1st Quarter Newsletter
Greetings AIA Birmingham,
In this first quarterly newsletter of 2022, I would like to thank our membership for the opportunity to serve as your president this year. It is an honor to lead this chapter, and to do so alongside such a strong Executive Committee makes it a pleasure as well. AIA Birmingham has so many irons in the fire for 2022 and beyond. Many of the things we are working on now have been building under our leadership over the last few years, and I am so excited to see these efforts come to fruition as we emerge from the fog of the pandemic with renewed energy and purpose.
Our Executive Committee has framed our plans for the year in keeping with our AIA Birmingham Mission Statement:
“AIA Birmingham’s primary goal is to provide support to our members. We advocate for the value of architecture and give architects the resources they need to do their best work. Our work should drive positive change through the power of design.
We want to support your goals and interests.
Please continue to share your expertise with our group and let us help promote it! We have put out a call out for nominations for presentations, please answer it. Self-nominate or nominate your friends and colleagues. This is a way we can build up our membership, providing an opportunity to hone the presentation skills of our members, as well as share our members’ expertise with our community. I am constantly impressed with the knowledge and experience of the Architects in our chapter. For a tight knit community, we have a lot of various experts in our field.
We want to make living and working in our community better.
AIA Birmingham has several special initiatives happening already this year. We are advocating at the local leadership level, making plans to represent our profession at the World Games, and we are building off the momentum of the ACFA’s Evicted exhibit to address the needs of our community through the expertise of our members. These are really exciting conversations we are having and there are lots of places for our membership to plug into these efforts and get involved in making action happen. Just raise your hand.
In addition, planning for all our favorite parts of the AIA Birmingham Calendar are still ongoing…
Interesting Chapter Meetings and HSWs, a Healthcare Symposium in August, Dream Architecture (ACFA), Design Awards, the Emerging Professionals group has fantastic site visits open to all members and a new plan for study sessions, and Women in Architecture will be back soon!
So much programming is happening to bring value to our architects and our community as a whole. None of this would be possible without the support of our members, sponsors, and unfailing executive leadership by Karma and Rhea Williams. When you see Rhea, her head might be spinning, but we are all smiling…I hope you will join us.
Laura Bartlett, AIA
AIA Birmingham Chapter President 2022
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March Chapter Meeting – Protective Stadium & Legacy Arena
March 15, 12:00 – 1:00 PM via Zoom
Join us for a virtual presentation from Jim Swords, AIA for an inside look at the design process of Protective Stadium!
Click here to learn more.
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We are so grateful for our partners and sponsors! Their continued support is crucial in everything we do. We encourage our members to consider sponsors first if they are in need of products or services.
See right sidebar for a full list of 2022 Chapter Sponsors.
2021 SPONSORS: We want you in the AIA Birmingham Family in 2022! Email anna@karmamanagementinc.com to renew today! Click here to view the 2022 Sponsor Brochure.
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AIA Birmingham Events
Even though we are only 3 months into the year, we have already had great opportunities for our members!
Click to see photos from each event.
- EP New Year Kickoff
- Exploring Tall Wood: New Code Provisions for Tall Timber Structures (1 HSW)
- The Fennec & Citizen Site Visit
- 16th St Baptist Church & Parsonage (1 HSW)
Thank you to Southern Clay Brick, WoodWorks: Wood Products Council, Creature, and ArchitectureWorks for hosting & presenting at our events!
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Affordable Housing
All of the continuing education around affordable housing and the Evicted exhibit have resulted in a dialogue with Mayor Woodfin. His goal is to increase the affordable housing stock in the city and making the process less challenging.
We held our first round table meeting February 24th at the Alabama Center for Architecture. We will meet quarterly to discuss barriers and solutions to present to Mayor Woodfin. We hope this administration will move forward and we are not meeting to just “meet”.
The need for affordable housing is now a crisis in our community and across the nation. We have a Mayor who sees the need and has reached out to AIA for your expertise.
Architects are problem solvers, we look forward to seeing what AIA Birmingham makes happen.
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Call for Presentations!
Thank you Brittany Foley, AIA, Cindy Coyle, AIA, Jessica Hughes Bennett, AIA, and Scott Thompson, AIA for sharing your expertise with our members so far in 2022!
We want to celebrate our members and share your expertise with AIA Birmingham. If you have a special project, specialize in a specific A/E/C “niche”, or have volunteered out of the country after a natural disaster and want to share the success story or challenges, our Programming Committee is opening nominations for speakers for our 2022 Chapter Meetings.
If you are interested in sharing your presentation, please submit this proposal.
If you would like to nominate a speaker, please fill out this form to let us know!
AIA Birmingham will get presentations approved for a one-time CEU/HSW.
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Building with Bricks Exhibit
Do you love playing with LEGOS®? Our annual “Building with Bricks” LEGO® Exhibit invites children and adults alike to come into the ACFA and experience the joys of building and design!
If you’re interested in volunteering for the exhibit, click here!
To learn more about sponsoring the event, click here!
Register for all ACFA events & pay for Membership online here!
- March 24, 2022 – World Games Infrastructure & Compassion Project (1 HSW Pending)
- March 26 – April 2, 2022 – Building with Bricks Exhibit
- March – May 2022 – dreamARCHITECTURE
- May 19, 2022 – Shooting Clays Fundraiser
- October 13, 2022 – ACFA Golf Tournament
Want to help the ACFA continue offering scholarships, education outreach, and more? Become a member!
To learn more about becoming a Member of the ACFA click here!