Texas Society of Architects

Monday, August 16, 2010

2010 TSA Award for Young Professional Achievement: James M. Evans

James M. Evans, AIA, Houston, Collaborative Designworks

James M. Evans, AIA, of Houston's Collaborative Designworks, has been recognized with the 2010 TSA Award for Young Professional Achievement in Honor of William W. Caudill FAIA. The award recognizes a TSA member for professional achievement in leadership development during the early years of AIA membership.

Evans, the recipient of AIA Houston's 2010 Ben Brewer Young Architect Award, has been an active member of several AIA Houston committees and currently chairs the Residential Committee. Described by the AIA Houston Chapter as a "quiet but effective leader who is a joy to work with," Evans has already won a national design award (AIA Housing Award, 2007) and has served on national design award juries.

Additional awards and honors include: Houston Mayoral Proclamation (2010), AIA Houston Design Award - Residential (2010), PaperCity Design Excellence Award (2007), Residential Architect Grand Award (2007), AIA Houston Design Award (2006), Texas Society of Architects Design Award (2006), and others.

A graduate of Rice University, Evans demonstrates a passion and commitment to the profession along with a desire to foster students of architecture. He has participated in the Rice University Mentorship Program and in Rice University and Texas A&M Studio Reviews, in addition to serving as a substitute teacher for third year architecture students at the University of Houston in 2005.

As noted in a nomination letter to the Honor Awards Committee: "There is no doubt that Jim Evans is an outstanding candidate for this significant honor given his exemplary record of professional achievements in design and service. He is poised to make even greater contributions to the profession in all capacities."

1210, project team James M. Evans, Shirat Mavligit, Alexis Franco, and James Austin Engineers

House x2, project team James M. Evans and Matrix Structural Engineers

Sunday, August 15, 2010

KRob 2010: AIA Dallas Delineation Competition

Best in Show 2009, Nathan Friese

The annual Ken Roberts Memorial Delineation Competition, sponsored by AIA Dallas, recognizes students and professional designers for excellence in architectural drawing. The deadline for entries is October 22, 2010. Awards will be presented during a ceremony November 3. For more information, visit www.krobarch.com.

Friday, August 13, 2010

Ray Bailey, FAIA, Receives 2010 TSA Lifetime Achievement Medal

Ray Bailey, FAIA

In recognition of his contributions to building an award-winning organization; his leadership that was directly associated with Texas architects having their first law regulating the practice of architecture; and for being a leader and an architect of unquestioned loyalty, commitment, and dedication to the Texas Society of Architects, Ray Bailey, FAIA, will receive the 2010 TSA Lifetime Achievement Medal in Honor of Llewellyn W. Pitts during the TSA Convention in San Antonio, Oct. 14-16.

Ray Bailey founded Bailey Architects in 1975, where he leads the design of the firm’s projects, many of which have received local and national awards. Under his leadership, Bailey Architects has received firm awards from both TSA and AIA Houston.

Bailey is recognized in professional and academic circles throughout the state for his leadership and dedication to architecture. He was president of TSA in 1989, president of AIA Houston in 1985, and was elevated to AIA Fellowship in 1985. He is founding president of the Houston Architecture Foundation.

Long involved in community service, Bailey is past chairman and a current member of the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department’s Operation Game Thief, a past board member of the Lighthouse of Houston and the UT Austin School of Architecture, in addition to being involved with other charitable organizations in the Houston area. Bailey earned a master's of architecture from Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a bachelor's of architecture from The University of Texas.

Wednesday, August 11, 2010

The Texas Court House Project: Meet Mick Watson

Photo provided courtesy of TexasCourthouses.com

by National Trust for Historic Preservation on August 10th, 2010

Written by Mick Watson

Note: This is the first post in a four-part series on Mick Watson’s Texas Courthouse Project, in which he travels around Texas to photograph every county’s courthouse (all 254 of them). Follow along to learn how Mick became a preservationist with nothing more than a camera and a map.

Click here to view the photos.

I’m definitely a Texan. I grew up in Midland which is out in West Texas and I spent some years in Huntsville and Lubbock for school, but for most of my life I have lived in the Houston area. I worked in advertising as a graphic designer for awhile after graduation, but now I make my living as a high school art teacher.

Outside of work I mostly spend time with my wife, who is also a teacher, and our three children. I love to travel as much as I can, and obviously photography has become a passion of mine over the last few years. Photography has allowed me to become closer to the things I love: my family, traveling, history, and Texas.

The Texas Courthouse Project started with a question: Could it be possible to see every part of Texas? In person, with your own eyes. Not just the large cities, not even just each regional area, but everything. Big towns, small towns, farms, forests, deserts, beaches, mountains, plains, canyons and islands. And not just a drive-by, but to actually stand on the dirt and breath the air of every part of Texas.

Even when you have lived here your entire life it’s hard to wrap your head around how big this state really is. From the northwestern tip of Dallam County in the panhandle, to the southeastern tip of Cameron County on the U.S.-Mexico border, is a span of over 900 miles. That’s farther than the distance between New York and Atlanta.

Going from east to west, you would have to drive 856 miles to get from Orange to El Paso. If you drove from New York to Chicago you would drive 70 less miles. To put it another way, when you’re in El Paso you are closer to San Diego than you are to Houston.

So when I sat down and spread out a map I was amazed at how much of my home state I had never visited. There were huge, smaller state size chunks of Texas I had never even seen. I decided that I would at least try to see most of it in my lifetime.

Bill Greehey Receives 2010 TSA Cornerstone Award

Bill Greehey

Chairman of the Board of NuStar Energy L.P. and NuStar GP Holdings, LLC

San Antonio, TX

The Texas Society of Architects recently named Bill Greehey as the recipient of the 2010 TSA Cornerstone Award. The award recognizes outstanding contributions that enhance the quality of life by elevating architecture and the arts, promoting the value of community, or preserving the natural environment. Greehey will be recognized with the award during the TSA Convention in San Antonio, Oct. 14-16, 2010.

Friday, August 6, 2010

2010 TSA Architecture Firm Award: Overland Partners

Overland Partners of San Antonio has received the 2010 TSA Architecture Firm Award, which recognizes distinguished architecture and significant contributions to the profession and the community. The firm will be recognized during the TSA Convention in San Antonio in October.

Founded in 1987 by four friends who met at the University of Texas at Austin in the 1970s (Rick Archer, Tim Blonkvist, Robert Schmidt, and Madison Smith), Overland Partners has grown to over 60 professionals working on significant public buildings throughout the United States and several countries. The firm’s collaborative approach to architectural problem solving and design has resulted in a body of work that adheres to a common set of values and design principles rather than a common style.

Among the firm’s projects are the Texas A&M University Bonfire Memorial, College Station; Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center, Austin; San Antonio Museum of Art; Riverside Church, Austin; Penn State School of Architecture and Landscape Architecture; and The Bridge Homeless Assistance Center, Dallas.

The firm’s work has been published in more than 20 architectural journals and 80 general interest publications, including the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Texas Monthly, Time, and Texas Architect. The firm has received numerous awards, such as the AIA National Housing Award (2009), AIA Committee on the Environment Award (2000), AIA/HUD Secretary Award (2009), American Architecture Award, Chicago Athenaeum (numerous years), TSA Design Award (numerous years), and more.

In addition to accolades for architecture, Overland Partners is recognized for being a leader in sustainability and for contributions to its community and to issues around the world, which include humanitarian missions to Cairo; participating in border initiatives to care for the needy in Piedras Negras; and voluntarily designing a sports facility in Benin, Africa. Employees of the firm have served in numerous capacities for TSA and AIA as TSA committee chairs and convention speakers; AIA San Antonio committee chairs, president, and director; and as members of AIA advisory committees. Several of the firm’s members have been inducted into the AIA College of Fellows.

Thursday, August 5, 2010

Texas Architect Design Awards Issue in Production

Texas Architect magazine is in production for the annual TSA Design Awards issue featuring the following 2010 winners. Be sure to pick up a copy when the issue hits stands in September...

2010 Design Awards