Design Awards are a celebration of architecture. Representing the discipline at the highest level, the culling of an elite group of projects from a spectacular pool of talent captures an architectural stratum of time in the cultural milieu of Texas.
Design Awards are also a time for reflection on our profession and on the contributions that architecture can make in diverse ways to society, culture, and humanity. The awarded projects, diverse in scale and each emerging from uniquely individual circumstances, all demonstrate the power of design and the significance that it plays in the determination of the built environment. Their ways of engaging with space, form, light, material, program, energy, social consciousness, and sustainability represent elegant and thoughtful design solutions to many of the imperatives facing us.
Design Awards emerge out of a long process. Exciting projects demand prepared designers, great clients, engaging sites, diligence, careful consideration, relentless execution, and devoted craftsmanship, all coming together within economic and legal limits. Exceptional projects resonate with intentionality, performance, and beauty.
The Texas Society of Architects Design Awards program recognizes outstanding architectural and urban design projects by architects practicing in Texas to promote public interest in design excellence. This year, the program received 251 entries—a record number of submissions—an indicator of the strong state of architecture in Texas.
The TxA Design Awards program is held in extremely high regard as one of the nation’s premier design competitions. This is fundamentally due to the quality of architecture in the state. The integrity of the Design Awards program, along with TxA’s willingness to invest in building a great jury each year, is something that requires the Design Awards committee to commence work nearly a year in advance.
The committee is an all-volunteer group drawing from the Society’s membership. With diverse backgrounds and interests, this group meets to set the stage and facilitate continuity. Identifying talented designers from across the discipline nationally to orchestrate a curated conversation about the state of built work in Texas is a thoughtful and persistent undertaking.
Jury selection is a collaborative process to identify a dynamic slate of thinkers, innovators, and experts who have distinct and celebrated design identities with a unique ability to elevate and educate us with their critical-thinking and curatorial skills. Their professional experience, project diversity, background, and geography all factor into the careful individual selection process and the determination of the collective group to ensure a well-balanced conversation.
On April 25–26, we were honored to convene a dynamic and thoughtful jury including Roberto de Leon, FAIA, of de Leon & Primmer Architecture Workshop, based in Louisville, Kentucky; Gordon Gill, FAIA, of Adrian Smith + Gordon Gill Architecture, based in Chicago; and Celia Esther Arredondo Zambrano, emeritus professor at Tecnológico de Monterrey in Monterrey, Mexico.
Prior to gathering at the TxA office, the jury was sent copies of all 251 entries with the assignment to independently review each submission and provide an initial recommendation on each project. Once convened in Austin, the jurors collectively discussed projects, established rubrics for evaluation, and debated the merits of each submission. They focused on the power of design as a social and physical act. Materials and innovation within normative and specialized opportunities were all equally weighed. A reflective conversation on the discipline and the state of architecture in Texas challenged the expectations of contemporary design and the responsibilities of practice. They placed intense value on the consistency of a project and its design narrative.
This year, as in the past, the instructions to the jury focused simply on the merit of the design. There were no categories. There were no restrictions on how the awarded projects were selected. There were no limits on the number awarded. The process was developed by the jury during the deliberations, in a manner of their own choosing. The submissions were anonymous, and questions from the jury regarding specific projects were addressed only with statements noted in the submittal materials.
The result was a collaborative and inclusive process in which jurors readily found consistency in their determinations, ultimately arriving at 15 award-winning projects from 15 different firms.
This year’s submissions were drawn from across the state, with 31 percent of projects located in Austin, 16 percent located in Houston, 18 percent located in the Dallas-Fort Worth area, and 10 percent located in San Antonio. Eighteen percent were from other areas of Texas, and seven percent hailed from outside of Texas. The submitted projects captured a wide cross section of the market sectors that make up our profession. The detailed breakdown of this year’s submissions included: 26 percent residential design; 13 percent commercial; 12 percent institutional; and eight percent civic. Additionally, 30 percent self-classified as multiple project types.
The 15 winning projects include four residential designs, three commercial, three interior, two institutional, two restoration/rehabilitation, and one civic.
The outcome of the jury is a resounding celebration of the diverse talent and high quality of work across our state. The diversity of the project types, firms, geographies, and design approaches demonstrates a rich pluralism of deeply considered design work, thoughtfully executed. The collective is a cross-section of all the submissions that represent the best of our discipline and the deep opportunity architecture offers to the future of humanity through the creation of carefully considered and inspired built environments.
Gail Peter Borden, FAIA, is the chair-elect of the TxA Design and Studio Awards Committee. He is a principal of Borden Partnership in Houston and a professor and director of Graduate Studies at the Gerald D. Hines College of Architecture and Design at the University of Houston.