Marlon Blackwell honored with the 2020 American Institute of Architects Gold Medal
"The Gold Medal is the highest annual honor, recognizing individuals whose work has had a lasting influence on the theory and practice of architecture."
We are excited to announce that Marlon Blackwell has been awarded the AIA Gold Medal, one of architecture’s highest honors, which recognizes individuals whose work has had lasting influence on the theory and practice of architecture.
In the words of Canadian architect Brian Mackay Lyons, "Marlon is an architect whose personal character matches the exceptional quality of his work." Fundamental to this work is a spirit of optimism and a belief in architecture's ability to elevate our condition and our expectations. The work, like its author, is an intense mixture of the situational and the universal and demonstrates a deep dedication to craft.
His distinguished body of work has a global reach, but is rooted in the Arkansas Ozarks, demonstrating his belief that architecture can happen anywhere, for anyone, at any budget. Marlon encourages us as a community, to extend his profound optimism and expand the power and potential of architecture.
This award places Marlon in a lineage of the most distinguished architects of the past century including Thom Mayne, Le Corbusier, Tadao Ando, Frank Lloyd Wright, Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, Alvar Aalto and Arkansas' E. Fay Jones, who received the award in 1990.
Marlon Blackwell receives the 2016 Cooper Hewitt National Design Award for Architecture Design
“This national recognition from Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum for Marlon Blackwell and his practice acknowledges what the Fay Jones School has benefited from for more than two decades.”
-Peter MacKeith
Marlon Blackwell Architects in Fayetteville has received a 2016 National Design Award from Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum. The design firm was recognized “for exceptional and exemplary work in” Architecture Design for its body of work.
The selection criteria for all of the awards are excellence, innovation, and enhancement of the quality of life. Individual candidates must be citizens or long-term residents of the United States and have been practicing design for at least 7 years.
Marlon Blackwell Architects ranked the top design firm by Architect Magazine for 2016
“Of all submissions, this collection of work conveys the most succinct, clear, and rigorous design ethos, This is design with conviction.”
The Architect 50 is a nationwide ranking of architecture firms published by Architect magazine.
Architect magazine is the official publication of the American Institute of Architects. This is the eighth year the magazine has published the survey of top firms, with an overall ranking and additional rankings in the categories of design, business and sustainability.
Marlon Blackwell receives the Arkansas AIA E. Fay Jones Gold Medal in 2017
"Coming to work everyday and watching other people bring their children to [Montessori Primary] was magical. People just reacted to the building even if they didn't know why they were reacting to the building."
-Victoria Butler
This award recognizes an individual architect who has demonstrated touchstones of excellence through artistic vision and design, leadership and service to the State of Arkansas and the AIA Arkansas Chapter. Excellence is measured not only by the mark of architectural and individual achievement, but through the esteem and regard held for the architect by professional practitioners and the community as a whole. This is the highest award AIA Arkansas can bestow on one of its members and goes to an architect who not only builds buildings, but builds the communities surrounding them.
Marlon Blackwell receives the 2012 Arts and Letters Award in Architecture
“He enters the national discourse from a position that is rooted in the vernacular of his region. Working outside of the mainstream, Blackwell has developed a voice that is uniquely his own.”
-Billie Tsien
The American Academy of Arts and Letters is an honor society of the country’s 250 leading architects, artists, composers, and writers. Each year it elects new members as vacancies occur, administers over 70 awards and prizes, exhibits art and manuscripts, funds performances of new works of musical theater, and purchases artwork for donation to museums across the United States. The American Academy of Arts and Letters goal is to "foster, assist, and sustain excellence" in American literature, music, and art.
Marlon Blackwell named as the 2014 USA Ford Fellow for Architecture and Design
“He brings a strong design orientation and always provides good criticism; it is evident that he is truly interested in advancing design through both teaching and practice.”
Each year, United States Artists (USA) awards fellowships to the country’s most accomplished and innovative artists working in the fields of Architecture & Design, Crafts, Dance, Literature, Media, Music, Theater & Performance, Traditional Arts and Visual Arts. Fellows are selected through a rigorous, highly competitive process involving hundreds of experts, scholars, administrators and artists. USA Fellows spotlight the importance of originality across every creative discipline, celebrating the broad diversity of American artistic practices from coast to coast, cultivating a creative ecology that is diverse. The support that USA Fellows receive each year clears the way for unburdened artistic innovation and unleashes creative expression.
Shelby Farms Park receives AIA'S 2019 Regional & Urban Design Award
The 2019 Regional & Urban Design program recognizes the best in urban design, regional and city planning, and community development. The best planning accounts for the entire built environment, local culture, and available resources—modeling architecture’s promise and true value to communities.
“Shelby Farms Park is the linchpin for the greening of Memphis”
Laura Adams, former Executive Director of Shelby Farms Park Conservancy
Master Planning and Landscape Architecture: James Corner Field Operations
Steven L. Anderson Design Center & Vol Walker Hall wins the 2018 National AIA Honor Award for Architecture
The 2018 AIA Architecture Award celebrates the best contemporary architecture regardless of budget, size, style, or type. These stunning projects show the world the range of outstanding work architects create and highlight the many ways buildings and spaces can improve our lives.
"Consistent orchestration of natural light and a sparse but powerful use of red to make landmark moments in the building is invigorating. "
-Jury comment
Graphic House wins 2017 National AIA Housing Award
The Housing Awards emphasize good housing as a necessity of life, a sanctuary for the human spirit, and a valuable national resource. Recipients show the world how beauty, safety, sustainability, and comfort can come together.
"Realistic house that advances the suburban house type"
-Jury comment
Harvey Clinic wins the 2017 AIA/AAH Healthcare Design Award
The AIA/AAH Healthcare Design Awards showcase the best of healthcare building design, healthcare planning and healthcare design-oriented research. The awards highlight the trends of healthcare facilities and the future direction of these facilities. Projects should exhibit conceptual strength that solve aesthetic, civic, urban, and social concerns as well as the requisite functional and sustainability concerns of a hospital.
Graphic House wins 2017 Arkansas State AIA Honor Award
The Graphic House is a single-family home for a middle income family of four that occupies a corner lot within a typical suburban neighborhood. The “L” configuration keeps the house’s program on a single level, providing an accessible home for the family and simplifying the building’s organization.
Harvey Clinic wins 2017 American Architecture Award
The American Architecture Awards give an important overview of the current aesthetic direction of today’s built environment to the press and general public. The program is one of the Museum’s most important public education outreach initiatives produced throughout the year―to both the Museum’s U.S. and international audience. The American Architecture Awards are dedicated to the recognition of excellence in architecture and urbanism in the United States.
Steven L. Anderson Design Center wins 2016 AIA/CAE Educational Facility Design Award of Excellence
Recognized projects represent state-of-the-art learning environments, including early childhood, K-12, alternative, community and technical colleges, schools of higher education, corporate or other specialized training centers and non-traditional learning environments such as community centers, museums, libraries, nature centers, and interpretive centers.
Fayetteville High School wins 2016 AIA/CAE Educational Facility Design Award of Excellence
Recognized projects represent state-of-the-art learning environments, including early childhood, K-12, alternative, community and technical colleges, schools of higher education, corporate or other specialized training centers and non-traditional learning environments such as community centers, museums, libraries, nature centers, and interpretive centers.