The American Institute of Architects has selected, Curtis Fentress, FAIA, a designer, Les Shepherd, AIA, a government agency head, and Ken Greenberg, Assoc. AIA, an urban planner to receive the 2010 Thomas Jefferson Award for Public Architecture. This year's award recipients will be honored and receive their awards at the 2010 AIA National Convention and Design Exposition in Miami.
The Thomas Jefferson Award recognizes excellence in architectural advocacy and achievement in three categories: Private-sector architects who have established a portfolio of accomplishment in the design of architecturally distinguished public facilities; public-sector architects who manage or produce quality design within their agencies; and public officials or other individuals who by their role of advocacy have furthered the public's awareness and/or appreciation of design excellence.
Curtis Fentress, FAIA
The 2010 AIA Thomas Jefferson Award for Private-sector Architects
Fentress, founder of Denver-based Fentress Architects, is recognized for his deep expertise in nearly all types of public buildings. His portfolio is filled with well-received courthouses, museums, memorials, and other cultural facilities. He's left an indelible mark on the civic life of Denver, as he's designed the tent-like, tensile fabric roof of the Denver International Airport Main Passenger Terminal, and the city's glass curtain walled convention center. Throughout his work, Fentress has demonstrated a contextual and inventive material sensibility, and a focus on sustainability.
Fentress graduated from North Carolina State University in 1972, and before he established his own firm he worked for I.M. Pei, FAIA, and KPF in New York. Currently, Fentress Architects has 100 employees, making it the largest architecture practice in the region, with four offices and projects across the world. Fentress regularly serves as a General Services Administration (GSA) Design Excellence peer professional, and was named the 2001 Executive of the Year in Architecture by the Denver Business Journal. His projects have won 78 AIA awards. Other major projects by Fentress include the Clark County Government Center in Las Vegas, the National Museum of Wildlife Art in Jackson, Wyo., and the National Museum of the Marine Corps in Quantico, Va.
Les Shepherd, AIA
The 2010 AIA Thomas Jefferson Award for Public-sector Architects
A 21-year veteran of the GSA, Shepherd has brought together architects, federal clients, and the public in innovative ways to create a higher standard for federal facility design.
A graduate of Texas Tech University, Shepherd previously served as project manager for several major GSA building projects in local offices. As chief architect, he led the development of key publications that codified the criteria for designing, siting, and leasing federal buildings. He oversees $12 billion of GSA building projects: renovations, historic preservation, courthouses, land ports of entry, and national labs. Major projects he's facilitated include Morphosis's San Francisco Federal Building, Yazdani Studio's Lloyd D. George U.S. Courthouse in Las Vegas, Bennett Wagner and Grody's Byron R. Rogers Federal Building and Courthouse in Denver, and SmithGroup's renovation of the Eisenhower Executive Office Building in Washington, DC.
"Shepherd's discerning commitment to excellence in architecture represents a worthy continuation of the architectural challenge presented by Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan," wrote Hugh Hardy, FAIA, of H3 Hardy Collective Architecture, in a recommendation letter.
Ken Greenberg, Assoc. AIA
The 2010 AIA Thomas Jefferson Award for Public officials or other individuals who by their role of advocacy have furthered the public's awareness and/or appreciation of design excellence
Throughout his entire career, Greenberg has fearlessly been an advocate for the civic life of some of the most hobbled and challenged cities in North America. As a city planner and urban planning design consultant with his own firm Greenberg Consultants, Ken Greenberg has designed numerous influential master plans for cities like Philadelphia, Hartford, Washington, DC, and Detroit, becoming one of North America's most eminent thinkers on the Post-Industrial city, and earning the 2010 Thomas Jefferson award in the process. He's renowned for his ability to engage the public and ground his designs in the unique zeitgeist of each place he works for to repair its urban fabric. An acolyte of urbanist and writer Jane Jacobs, Greenberg understands that cities are too complex and dynamic to be solved by final, definitive design end points, and that the best urban design interventions allow for and encourage this kind of spontaneous evolution.
Greenberg studied architecture and international relations at Columbia University and completed an architecture degree at the University of Toronto. He co-founded the Toronto-based planning and urban design firm Urban Strategies in 1987. Greenberg Consultants was founded in 2001. Greenberg has also created urban master plans for projects in Toronto, Boston, Cambridge, Mass., and the Twin Cities.
"Ken is one of the most skilled and respected urban designers practicing in the world today," wrote Kairos Shen, Boston's chief city planner, in a letter of recommendation. "His greatest strength, however, is his ability to build consensus on even the most controversial of projects."