park Receives ASLA Design Award of Excellence

Klyde Warren Park Receives ASLA Design Award of Excellence

OJB Landscape Architecture wins the ASLA Design Award of Excellence for Klyde Warren Park, a 5-acre freeway deck park in Dallas, Texas. By Subcontractors USA News Provider SAN DIEGO, Aug. 31, 2017 — The American Society of Landscape Architects (ASLA) today announced Klyde Warren Park, a freeway deck park in Dallas designed by OJB Landscape Architecture (OJB), as the recipient…

Rimkus Consulting Group Leverages Global Forensic Expertise to Form Full-Service Engineering and Technical Firm, Rimkus Building Consultants

Rimkus Consulting Group Leverages Global Forensic Expertise to Form Full-Service Engineering and Technical Firm, Rimkus Building Consultants

Rimkus Consulting Group Leverages Global Forensic Expertise to Form Full-Service Engineering and Technical Firm, Rimkus Building Consultants. A worldwide provider of forensic consulting services, today announced the strategic expansion of its business operations with the formation of a new company, Rimkus Building Consultants. Headquartered in Houston, Texas, the firm will help clients from coast-to-coast proactively…

AIA Houston News! Made/UnMade Houston: Technology, Fabrication & Design

AIA Houston News! Made/UnMade Houston: Technology, Fabrication & Design

By Subcontractors USA News Provider AIA Houston is the local chapter of the American Institute of Architects. AIA Houston is a community of architects coming together to accomplish things in their practices and in our communities that no single architect can do alone.  AIA has recently come together for Made/UnMade Houston: Technology, Fabrication, and Design….

Association of Collegiate Schools of Architecture News

Association of Collegiate Schools of Architecture News

University of Texas at San Antonio. Armando Araiza, Lecturer, led his undergraduate students in the design, fabrication, and mounting of a public art installation mounted on the façade of the Houston Street Parking Garage in downtown San Antonio, TX. The installation was composed of 128 individual aluminum modules clustered to create 16 unique tiles. The tiles…

Association of Collegiate Schools of Architecture News: University of Texas at San Antonio

Association of Collegiate Schools of Architecture News: University of Texas at San Antonio

By Subcontractors USA News Provider Armando Araiza, Lecturer, led his undergraduate students in the design, fabrication, and mounting of a public art installation mounted on the façade of the Houston Street Parking Garage in downtown San Antonio, TX. The installation was composed of 128 individual aluminum modules clustered to create 16 unique tiles. The tiles were…

AUTOARCH Architects: 25 Years of Designing Excellence

AUTOARCH Architects: 25 Years of Designing Excellence

By Subcontractors USA News Provider For 25 years, AUTOARCH Architects (AUTOARCH) has been a familiar and well-respected name in the architecture industry, having a reputation for accountability, passion, and design excellence.  AUTOARCH believes strongly in the power of good design and its effect on the built environment, the end user, and the community.  Those beliefs…