A Message from Paul Gunther

Dear Friends,

The trust extended by you in the course of the last decade of service to the Institute has given me the strength and encouragement to help shape and inform a future path for our unique and multi-faceted educational enterprise. After the 2002 conglomeration of Classical America and the Institute of Classical Architecture, sustaining and applying the classical tradition in architecture, design, and their allied arts is a mission your support and participation has made possible. The results prove it. I have worked to advance our strategic goals alongside a remarkable and increasingly national board of directors, under the successive chairmanship of three of America’s leading contemporary classicists. The catalytic confidence of our late treasurer, Chris Brown, and, above all, our co-founder and chairman emeritus, the late Arthur Ross, set the standard from the start.

The advent of the chapter blueprint and evolving partnerships signify best such well-considered growth. The network of these chapters now number 16 with others in formation. Such regional application of our educational intent is an achievement in which all must take abiding pride. The recent second annual National Curriculum Conference with its purpose of spreading instructional expertise is a direct outgrowth of the countrywide engagement that the Chapters represent.

It is with these accomplishments in mind that I have decided after these ten years of service that the moment is right for me to resign my post as president. I announce it today with this message, sent as it is with full senses of gratitude and future promise. I will depart August 31, 2013.

The goals I first set for myself in generous concert with those like you who make our work possible have been accomplished. And despite my love and appreciation for the varied duties that define my days along with such an eager and creative staff, the time is right for new leadership to embark with a strategic imperative comparable to that with which I was entrusted. Change is a vital force for any modern organization competing today in the marketplace of ideas and affirmative civic intent and I herald it knowing that the best days of the ICAA are still to come.

In these remaining weeks I look forward to seeing and speaking further with many of you who have made my work joyfully possible. My ties here will endure as a measure of satisfaction with a job well done. It is precisely this spirit that will lead me forward in the next phase of my career, dedicated as it will always be to forging a better world through culture, design, and a unifying humanistic impulse cutting across generations.

Meanwhile, I can report that the board will announce shortly the composition of a search committee that will lead the ICAA to find a new chief executive.

With warm regards and anticipation of future associations ahead,

Paul Gunther
ICAA President