Fay Jones School faculty-led projects earn recognition
by February 9, 2023 1:24 pm 929 views
The Marygrove Early Education Center is a state-of-the-art early childhood education center on the campus of the former Marygrove College in Detroit, Mich.
The Architect’s Newspaper (AN), an architectural publication that covers the United States in monthly printed issues and online, has awarded several projects that originated in the University of Arkansas’ Fay Jones School of Architecture and Design.
The publication’s 2022 AN Best of Design Awards recognized projects designed by Marlon Blackwell Architects, the Fayetteville practice of UA professor Marlon Blackwell, and the UA Community Design Center, an outreach program of the Fay Jones School directed by professor Steve Luoni.
In addition, Somewhere Studio, the professional architecture practice of UA professors Jessica Colangelo and Charles Sharpless, received an honorable mention for the Young Architects Award.
The annual awards program is open to design professionals for interiors, buildings, landscape, urbanism and installations in the United States, Mexico and Canada.
The Marygrove Early Education Center in Detroit, designed by Marlon Blackwell Architects, was the winner in the Education — Kindergarten, Primary, High School category. The early childhood education center was also a finalist for the project of the year.
The ARK: Rural Botanical Garden for Arkansas, designed by the Community Design Center, was the winner in the Unbuilt — Landscape, Urban Design and Master Plan category.
Blackwell has taught at the UA since 1992 and received the 2020 AIA Gold Medal. Luoni is the Steven L. Anderson Chair in architecture and urban studies in the Fay Jones School.
Colangelo is an assistant professor of architecture, and Sharpless is an assistant professor of interior architecture and design, both in the Fay Jones School.
According to a UA news release, the Marygrove project is on the campus of the former Marygrove College in the Livernois-McNichols district of northwest Detroit. It is the first new building on the campus in decades, built specifically to house early childhood programs to benefit the surrounding neighborhood, which has suffered from an array of economic and education problems related to the city’s decline.
The center supports 150 students up to age 5 from local neighborhoods, which reflects the diversity of the community.
The ARK: Rural Botanical Garden for Arkansas is the centerpiece of new hospitality and eco-tourism landscapes under development at Cherokee Village in north central Arkansas.
AN recognized Somewhere Studio with the Young Architects Award honorable mention for their focus on public space design projects that explore new strategies for space activation and material reutilization.