AIA Philadelphia Announces Annual Award Winners

Please join the Philadelphia Chapter of the American Institute of Architects (AIA Philadelphia) in congratulating the individuals and architecture firms receiving the Chapter's highest honors. The annual Design Awards Celebration will be presented virtually on December 3, 2020 at 5:30pm. The ceremony will honor the individual winners of exceptional achievements and the project winners that showcase design excellence.

Achievement awards will include the following: 2020 John Frederick Harbeson Award, Harris Steinberg, FAIA; the 2020 Paul Philippe Cret Awardrecipient Betty Jane Turner MA BA CIP, the 2020 Young Architect Award recipients, David Quadrini, AIA, the 2020 Philadelphia Emerging Architecture Prize recipient Bright Common; and the 2020 Volunteer of the Year Award, Lance Rothstein, AIA.

In addition to the individual awards, the following Philadelphia firms will receive project honors based on a jury selection: Bright Common; BLT Architects; Coscia Moos; DIGSAU; Erdy McHenry Architecture; EwingCole; HOK; ISA; Kaminski + Pew; KSS Architects; KieranTimberlake; KJO Architecture; MGA Partners; OOMBRA Architects; PORT Urbanism; Stantec/Snøhetta: A Joint Venture; Voith & Mactavish Architects, LLP; and WRT. 

This year's Boston, Massachusetts jury included: Andrea Leers, FAIA, Founding Principal of Leers Weinzapfel Associates, Eric Höweler, AIA, Co-Founder/Principal of Höweler + Yoon,  Elizabeth Whitaker, AIA, Principal of Merge Architects Inc., and Andrea Love, AIA, LEED Fellow/Principal at Payette. The winning firms will find out which awards they will take home at the Design Awards Celebration.

The John Frederick Harbeson Award is presented annually to a long-standing member of the architectural community and is intended to recognize their significant contributions to the architectural profession and its related disciplines over their lifetime. The recipient of this award will distinguish themselves throughout their career by their contributions to the architectural profession, the American Institute of Architects, the education of the architectural community, and their contributions to the Philadelphia community at large.

Harris M. Steinberg, FAIA, is currently a distinguished teaching professor of urbanism at the Westphal College of Media Arts and Design at Drexel University where he is the founding executive director of the Lindy Institute for Urban Innovation. Harris also serves as a special advisor on urbanism to Drexel University President John A. Fry. Prior to his appointment at Drexel, Harris was the founding executive director of PennPraxis, the applied research arm of the University of Pennsylvania’s Weitzman School of Design with academic appointments in architecture and city planning.Harris is best known for his leadership role in the creation of A Civic Vision for the Central Delaware - a landmark public planning process in Philadelphia from 2006-07 that engaged more than 4000-Philadelphians over 13-months in more than 200-meetings. The process was widely covered by the local press and changed planning history along the Delaware River. Additionally, Harris led the creation of PlanPhilly – the web site of record for planning and development in Philadelphia which initially served the Delaware River planning process and now is a project of local public media station WHYY.Harris’s work in his hometown has made Philadelphia a better place. His reputation as a honest broker has enabled Harris to help the city and its citizens make informed choices about how we develop and steward our inherited built and natural environment. From his teaching at Drexel and Penn where he shapes the next generation of engaged urbanism leaders to his visionary planning work, Harris exemplifies the selfless, lifelong dedication to the architectural community and the Philadelphia community at large that the John Frederick Harbeson Award celebrates.  

The Paul Philippe Cret Award recognizes individuals or organizations who are not architects but who have made an outstanding and lasting contribution to the design of buildings, structures, landscapes, and the public realm of Greater Philadelphia.

Betty Jane Turner, MA BA CIP, is the Co-Founder and President of Germantown Community Connection and currently serves at Co-Chair of the Philadelphia Historic Commission.  Betty is an advocate for community development and historic preservation. In the world of architecture, planning and preservation and after a first career as a teacher, she began a new career in 2009, when she became the Co-Founder and President of Germantown Community Connection a local representative of Classic Towns of Greater Philadelphia. 

In 2010 she received her Citizen’s Planner Certificate from the Citizen’s Planning Institute and in 2012, she was appointed to the Philadelphia Historic Commission. In 2017, she was appointed to the position of Vice-Chair of the Historical Commission. She was an advocate for Mr. Kenney's Task Force on Historic Preservation. She has devoted her life to a career in education and community affairs and is most deserving of the 2020 Paul Cret award.

The Young Architect Award, presented by AIA Philadelphia's Steering Committee of Fellows, seeks to recognize registered architect(s) between the ages of 25 and 39 for their contribution to the categories of leadership, practice, and service.

David Quadrini, AIA, Co-Founder of Studio6mm with Bryan Syzmanik.  David's work has served a variety of institutional, civic, and cultural clients including the Pennsylvania Bureau of Forestry, the Philadelphia Zoo, the School of Nursing at the University of Pennsylvania, and Weaver's Way Co-op in Chestnut Hill.  

David is currently a member of the faculty in the Division of Architecture and Environmental Design at the Tyler School of Art at Temple University.  He has served as an adjunct professor at  Philadelphia University's College of Architecture and the Built Environment teaching 3rd, 4th, and 5th-year design studios.  He has been an invited design critic at Drexel University, The Tyler School of Art, Philadelphia University, and Marywood University. 

A registered architect in Pennsylvania, Delaware, and New York, David is a founding partner at Bench Dog Design, an interdisciplinary woodworking studio whose work has been exhibited regionally and published nationally.  David is actively engaged in his community and serves on the Zoning Committee of the Fishtown Neighborhood Association as well as the Steering Committee, Buyers Committee, and Building Committee of the Kensington Community Food Co-op.

The annual Philadelphia Emerging Architect Prize recognizes a Philadelphia firm that has been established and licensed within the past ten years for its high-quality design and innovative thought.  

Bright Common, Our work is rooted in research, place, and continuous collaboration. As experts in Passive House design and implementation, we revel in exploring what’s mutually beneficial for our clients, the communities we serve, and a thriving planet.

In the past nine years Bright Common has implemented a building biology based approach to both renovation and new-construction projects including residential, commercial and mixed-use Passive House level deep-energy-retrofits, new-construction Passive Houses, and Living Building Challenge inspired work in both urban and rural settings.

The pursuit towards a carbon neutral built environment has evolved into ever more natural, biophilic and socially conscious approaches for enclosure and systems design with the goal of decoupling the constructed world from its century-plus-old fossil fuel addiction.  

The annual Volunteer of the Year Award is given to an AIA Philadelphia member who has exemplified outstanding service over the past year and advances the Chapter’s mission and goals.

Lance Rothstein, AIA, Vice President at Hill International. Lance is being recognized for his long-standing but exceptionally time-intensive and difficult year and a half of fighting to keep the Charter High School for Architecture and Design open and continuing to serve the 600 students attending CHAD.  Lance advocated and represented the AIA and larger architectural community extremely well through a difficult series of obstacles – the ultimate one being the unprecedented COVID-19 pandemic, which necessitated the ultimate closure of the school this past June.  Lance served as the CHAD Board president in its final years and spent countless hours solving the big and the “small” issues – always keeping the students’ and their families top of mind.  We are grateful to his service and look forward to the next chapter of design education in Philadelphia.

Congratulations to all of the individuals and firms recognized for their exceptional achievements in design.