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Register Now -- Missing 32% Symposium 2014! - Jean Nilsson, Ed.

Sept 12-14 Weekend -- 2014 Annual Retreat - Jean Nilsson, Ed.

Remembering Architect Mary Laleyan - Wendy Bertrand

Julia Morgan's 2014 AIA Gold Medal Conferral - Sandhya Sood and Jean Nilsson, Ed.

Beverly Willis: "I Express Our Collective and Respectful Anger. . . I Express our Collective Joy" - Jean Nilsson, Ed.

July Panel / Discussion on "Aging in Place" - Janet Crane and Patty Haight

Brief Update from the Steering Committee - Jean Nilsson, Ed.

Naomi Horowitz launches nih architecture - Naomi Horowitz

Lian Eoyang Wins Marvin "Architects Challenge" - Jean Nilsson, Ed.

Sculptor Looks to Women's Groups - Jean Nilsson, Ed.

On October 18, 8am-5 pm, the 3rd annual symposium by The Missing 32% Project and AIA San Francisco sponsored by OWA and other local organizations and firms will be held at the San Francisco Art Institute, 800 Chestnut Street, San Francisco.

Many OWA members have participated in the project and its events, and we highly recommend attending this symposium. OWA member Rosa Sheng (a Board of Director for AIA San Francisco and Senior Associate at Bohlin Cywinski Jackson) is the Founding Chairperson for The Missing 32% Project Committee to address the issue of Equity in Architecture. Member Eliza Hart was on the first 2012 Panel.

The project's website describes The Missing 32% Project as "a call to action for both women and men to help realize the goal of equitable practice to advance architecture, sustain the profession and communicate the value of design to society."

The Equity by Design: Knowledge, Discussion, Action! 2014 symposium will include sharing of the data gathered in the recent Equity in Architecture Survey and "learning-by-doing", utilizing the studio environment of the San Francisco Art Institute. Panel discussions will focus on 3 major topics: Hiring & Retention, Growth & Development, and Meaning & Influence, followed by break-out sessions. Participants will choose from among several break-out session options.

•We will hear from thought leaders and then use our design thinking skills to generate creative solutions to challenging practice issues that confront architects, emerging professionals, and firm leadership.

•Our goal is to inspire and empower participants to generate actionable takeaways that will be collected and shared as Equity by Design [EQxD] Best Practice Guides as an open resource to transform the future of the profession. (from the website)

For registration and more information, visit their website
The Missing 32% Project, which is full of information and inspiring stories, such as the following two recent blog posts: No Longer Missing. Pamela Tang's Return to Architecture and How to Advance Women in Architecture? A Chat with Rosa Sheng at BAR Architects. You can also view early results of their Equity in Architecture Survey.

The Missing 32% Committee meets the 3rd Thursday of the month, 12:30-2pm at AIA San Francisco, 130 Sutter Street, Ste 600.

Symposium registration, limited to 250, is already half full and is expected to sell out, so Register Today. Join us at this important event on October 18.

Due to her connection to SFAIA President Howard Friedman, OWA was offered a booth, at no cost, at the 1973 AIA National Convention, and she was influential in getting the first big article about our organization into the San Francisco Chronicle (May 8, 1973), "Women Architects in the Flesh", just months after our founding (article saved in our OWA June 1973 Newsletter by editor Mui Ho). Mary was super active at the national level of the AIA and, thus, after several years grew less active in OWA.

I hold great respect and kind memories from knowing and working with her. I tried to link up with her a few years ago, but I am sorry it didn't work out; I wanted to know her perspective on the situation of women in the profession. I recently learned that she died on January 21, 2014.

Mary's archive is part of the International Archive of Women Architects at Virginia Tech. I edit here from IAWA website's biographical notes:

"Marie-Louise Laleyan (1935-2014) was a San Francisco based architect with 48 years of experience including 30 years as principal of Laleyan Architects (1977-2007), formally Laleyan Associates.

"Born and educated in Bulgaria, Laleyan arrived in the United States in 1964. Laleyan has practiced architecture in Sofia, Bulgaria; Paris, France; and the United States. Before establishing her own practice she worked with the following firms: Hart & Turner Architects (Sacramento, CA), Richard Neutra (Los Angeles, CA), and the San Francisco, CA firms of Claude Oakland and Associates, Anshen & Allen, Mario J. Ciamp, FAIA, and Paffard Keatinge Clay.

"An active member of the American Institute of Architects (AIA) she has served on the Northern California Chapter's Board of Directors, as co-chairperson of the national AIA Task Force of Women in Architecture, and coauthor of the AIA Affirmative Action Plan. Besides her instrumental work getting OWA started, she represented the interests of women architects at numerous conferences and seminars. Mary cared for her parents who lived with her in San Francisco for many years. She never married.

"The establishment of Laleyan Associates in 1977 was the culmination of a lifelong career intention and in her words a 'family tradition.' Laleyan was committed to keeping the firm small so that she would be able to provide quality service and personal attention to each project and client. In 2001, Laleyan began providing Physical Needs Assessments (PNA) and Construction Monitoring services for the California Housing Finance Agency (CHFA), a state housing acquisition lender to non-profit and for profit developers. She was highly respected in the field of affordable housing.

"Projects undertaken by Laleyan Architects included light commercial, medical, institutional, residential, and public buildings with construction costs ranging from $25,000-3.4 million. She generously helped many public non-profit organizations with their projects."

One of my favorite mentoring events in 2013 was our visit to a lighting installation by the artist, Jim Campbell at the Hosfelt Gallery in the city. The exhibit was titled "Tilted Plane" - an entirely black room with rows of single light bulbs hanging from the ceiling on black cords. The lengths of the cords varied across the room, to create an illusion of a diminished perspective, a tilted ceiling plane. We were able to walk between the rows to experience the change in perspective as the ceiling plane changed.

This past May, our group met up at the Berkeley Heritage Alliance's Bernard Maybeck walking tour, for a fascinating look inside homes along Maybeck's Rose Walk development in the Berkeley hills.

The OWA organization has been a source of inspiration, support, and friendship over the years that I have been an OWA member since the late 1980's. So it seems appropriate to support the future of the OWA, by participating in the mentoring program. I believe we long-time OWA members are each responsible for doing what we can to help the next generation of design professionals succeed.

If you choose to participate, there is much to gain as a mentor. You will enjoy the exuberance of OWA's mentees, while staying current with the latest local design trends and local events. I can attest to the value that we mentors gain from our younger colleagues; participating as a mentor in the mentoring program continues to be an inspiring, exhilarating, and rewarding experience.

The Steering Committee has been working on a variety of fronts in addition to this year's events, which happily, we find have all been well attended and enjoyed. For next year, we are considering adding a series of informal gatherings to compliment the presentations and tours. Please feel free to contact any Steering Committee member with your thoughts or questions (click on our photo here to go to the Jan/Feb issue in which we introduced ourselves).

Among our PR efforts to make our organization more visible and helpful to women in design professions, we are continuing with plans to update our logo and website, which we will discuss at the annual business meeting in October, and discussing initiating a blog instead of, or in addition to, our bi-monthly newsletter.

We continue our connections with the AIA, particularly joining efforts with SFAIA's Missing 32% and Mentorship Committees, whose concerns and members overlap those of two of our "pods" (does anyone have a better term than "pod"?) See articles in this newsletter on Mentorship groups and the upcoming "Missing 32%" Symposium, which we again are sponsoring.

Membership renewals, however, are down this year, partly due to less need for the health insurance long-offered as one of our membership benefits. PLEASE RENEW to support our group's mission and goals!

Lian Eoyang, Associate AIA and Principal of San Francisco-based design firm VIFStudio, won the Marvin Windows and Doors Architects Challenge 2014 Showdown for her "Summer Cottage", receiving the most public votes of the 150 entrants.
The winning two-story home, featuring hand-cut fieldstone and Marvin windows and doors that provide 180-degree panoramas of the Boston harbor and skyline, replaced a dilapidated hillside cottage. Eoyang will receive a trip to the 2015 Reinvention Symposium in Washington D.C., a high level design conference for housing professionals produced by Residential Architect magazine.