4.5 min readPublished On: November 23, 2016Categories: News, Newsletters

Happy Thanksgiving to you!

I missed sending out my third quarter newsletter at the end of September and here we are at Thanksgiving.  I’m taking this time to encourage you to join us on December 3rd for our annual Holiday Party.  It’s again at John Stewart’s house from 6 to 10 pm.  Big thanks to John for opening up his home to our chapter and friends of the chapter.  Please contact Rene to RSVP and to let him know what you can bring to contribute.  Come on by and toast the holidays – I hope to see you there and get a chance to talk!

A lot has happened in the months since the last newsletter. To highlight a few things, we had some interesting speakers at our Fellowship dinners: John Loomis of SJSU Design Dept., and Bernard Trainor, ASLA. In August, we had a very successful Silicon Valley Home Tours — partnering with AIA Santa Clara Valley — kicked-off by a fun mixer the night before at Rejuvenation Lighting in Palo Alto. We also had a wonderful time at Runnymede for our Summer Social BBQ.  Thank you so much to those that made it possible.  For the amazing food, thank you to Atherton Appliance and Kalamazoo Grills for their generous contribution of food, staff, and the use of kitchen/grill equipment.  And for the venue, thank you to Adolf Rosekrans for welcoming us to Runnymede Pool House for a beautiful evening.

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House Tour Mixer at Rejuvenation, Palo Alto

As a chapter we also strive to provide benefit to our members in the way training and other informative events.  In September/October, we offered an ADA/Accessibility Seminar and a Code Seminar on the upcoming 2016 CBC to be in effect in January.  Our speaker for the code seminar, Gale Bate, requested info in advance for what attendees would like to hear about, specifically.  This brought me to think about this as a whole for our chapter.  If there are services, information, training, or specific areas of practice that you would like to have our chapter address, please let us know.  We are here to provide benefit and value to you and to our profession and we welcome your feedback.  Also in October the new board was voted in for next year, 2017.  Congrats and thank you to the new board and to the incoming President, Heather Young!

Additionally, AIASMC had two interesting, fun events in November.  On November 3rd, the AIASMC 2016 Design Awards Event was held at Dome Construction — Please see the website to see the award winning projects.  Design Awards happens every two years for our chapter, similar to other chapters, and even though that’s a long ways off, I encourage you to look ahead and consider attending the event and perhaps joining the committee in 2018!  We can always use extra help, more volunteers, and new people to get involved!

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Showcase of Design Award Entries

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Great finger foods!

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John Lum Architecture and Guests

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Demattei · Wong Citation for Façade Design

The other event that took place in November, besides the national presidential election, was the Shared Event with AIA Santa Clara Valley.  We gathered together for appetizers and drinks at Stanford University and heard about the new Redwood City Stanford Administrative campus plans from Zach Pozner, from Stanford Architecture and Planning Dept.  Prior to introducing Zach, each chapter had some announcements.  This leads me to the issue of the Presidential election and the discussion of the letter from AIA National CEO Robert Ivy.  David Regester and I work together in the same firm and this year, we have been Presidents of our chapters, AIASMC and AIA SCV, so the partnership of these Shared Events has been great.  After Robert Ivy’s letter came out, AIA membership response was immediate and strong so David and I worked together to craft a response with both our chapters in mind.  We took the opportunity to present it to the attendees that night before finalizing it and sending to Robert Ivy and AIA National.  To summarize our letter, we wanted AIA National leadership in DC to hear what our goals and values are and how we believe they are integral to design, architecture, and our profession in Silicon Valley and the Bay Area.  The goals and values include diversity, inclusion, accessibility, and sustainability.

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Chapter Presidents at Stanford Lecture

In other election news, Proposition 51, the State School Bond measure was approved by California’s citizens for a $9 billion state bond, for school facility expenditures during the next four years.  The combined state and local funds will allow more classrooms with natural lighting, better classroom acoustics, group spaces and other design features for California’s schools. The American Institute of Architects, California Council (AIACC) worked with other groups to help pass this proposition.

As always, you can always reach me or Rene Peraza for AIA issues or to get involved at: [email protected] or [email protected]

I look forward to seeing you at the Holiday Party on December 3rd at John Stewart’s home!

Thanks,

Margaret Williams, AIA | President AIASMC

 

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