I AM AIA
Stone Faison
I’m Stone, co-founder and principal architect of Refine Design Architecture, a residential firm working across Washington State. Alongside my partner Julia Atkins and our team, I design homes throughout the region—from Seattle, Bellevue, and Gig Harbor on the west side to the Methow Valley, Lake Chelan, Winthrop, Leavenworth, and Wenatchee in the east. My approach is grounded in the technical craft of building: how a house meets its site, holds light, and lasts. I care about restraint and precision over spectacle. When I’m not drafting, I’m usually building something with my hands or tinkering with a side project.
I joined AIA Seattle because…
I joined the AIA to surround myself with fellow obsessives—the visionaries, dreamers, and craftspeople who lose sleep over a good design and love every minute of it.
What drew you to architecture as a profession?
Making space, creating movement, shaping how people understand the world around them. I’m drawn to the blend of the technical and the creative—the precision and the looseness living side by side.
How do you explain what you do for a living to family or at a party?
We don’t just draw floor plans—we create moments. We take the parts that are easy to grasp—the budget, the site constraints, the program—and orchestrate them into something that isn’t. We start with a parti, a big idea, and drive it home through every decision until the design makes moments that move people.
What inspired you today?
Trying something I am usually uncomfortable doing.
If you could sum up your outlook on life in a bumper sticker, what would it say?
Find the familiar surprises.
What is something you are proud of from early in your career?
Looking at everything we create with a critical eye—pushing ourselves and our craft, and finding a rhythm of work that resonates with how we live our lives.
How has your community helped you get where you are?
My community shaped the path more than anything. SPARC events and my early years at small firms—before founding RDA—gave me the mentorship and real-world grounding to understand how to actually execute on my goals, not just imagine them.
Where do I think the field of architecture, engineering, or construction is heading?
Loaded question. We live in exciting times—generative AI, more efficient production tools. But everyone before me thought the same of their own era, and in every case those shifts expanded the profession and pushed the boundaries of what’s possible. What I keep coming back to is that human interaction and experience are innate to what it means to be human. The connection, creativity, and authorship behind the architectural process are, to me, the most valuable drivers of the profession’s legitimacy. As the technical and production side becomes more efficient and the output grows, I think we’ll gain back time to do what matters most: create and design spaces.
What do I hope to contribute through my work?
We once had a guest walk into one of our finished residences and break down in tears. The orchestration of the space—its light, proportion, and emotional weight—was strong enough to provoke an intense physical response. That’s what I hope to contribute: I want to make more people cry.
My favorite Seattle-area structure is…
“Wake” – Seattle Sculpture Park
What is something about your identity or lived experience that informs your work?
I’m a visionary and a maker—building digital processes, painting, woodworking. I’m a pragmatist—hands-on construction experience and hard manual labor. And I’m an outdoorsman—hiking, biking, skiing, fishing.
Each one feeds the work. The creative side gives me new ways to find an idea, or to understand one when it finds me. The pragmatic side gives me a deep respect for the people doing the labor on site, and a real grasp of the components a building has to account for. And the outdoors gives me a raw, organic sense of space, light, and materiality.
