Ehrlich Architects, founded by architect Steven Ehrlich ’68, has been awarded the 2015 American Institute of Architects (AIA) Architecture Firm Award. This award is the highest honor the American Institute of Architects bestows on an architecture firm, and it recognizes a practice that has consistently produced distinguished
architecture for at least 10 years.
In May, Ehrlich will be honored at the AIA Convention in Atlanta, Ga., where former President William Jefferson “Bill” Clinton is scheduled to give the keynote address.
Steven Ehrlich ’68
Ehrlich founded his firm in California in 1979, after he spent time in the Peace Corps working in Africa. There, he said, he gained an appreciation for simple, natural materials and local solutions to energy, sustainability, and building performance challenges. He and the partners in his firm said they work as “architectural anthropologists,” exploring ancient traditions and using them in contemporary buildings to solve modern problems.
Ehrlich is a member of the Dean’s Leadership Council at Rensselaer, helping to guide the School of Architecture to new successes.
Prior winners of the AIA Architecture Firm Award include Bohlin Cywinski Jackson in 1994 and Skidmore Owings & Merrill (SOM) in 1996 and 1962. Peter Bohlin ’58, another member of the Dean’s Leadership Council, is a founding partner in Bohlin Cywinski Jackson. SOM is an industry partner at CASE (the Center for Architecture Science and Ecology) in New York.