AIA Gold Medal to Climate Advocate

by John Morris Dixon | February 22nd, 2021

The annual awards of the American Institute of Architects continue to reflect an evolution in the profession’s concept of superior accomplishment. Historically, the institute’s one-per-year Gold Medal has recognized the architectural design stars of the time. It was bestowed, for instance, on Frank Lloyd Wright in 1949, Louis Kahn in 1971, I.M. Pei in 1979, Frank Gehry in 1999. Our American admiration for foreign masters was indicated by the award of the Gold to eminent architects from other countries, such as Alvar Aalto of Finland in 1963, Kenzo Tange of Japan in 1966, and Ricardo Legorreta of Mexico in 2000. In the past decade, AIA has done some catch-up in the area of diversity. In 2014 it awarded the Gold — posthumously — to Julia Morgan, the first woman medalist (and only one to date), a Bay Area architect whose practice flourished early in the 20th century. Then in 2017 …