This is a photograph of the model Joey Weishaar built for a rest area in northwest Utah, west of Salt Lake City. His design won second place in the 2011 Lyceum Fellowship Competition.

The Lyceum Fellowship was established in 1985, with a design competition conducted annually since 1986. Only 15 schools were invited to participate this year, and the University of Arkansas has participated since 2008. Weishaar, a third-year architecture student from Fayetteville, is the second student from this university to win a prize. (Ryan Wilmes won a Merit award in 2008.) Weishaar’s design won second place from about 250 total projects submitted in this year’s competition. The second-place Lyceum fellowship comes with $7,500 for travel.

Many constraints were given by the competition’s project description, which included the program and site: a rest area in northwest Utah, west of Salt Lake City. Weishaar and other students were given a different program on the same site in their fall semester studio, just to get them thinking about desert architecture. Then, this semester, they focused on large-scale operations that fit in the climate and pure expanse of the region. Students also researched land art installations by Robert Smithson, Michael Heizer, Walter de Maria and others to see how they dealt with this area type.

Even with that basis, it took Weishaar a while to formulate his design. “There’s nothing on this site that gives it any sort of organization or scale,” Weishaar said. Working under assistant professor Santiago R. Perez, Weishaar established early on that he wanted to emphasize the site’s flatness, particularly in the way in which objects above the horizon were expressed.

He did a study early on that he didn’t think would have anything to do with the later product. He made tiny cardboard flaps on the model and shone light on them from different angles, observing the length of a shadow cast by a flap raised just a few millimeters. He eventually took that strategy and really elongated it. It’s a core concept to the final project.

(Click here to read more about Weishaar’s design process and see a slideshow of images.)

This was a collaborative project between students in architecture, landscape architecture, interior design and crop, soil and environmental sciences.

In broad terms, sustainable development is “a manmade intervention on the land that provides for the needs of the current generation while allowing future generations to meet their own needs,” said Smith. “In effect, that means it has to balance not only being economically viable — which is usually the reason for development to occur — but it also has to balance ecological capacity with social equity. And when you balance those three, that’s when you have sustainable development.”

Five students in the disciplines of architecture, landscape architecture, interior design and crop, soil and environmental sciences took this course in summer 2010. They spent six weeks considering sustainable development concepts as they focused on a nearly 8-acre tract of land in south Fayetteville. They worked with Partners for Better Housing, of which Smith is a board member, developing a design for this site with about 40 to 50 affordable homes, costing between $85,000 and $115,000.

Their design had a strong ecological component and looked to preserve vegetation and a stream corridor, which a lot of developments wouldn’t do, Smith said. Students determined if it was a flood zone and examined the soil to determine the load capacity for building heights. The idea was to cluster the housing with communal space, to encourage a mixed community.

Sustainable aspects of the landscape design in this project included keeping many of the natural features, including oak, hickory and cedar trees, while adding evergreens to block the northern wind. They also preserved a stream that runs through the site instead of rerouting it, giving the clustered homes views of that waterway. Gardens allow residents to tend and harvest their own food, decreasing their reliance on cars and encouraging walking within the community.

John Fohner, a graduate student in crop, soil and environmental sciences in the Bumpers College of Agricultural, Food and Life Sciences, brought green-roof design ideas to the project. Chris Phillips, a landscape architecture student, influenced how the site was laid out and the housing arranged. Architecture students Bethany Miller and Anne Fulton and interior design student Sara Denney considered the functions and aesthetics of the buildings, which included housing and a community center.

Smith said that designers work better by working collaboratively because it’s impossible for individual design disciplines to master everything. “There’s just too much to know, unless you want to deal with things in a very shallow, facile way. But if you do that, then it’s very unlikely you’re going to produce anything that’s sustainable — ecologically or socially. So, collaborative working is a must for sustainable design.”

(Click here to read more about the course and view a slideshow of images.)

Reese Rowland’s work as principal designer for the Arkansas Studies Institute won him the top Honor Award in the 2011 Fay Jones Alumni Design Awards. (Photo by Timothy Hursley)

Reese Rowland took this year’s top award, the Honor Award, as design principal for the Arkansas Studies Institute in Little Rock. Rowland (B.Arch. ’90) is a principal with Polk Stanley Wilcox Architects in Little Rock. Rowland won the first prize in the 2010 alumni design competition, with his design of the Heifer International Education Center in Little Rock, and was a co-winner of the 2008 alumni design competition, with his design of the Heifer International Headquarters in Little Rock.

The jury commended the Arkansas Studies Institute project for its “sensitive and innovative adaptive reuse of existing buildings” in the River Market District of Little Rock. “The architects successfully combined a modern, inviting series of spaces and materials, with the skillful and sensitive renovation of the historic existing buildings containing special collections as an extension of the main library.”

Two Merit Awards went to Tim Maddox (B.Arch. ’02) of deMx Architecture in Fayetteville for RomWoods and Bakhita Ridge, two homes in Fayetteville. For RomWoods, jury members applauded the “clear, compact sense of scale and breakdown of elements.” With Bakhita Ridge, they recognized the project’s “strong, clear plan, clear forms and connection to the outdoors, bracketing or framing the exterior landscape garden and barn through the use of scale, massing and abstraction of the agrarian-inspired architectural language.”

An Honorable Mention was given to John Dupree (B.Arch. ’69) of Polk Stanley Wilcox Architects in Fayetteville for restoration of the Historic Washington County Courthouse. The jury said the “most spectacular achievement” in the restoration of the courthouse, built in 1905, was the refurbishment of the third-floor courtroom, complete with a gallery opening to the fourth floor, returning it to its original appearance.

(Click here to read more about these projects, view a slideshow and see jury comments. Click here to see PDFs of the projects.)

Kate Phillips, left, a freshman interior design student, attends the 2011 Honors Recognition Banquet. (Photo by Beth Hall)

Several students were selected from the entire school for recognition, including:

• Leanna M. Medal, a landscape architecture student who was named the Senior Scholar
• Chloe A. Costello, an architecture student who received the University of Arkansas Presidential Scholar
• William J. Fleming III, a landscape architecture student who received the Alpha Rho Chi Medal
• Sarah DaBoll Geurtz, a landscape architecture student who received the Michael J. Buono Sustainability Medal
• Patrick A. Templeton, an architecture student who received the Pella Student Essay Award for “Cardboard Columns and Postmodern Culture”
• Suzana D. Christmann (architecture), William C. Towle (landscape architecture) and Chasity D. Whyte (interior design), who received Professional Advisory Board Fifth-Year Scholarships

Notable recognition for architecture students included:

• Addison W. Bliss, who received the National AIA Henry Adams Medal
• Jamie E. Edwards, who received the National AIA Certificate of Achievement
• Chase A. Pitner, who received the Edward Durell Stone Medal
• Stephenie C. Foster, who received the Barbara C. Crook Medal
• Tyler K. Cukar, who received the C. Murray Smart Medal

Notable recognition for landscape architecture students included the American Society of Landscape Architects Honor Award given to Sarah DaBoll Geurtz, and the ASLA Merit Awards given to Chris Phillips and Derek Linn.

Jennifer Admire and Ariel Anglin received the Andrew A. Kinslow Interior Design Scholarship, which was established this year, the first year the interior design program was part of the school.

(Click here to read more about the scholarships and awards.)

The Ruth Lilly Visitors Pavilion, located in the 100 Acres Art and Nature Park at the Indianapolis Museum of Art, opened in June 2010. The project is featured in the May 2011 issue of Architectural Record. (Photo by Timothy Hursley)

Architectural Record, in print and online, included the Ruth Lilly Visitors Pavilion at the Indianapolis Museum of Art in a Building Types Study feature on parks and public spaces. The article by Cheryl Kent describes the requirements of the pavilion’s program and the restrictions of the site.

The pavilion is located in the museum’s 100 Acres Art and Nature Park, which is situated in the floodplain of the White River in Indianapolis. The park property is behind the museum, across a canal that runs north-south. A former quarry forms a 35-acre lake, and the White River wraps around the border of that lake. The 1,290-square-foot structure is made from steel, ipe wood and glass. Surrounded by an extensive deck and terrace, the covered core of the pavilion houses a large multipurpose space, as well as an office, kitchen, restroom and storage area.

The article tells how Blackwell teamed with the late Ed Blake, a landscape designer who’d landscaped Pinecote Pavilion in Picayune, Miss., for the late Fay Jones. The pavilion, which sits 30 inches above the ground, is located on the only part of the floodplain that could be built upon. With a plan that cleared out nonnative species and created pathways, Blake also designed berms to hide the building’s height, connect it to the ground and remove the need for railings, Kent wrote.

Kent referenced Mies van der Rohe’s Barcelona Pavilion, built to represent Germany at the 1929 World Exposition and to formally receive the king and queen of Spain that May. Demolished in January 1930, it was rebuilt in 1986. “Where the Barcelona Pavilion is an exquisite expression of formality and chilly beauty fit for royals, the Lilly Pavilion is a quiet creature revealing itself slowly and rewarding contemplation. That is as it should be for a pavilion in the woods,” Kent wrote.

Architect magazine selected Blackwell’s Porchdog House for its AIA Voices feature in the May 2011 issue. Architect is the official magazine of the American Institute of Architects. The story is told from the point of view of homeowner Richard Tyler, a 51-year-old single father of three, in a conversation relayed to writer Joe Sugarman.

In addition, the Porchdog House won an Honor Award at the national AIA convention in New Orleans in May with two Gulf States Regional AIA Design Awards. The firm’s design of the St. Nicholas Orthodox Christian Church, in Springdale, won a Merit Award.

(Click here to see the Architectural Record article, which includes a slideshow featuring several images of the Ruth Lilly Visitors Pavilion. Click here for a video of a discussion between Guy Nordenson, the project’s structural engineer, and Blackwell. Click here to read the Architect article.)

John Camacho, Jerome Tomlin and Joed Lopez-Robles, center, celebrate with other graduates on the front steps of Vol Walker Hall following the school's commencement ceremony on May 14. (Photo by Michelle Parks)

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