AIA Seattle announces 2015 Honorees

Each year, AIA Seattle recognizes leadership and achievement in design and the built environment through its honors program.

Honorees are nominated by their peers and selected by the Fellows & Honors committee each spring. AIA Seattle is delighted to recognize these recipients for their exceptional contributions to the profession and our community.

Please join us in congratulating the 2015 Honorees! We will celebrate their achievements at the 2015 Honors Dinner on May 30, 2015 at Palace Ballroom in Seattle.

2015 Honorees

AIA Seattle Medal of Honor

For the past 40 years, Donald I. King, FAIA, has based a practice of architecture on the needs of underserved populations; empowering community organizations in project development to design facilities and housing that resonate with the end users’ cultural identity. Between 1968 and 1984, he worked at community design centers in Detroit, Watts and Seattle. His Seattle practice serves a culturally diverse clientele in the design of community facilities and affordable housing. Donald is licensed to practice architecture in California, Hawai’i and Washington. He received his M’Arch degree from UCLA and a BFA in Interior Architecture from Wayne State University. He has been a member of the AIA since 1979 and was elevated to the College of Fellows in 2000. He is currently the Director of AIA Northwest & Pacific Region, and a member of the AIA National Strategic Council, the AIA Seattle Diversity Roundtable and the Bellwether Housing Board of Directors.

Young Architect Award

Brendan Connolly, AIA, has devoted the entirety of his professional career to creating sustainable buildings and landscapes that help to advance the educational missions of a wide variety of clients and communities, including museums, independent schools, and higher education institutional projects.  Brendan’s work is informed by place and people – design that is focused on curiosity, engagement and user experience and health.  Brendan is a partner, and serves on the Mithun Board of Directors, helping to lead the firm’s education practice area through design, outreach and mentorship.  Brendan’s commitment to education and design extend beyond his role at Mithun, with involvement as a teacher, juror, volunteer and mentor in a range of external organizations and committees such as the University of Washington, AIA and other civic and educational institutions.  Brendan believes in the power of design to improve lives and advance community, and that every project has potential to teach.

Honorary AIA Seattle Membership

Meredith L. Clausen, an architectural historian at the University of Washington, sees her work geared more to architectural practice than to academia. Less interested in theory than the challenges actually architects face and how they fared, her work began with her PhD at UC-Berkeley, addressing the design of the first major steel-frame building in Paris, the turn of the century Samaritaine department store. It then moved on to shopping centers, with a pioneering article on Northgate, the first regional shopping center in the country, a monograph on Pietro Belluschi focusing on his professional practice as much as his body of work, and Michael Graves, with an critical analysis of the Portland Building. More recently, she’s returned to Paris, with the Tour Montparnasse and its impact on the Montparnasse quartier, and Bernard Tschumi, whose shift from theory in the 1980s to the natural environment she discussed in a review of the Tschumi exhibition at the Centre Pompidou last year.

George Schuchart, a fourth generation general contractor, has more than once described himself as a frustrated architect.  His passion for architecture and design developed when he began to take note of Jim Olson’s earliest work, even asking Jim to design a home for him and his wife Laurie in the mid-seventies.  After launching Schuchart Corporation in 1988, George enjoyed many successful years in the commercial construction industry before co-founding Schuchart/Dow.  Today the two companies continue to thrive, both highly regarded in their separate fields of commercial and residential construction. In 2003, George and Laurie commissioned George Suyama to design a Seattle home for them which later won the 2005 AIA Honor awards for both the Seattle and Northwest chapters.  Schuchart’s office is located in downtown Seattle at 5th and Madison and was designed by Gensler.  In 2014 the space was awarded NAIOP’s Commercial Interior of the Year!

Community Service Award

Walter Schacht, FAIA, is an advocate for design excellence and the public policies that support it. The intersection between design and advocacy began for Walter when he chaired the 2000 Honor Awards for Washington Architecture. In 2006 he served as AIA Seattle President, working with fellow Board members to renew the organization and advocate for the removal of the Viaduct, creating a new level of relevance for the chapter. Walter has been a member of AIA Seattle’s Public Policy Board since its inception. Today, Walter represents AIA Seattle on the AIA WA Council Board where he is working with fellow Board members to refine the focus and reimagine the organization of the Council. He is a member of the Council’s Government Affairs Committee. Walter chairs the Architects and Engineer’s Legislative Council (AELC) and represents architects on the State’s Capital Projects Advisory Review Board (CPARB). He is actively involved in developing policies related to high-performance buildings and project delivery.

Emerging Professionals Travel Scholarship Recipient

Garrett Reynolds, AIA, is a licensed architect and designer at Mithun, a Seattle-based architecture firm. His work focuses on developing conceptually-based design solutions for dense, mixed-use, and transit-oriented developments from concept design through construction. He specializes in design visualization, parametric modeling, and forward-thinking design solutions. A LEED Accredited Professional, Reynolds is committed to sustainable design and works to develop innovative, energy efficient solutions to provide a more walkable, livable, and healthy environment. He is currently working on Block 136, a mixed-use residential development for Security Properties in Portland, Oregon’s Pearl District. Reynolds holds a Bachelor of Architecture degree from Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University. He is currently a member of AIA Seattle’s Honor Awards Committee and Residential Design Forum Planning Task Force.

Please click to view the 2015 Travel Scholarship announcement for more information about Garrett’s proposal.