Awards Season Returns to the Realm of Contemporary Classicism

A message from our President, Paul Gunther

All of us here salute the winners of the tenth annual Richard H. Driehaus Prize and the Henry Hope Reed Award: Michael Graves and Elizabeth Barlow Rogers respectively.  Visit the Notre Dame School of Architecture website to learn more as well as my recent blog post about Betsy and the history she has with the legacy of her Prize namesake and our co-founding scholar-in-residence. We are pleased too that Dean Graves was recently featured in our seminal Reconsidering Postmodernism conference of which a DVD recording by our esteemed colleagues at Checkerboard Films is in the completion phase as soon as we raise funds to so proceed. Thanks go to Gary Brewer for a lead seed grant to that worthy end. A video trailer of the upcoming DVD can be viewed by clicking here.

Likewise we salute all those who received recognition last month in Atlanta at the Southeast Chapter’s Sixth Annual Philip Trammel Shutze Awards, where I had occasion to help present the awards along with our peerless historian colleague Calder Loth, whose regular blog postings I hope you are taking advantage of as an ongoing educational classical resource. The winners of this year's Shutze Awards can be found and celebrated here.

The first annual Addison Mizner Medal for Excellence in Classical & Traditional Architecture offered for projects throughout the Sunshine State by the growing Florida Chapter will be awarded September 29, 2012 with applications due on April 6; visit www.flclassicist.org for more details. The Mizner Medal represents the fourth chapter awards initiative leading to active conversation today about creating an equivalent competition in the New York/Tri-State region itself. Details will follow as available. As it does unfold it reveals further the decentralized approach that now characterizes so much of the Institute’s work today with cues taken from all directions.

Likewise we are delighted to welcome the 2012 Arthur Ross Award winners to this 31-year old pantheon of contemporary classical excellence. They are:

• HBRA Architects (Architecture)
• Rhett Butler (Artisanship)
• Francis Morrone (History and Journalism)
• Edwina von Gal (Landscape Design)
• U. S. Commission of Fine Arts (Stewardship)
• Marc Appleton (Board of Directors Honor)

Click here to purchase tickets or call my colleague Stephanie Herold at (212) 730-9646 ext. 106.

I wish to pay particular tribute to the upcoming recipient of the occasional Board of Directors Honor which will go to trustee emeritus, author, architect, teacher, and generous friend Marc Appleton of Los Angeles and Santa Barbara. His eager determination almost a decade ago set in motion the creation of the chapter blueprint for the nation as launched by the strong Southern California Chapter, whose fine educational contributions to its region and beyond can be measured daily. It will be a special delight for all gathered to toast his close ties in hopeful spirit.

Before reading about the many programs taking place this month around the country please join me in thanking ICAA Fellow and Charleston Chapter president William Bates for the magnificent bronze plaque he designed and fabricated so generously in order to officially recognize the naming of our principle West 44^th Street classroom in honor of Henry Hope Reed. A bronze frame adorns the etched slate plaque reading as it does:

 This Room Named in Honor Of Henry Hope Reed Champion of the Classical There is such a quality as American taste and we will find it by looking to the best of our Inheritance. The key to the future lies there.