Assembly House 150 wins Great Places Award
Assembly House 150 (AH150) is proud to announce that it is the recipient of a 2021 Great Places Award, bestowed by the Environmental Design Research Association (EDRA) for programs that honor professional and scholarly excellence. The international distinction was granted by EDRA in partnership with the Project for Public Spaces. AH150 was recognized in the Place Art category for projects that utilize art as a tool of community placemaking, engagement, and social change.
As a global interdisciplinary community of research, design, and planning educators, professionals, and students, EDRA highlights the connection between people and place with an emphasis on human experience. The Great Places Awards honor organizations, people, and places that adopt a sustainable, human-centered approach to art, design, conservation, restoration, and the creation of environments that engage imaginations. TheEDRA jury cited Assembly House 150 as a “deeply participatory project using a former church in Buffalo, NY as a living workshop, construction training, and art installation space. As a creative hub it brings together a diverse group of people – from students and community stakeholders to artists, designers, and architects. Employing strategies of social practice, the project’s components highlight art as both process and product and ultimately as a transformative force in the community. What makes this work so unique are the contributions of graduates that – with the skills and experiences earned – return to their neighborhoods where they have the expertise to impact conservation, rejuvenation, and change.”
“We are honored to receive this international recognition. Assembly House is, at its core, an organization built of wondrous people who create equally wondrous environments,” said Dennis Maher, AH150 Executive Director. “We aim to foster a community where all of our publics are collaborators and creators, from Society of Construction Related Arts (SACRA) students and industry professionals to artists, artisans, architects, and designers. These collaborations contribute to a dynamic educational and artful environment that builds the confidence of our students and, in turn, a reinvestment in the communities and environments of Buffalo and beyond.”
Robert Shibley, Professor and Dean of the School of Architecture and Planning at the University at Buffalo said, “Assembly House is a magical place, where the spirit of a city and its people come together around the act of making and the art of craft. It is a generous extension of Dennis Maher’s work as an artist, designer and educator from the studios at the University at Buffalo and the forgotten spaces and people of our region. The SACRA program reveals the transformative power of design and making to build community, create meaningful places, and drive social change.”
Assembly House 150 recently graduated the Spring 2021 class of SACRA students. Over 80% of the cohort has been placed in jobs in fine carpentry, residential, and commercial construction with companies such as Hulley Woodworking Company, Maple Walnut Woodworks, Comfort Windows, Melco Construction, and C&R Housing.
Some students, past and present, will be hired to work on an ongoing collaboration with the Burchfield Penney Art Center. Announced last fall, this project will reinvigorate the museum’s existing education spaces through a large-scale interactive architectural installation. It will be one of the most unique, innovative museum education centers in the country. “The quality of work and vision that led to AH150 receiving the EDRA award makes perfect sense. Our organizations, working together, understand the importance of boldly reimagining spaces,” states Burchfield Penney acting director Scott Propeak. “AH150 provides people with a heightened level of precision and caring, revealing new insights that we all learn from. It’s an honor to collaborate with such a transformative community partner.” Funded by the Cameron and Jane Baird Foundation, the project at the Burchfield Penney will double the size of the Center’s public education spaces and offerings in the Western New York region. The artistic facelift will create a welcoming place for wonder and discovery, and enable the Assembly House students and collaborators to continue skill-building and giving back to their communities.
This summer Assembly House will launch a new initiative of public tours on the second Saturday of each month. Starting on Saturday, June 12, tours will be available to the public from 11am – 2pm. Advanced registration is required. For more information, please visit assemblyhouse150.org or email Olivia McManus at omcmanus@assemblyhouse150.org.
About Assembly House 150
Founded in 2015, AH150 is a nonprofit, art, design, and construction incubator and experiential learning center led by Dennis Maher – an internationally renowned artist and professor of architecture at the University of Buffalo. AH150 creates inspiring, wondrous environments for all to experience the art of building. The organization brings together artists, architects, designers, building industry tradespeople, artisans, planners, preservationists, students, and apprentices, to build awareness of the built environment, teach skills in design and construction, and work together on impactful community projects that empower people through creative action.
About the EDRA Great Place Awards
The EDRA Great Place Awards are unique among programs that honor professional and scholarly excellence in environmental design. They seek to recognize work that combines expertise in design, research, and practice, and contributes to the creation of dynamic, humane places that engage our attention and imagination. The chosen projects reflect an interdisciplinary approach that is enduring, human-centered, sustainable, and concerned with the experiential relationship between people and their environment (built and natural) over time.
About EDRA
The Environmental Design Research Association is a global interdisciplinary community of research, design, and planning educators, professionals, and students. Founded in 1968, the organization’s vibrant network of visionaries has anticipated movements in research and design decades before they have hit the mainstream. EDRA’s lineage of members have pioneered environment and behavior studies, evidenced-based design, facility evaluation methods, attention to social justice and equity n the built environment, sustainability, active living community planning, universal design, diversity in design, workplace design, informatics, and digital technologies. Their work, in conjunction with major universities and organizations, is reshaping diverse environments and government policies on national and global scales.
About Project for Public Spaces
PPS is a nonprofit planning, design, and educational organization dedicated to helping people create and sustain public spaces that build stronger communities. Their pioneering Placemaking approach helps