The 2021 AIA Nebraska Annual Conference is Going Virtual over three Thursdays in September: 

Thursday, September 9 | 10:00am - 4:30pm
Thursday, September 23 | 9:00am - 4:00pm
Thursday, September 30 | 10:00am - 4:00pm

The virtual exhibit will be available for attendees September 9 - October 9, 2021; showcasing the latest innovative design, industry products and emerging services. 

AIA Nebraska Conference App + Virtual Experience - "Attendify"
AIA Nebraska is proud to partner with Attendify to connect and network conference attendees and exhibitors through the Attendify App and Virtual Experience. You can download the app through the Apple App Store, and Google Play.

Continuing Education
The 2021 AIA Nebraska Annual Conference will offer AIA Learning Units.

Expo Education
Earn AIA CEUs over the noon hour  on both September 9 + 23 by joining select AIA Nebraska Allied/Affiliate members during their Expo Education Nano-Sessions. Each nano-session is 15 minutes long and will provide 1/4 credit per course. The more you attend, the more credits you earn. 

Annual Membership Meeting
The Annual Meeting of AIA Nebraska, A Chapter of the American Institute of Architects, shall be held on Thursday, September 30, 2021 commencing at Noon. Register for the Meeting >>
See documents in this folder to be reviewed at the meeting. 

Special Presentation: Timothy Hawk, FAIA, At-large Director on the AIA National Board (2019-2021) and recently elected, AIA National Treasurer (2022 – 2023). 

Learn more about the opportunities AIA Nebraska members will be presented with the transition from a region-based model to a state-based model.

Tim will also share the how his engagement with AIA has positively impacted his architecture practice, WSA Studio in Columbus, Ohio. An AIA Ohio Gold Medal firm, WSA Studio seeks to create innovative spaces through design collaboration. The firm’s work features urban interventions, significant interior environments, and iconic built form. 

Registration Options

• AIA Nebraska Members: $50/day or $125 for all 3 days.
• Associate AIA Members (Non-Emerging Professional): $50/day or $125 for all 3 days.
  (Defined as Associate AIA members not seeking licensure)
• Associate AIA / AIAS / Newly Licensed Members (Emerging Professional): Complimentary Registration (tours excluded) for Associate AIA, newly licensed AIA members, and AIAS Members that are considered Emerging Professionals.
  (Emerging Professional defined as students, recent graduates, associate members seeking licensure and architects licensed within the last year: Sept. 2020 - Sept. 2021).
• Non-Members: $100/day or $275 for all 3 days.

Questions
Contact Nathan Ehmke, Marketing & Membership Coordinator at [email protected], or (402) 858-1929.

10:00 am – 11:00 am | Keynote Presentation | Porches and Legacy [1 LU]

Jonathan Moody, AIA, NOMA, NCARB, LEED A, Moody Nolan, 2021 AIA National Architecture Firm Award recipient

Porches are one architectural component that have taken on various meanings throughout different histories in different communities. They are places where you can directly interact with your surrounding community. This course focuses on how this one element has been utilized in different contexts to offer opportunities for community engagement.

Jonathan approaches architecture with a focused mission—to bring transformational design to underserved communities, to educate and mentor underserved youth toward careers in architecture, and to become, a visible, present servant in underserved communities.

Jonathan has helped continue to extend the firm’s position as the largest African American owned architecture firm. Moody Nolan continues to garner national attention by promoting “diversity by design” and was selected as the 2021 AIA National Architecture Firm Award recipient, the highest firm honor achieved through the American Institute of Architects. Moody Nolan is not only the first Ohio-based firm to win this award, but the first African American owned firm to receive the recognition.

He has more than 12 years of high-end design experience focused on integrating digital fabrication and social engagement into the design process. He approaches design with an overall goal of having a major positive impact on communities in need. For Jonathan, architecture is a medium through which people can be connected and inspired by giving tangible being into ideas. Over the last several years, he has passionately devoted himself to community service through mentoring and education programs focused on empowering underserved youth.

11:00 am – 12:00 pm | Building & Running a Successful Hybrid Practice [1 LU]

Evelyn Lee, FAIA, Founder, The Practice of Architecture, Treasurer, The American Institute of Architects 2020-2021

In the blink of an eye, the way firms worked changed overnight. Now there’s no snapping back, and people’s expectations around how and where they work have changed. Many firms are just beginning to navigate and understand what they need to create a successful practice that allows their employees the flexibility they desire while remaining productive and profitable. 

Evelyn Lee, FAIA, is the first ever Senior Experience Designer at Slack Technologies, Founder of the Practice of Architecture, and Co-Host on the Podcast, Practice Disrupted. 

Lee seamlessly integrates her business and architecture background with a qualitative and quantitative focus to build better experiences for organization's employees, clients, and guests. She is widely published, wrote a monthly column for Contract magazine for over 3 years, and now is a frequent contributor to Architect Magazine. Evelyn has received numerous industry awards including the 2016 40 Under 40 award for Building Design + Construction and the 2014 AIA National Young Architects Award. She currently serves as the first ever female Treasurer to the AIA National Board in 2020-2021.

12:00 pm - 1:00 pm | AIA Nebraska Exhibitor Nano-Sessions

Tour: 1:00 pm - 2:00 pm | Restoring the former Blackstone Center into the Kimpton Cottonwood Hotel [1 HSW]

Kimpton Cottonwood Hotel
302 South 36th Street, Omaha, NE 68131

Get a behind the scenes tour with the Leo A Daly/DLR team and hotel management to visit the recently-opened historic Kimpton Cottonwood Hotel (formerly the Blackstone Center.) From a 8-story view of the downtown skyline to the amenities you’ll discover in a historic boutique experience, the hotel boasts a magnificent historic ballroom, a new outdoor pool and pool club, rooftop decks and direct access to Omaha’s bustling Blackstone District.  This tour will provide the opportunity for attendees to observe and learn about a variety of solutions to historic rehabilitation problems – solutions that can be applied or adapted to other projects.  

Metered parking is available on the street; valet parking is also an option.  Requirement: You must follow Douglas County Health Department covid-related guidelines - Masks not required. Tour led by David Hawes, Leo A Daly; Martin Janousek, AIA, Leo A Daly, Daniel Siedhoff, AIA, DLR Group. Limited to 20 Participants.

Tour: 3:00 pm - 4:00 pm | Tri-Faith Center [1 HSW]

Tri-Faith Center
13136 Faith Plaza, Omaha, NE 68144

Three differing religions come together onto one campus to form the Tri-Faith initiative. The building concept is focused on this integration as well as the important elements of the Abrahamic faiths. Surrounding the Tri-Faith building are three buildings, one for the three religions: American Muslim Institute, Countryside Community Church, Temple of Israel. The space within Tri-Faith consists of a large exhibition hall that serves to educate and present the different faiths beliefs and artifacts. A reflection room provides a space without bias for worshipers within each of the three religions. Each aperture and angle are positioned in a way to provide intention and focus on the three surrounding buildings. A large triangulate ceiling structure is design to focus on Abraham’s tent along with a large green space on the back of Tri-Faith to provide as a reflection garden.

• Arriving: When you arrive at the Tri-Faith Center (13136 Faith Plaza, Omaha, NE 68144), you can enter through either the upper-level or lower-level doors. If anyone has accessibility needs, we do have handicap parking spaces slightly south of our main (upper-level) entrance, but you can feel free to park in the parking lots on the north or south side of our building as well.
• Masks: Per current CDC guidelines, all of our visitors are asked to wear masks indoors, regardless of vaccination status. This allows us to respect the safety, health, and policies of our staff and partners. In case anyone forgets to bring a mask, we do keep some disposable masks on hand.

Tour led by Jeff Dolezal, AIA, of TACKarchitects.  Limited to 40 Participants.

Cancelled Tour: 3:30 pm - 4:30 pm | The Scarlet Hotel - Nebraska Innovation Campus

The Scarlet Hotel - Nebraska Innovation Campus
2101 Transformation Drive, Lincoln, NE 68508

The hotel will be six stories and have approximately 155 rooms. In addition to the rooms, the hotel would have a full-service restaurant, coffee shop, gym and other amenities and could serve as a learning space for University of Nebraska-Lincoln students pursuing majors in hospitality, tourism and restaurant management. The hotel will be built near the intersection of 21st Street and Transformation Drive, adjacent to the new Rise Building that just opened last year and across the street from The Mill Coffee & Tea on Innovation Campus. Along with providing lodging accommodations for those attending the conference center at Innovation Campus, the hotel could also be used for businesses located at the park to host clients, and it will be a short distance from the Devaney Sports Center. Limited to 40 Participants.

9:00 am – 10:00 am | Maintaining positive mental health and building cultural competency in a highly charged sociopolitical environment [1 LU]

Dr. Lawrence Chatters currently serves as the Senior Associate Athletic Director for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.

Providing culturally competent services for marginalized populations can be complicated and difficult. We are called to understand the cultural implications that impact our interactions while also being able to process our own biases and privileges that impact our worldviews. As our country’s sociopolitical landscape has become more highly charged it is evident that there are real consequences when we do choose to make a statement, support a cause or comment on an issue. Dr. Chatters will provide a high energy interactive session that will provide participants with strategies they can use immediately to increase their cultural competency, recognize their biases and be more positively present in their work and practice within the architectural industry.

10:00 am - 11:00 am | Tax Increment Financing [1 HSW]

David C. Levy,  Baird Holm LLP and Senator Justin Wayne, District 13

Presenters will explain everything you need to know as an architect when a project may quality for TIF in blighted areas. Session will provide an overview of LR14CA passed by the Nebraska voters in November 2020 and legislation recently passed in the Nebraska Legislature.

11:00 am - 12:00 pm | Nebraska's Housing Crisis - Ethical Considerations for Affordable Housing [1 HSW | Ethics] 

Our nation is facing a severe shortage of affordable housing, and Nebraska is no exception. Recent estimates indicate that the City of Lincoln alone is facing a deficit of 17,000 housing units, 9,000 of which need to be available to low- and moderate-income families. Learn more about the current issues, ethical considerations and efforts occurring in Nebraska to support neighborhoods and affordable housing. A panel of Lincoln colleagues will provide an overview to the critical perspectives from four key players in that City’s affordable housing dialogue, including architects, a developer, and a municipal staffer helping coordinate city strategy.

The panel will be moderated by Wayne Mortensen, AIA, CEO, NeighborWorks Lincoln, and panelists include Wynn Hjermstad, City of Lincoln; Pat Birch, AIA, Schemmer and Jeff Day, FAIA, Actual Architecture Co.  

Neighborhood Tours
Spend the afternoon touring neighborhoods transformed into vibrant neighborhoods, missing middle housing and community spaces in Omaha, Lincoln and Papillion.  

Lincoln Tour

Walking Tour: Affordability & Ethics Along Antelope Valley [1.5 HSW | Ethics]
2:00 pm - 3:30 pm
NeighborWorks Lincoln (NWL) development and construction staff will provide inclusive housing enthusiasts with a behind-the-scenes tour of two recently-completed mixed-income housing developments adjacent to the City's recently-completed Antelope Valley infrastructure project. Antelope Village is an 18-unit attached townhome development, while Antelope Square is a 23-unit rowhouse development. The walk will include unit walk-thrus, insight into NeighborWorks Lincoln neighborhood strategies, and possibly 1-2 additional infill and market rate units facilitated by NWL.

Meet at The Hub Café, 250 N. 21st Suite 3, Lincoln, 68503. The tour will also conclude at The Hub Café. On-street metered parking is available.

Omaha  Tour

CANCELLED Millwork Commons 
2:00 pm - 4:00 pm

Papillion Tour

CANCELLED Prairie Queen [2.0 HSW]
2:00 pm - 4:00 pm

13172 Lincoln Rd, Papillion, NE 68138

Perhaps the nation’s first exclusively “missing middle” housing neighborhood, the 50-acre Prairie Queen in Papillion, Nebraska—near Omaha—completed its first phase in June 2019. Developed only with Missing Middle Housing types. Prairie Queen is a re-imagining of a suburban apartment complex in the form of a walkable neighborhood, a new urbanist neighborhood of its kind. The concept combines the efficiencies of garden apartments and the flexibility of missing middle. Bungalows on the Lake at Prairie Queen was awarded the National Association of Home Builder's Best in American Living award for 2020.

Introductory comments from the design team, Dave Johnson, AIA and Jason Struve from studio951, a division of Shive-Hattery. Tour led by Kelly Zimmerman, Property Educator/Leasing Agent, Urban Waters Development

Meet at the intersection of 131^st and Lincoln Road. 13172 Lincoln Rd, Papillion, NE 68138. Use map for parking. Number of attendees unlimited. 

10:00 am - 11:00 am | STEM-Inspired Center to Inspire Next Generation and Revitalize Omaha Riverfront [1 HSW]

Thomas Rockwell, Senior Creative Director, Exploratorium, San Francisco and Michael P. Hamilton, AIA, Design Principal, HDR

The Kiewit Luminarium is an innovative community space and learning environment that is part workshop, part museum. It’s a place for hands-on experiences in science, math, engineering and technology for middle school groups and children ages 6 and up. The interior space is designed to be warm and inviting to suggest that science is friendly, familiar and approachable. The interior walls are constructed with custom milled 4 foot by 8 foot sheets of plywood that act as “pegboard” for interactivity and modularity.

The building is thought of as a “container” like the classic Nebraska vernacular “machine-shed,” simple, honest, performative — where apertures in the aluminum exterior envelope strictly adhere to optimal shading based on the orientation of the façade. The building geometry emerged out of an apparent “grain” to the landscape that organizes the building into two forms. On the west, towards Downtown Omaha, it “lifts” off the ground, which creates an elevated “canvas” into the air and acts as a billboard to the city. The space under the cantilever then becomes a pedestrian space — a large bus stop for group collection and lingering. The east form along the river anchors into the site along the riverfront boardwalk. The vertical shading fins along the east provide exciting glimpses into the interior, thus animating the façade experience as pedestrians meander the riverwalk.

The new privately-funded, community-backed science center aims to become a family-friendly destination when it opens in 2023. It will not only serve a critical need in Omaha’s cultural amenities, it will help inspire children’s interest in STEM.

11:00 am - 12:00 pm | Whole Building Life Cycle Assessment - Embodied Carbon Basics, Market Transformation and Project Implementation [1 HSW]

Tim Hemsath, AIA, LEED AP, WELL AP, Project Architect | Sustainability LEAD, BVH Architecture; Anthony Pak, Principal at Priopta and Founder of CLF Vancouver;
Melanie Silver AIA, LEED AP BD+C, Associate | Building Scientist, Payette's Building Science Group

Prioritizing reductions to global warming potential GWP in the built environment has focused primarily on operational energy or carbon dioxide emissions (CO2e) reductions. Building operations make up 28% of global C02e. To reduce this the AEC industry delivers more efficient, sustainable building designs. However, an additional 11% of global C02e come directly from building materials and construction. In fact within the first 10 years of a building’s life cycle embodied carbon can account for more GWP than operational energy emissions. Building and designing to reduce C02e requires attention to the embodied carbon emissions to achieve immediate GWP impact. 

Recent policies and standards for building are beginning to include tracking, measuring and reducing the embodied energy or embodied carbon of buildings. Due to states and the federal government implementing Buy Clean policies, the market is transforming the architecture and engineering industry.

1:00 pm - 2:00 pm | Clarity [1 HSW]

Ben Waechter, AIA, Founder, Waechter Architecture

For Waechter Architecture, the experience of a place is paramount. We feel an instinctual draw to the environments in which we feel most alive, awake, and present. These are environments where the relationship of elements is apparent and intertwined. These are the environments that contain a distinct character and coherence, yet are open to change and evolution. These are the environments that appear both timeless and vital. Ultimately, these are the environments that resonate in the mind, offering intelligibility to the world around us. Throughout our work, we seek to discover and evoke a similar sense of clarity, producing spaces for more vivid experiences. This lecture explores themes and techniques used to achieve this goal of clarity in four projects.

Tour: 2:00 pm - 3:00 pm | Lincoln's Luxury Skinnyscraper - Construction Progress Tour [1 HSW]

Corner of 11^th and Q, Across from the Lied Center, Lincoln 

Tour Lincoln’s 2^nd tallest building, built on the footprint of a former Applebee’s. See multiple stages of construction progress from the unfinished ground floor to nearly complete condos. Take a trip to the top and check out the incredible views. Hear from the developers about the project’s long journey from concept in the early 90’s to construction today.

Park in the adjacent parking garage, meet at the corner of 11^th and Q. Attendees must wear hard hats, vests, closed toe shoes and pants. 

Tour led by: Lead Developer: Tamas Allan; Owner’s Representative: Jon Thomas; Interior Architect: Kjersten Tucker, Sinclair Hille.

Limited to 20 Participants. 

Tour: 2:00 pm - 3:00 pm | 15000 Valmont Plaza, Omaha, 68154

Valmont HQ: Committed to Sustainability, Expansion and the Employee Experience, [1 HSW Pending]

The new headquarters will be strategically situated on a 6-acre site of the north gateway to the 500-acre Heartwood Preserve mixed-use development — which some foresee as the new downtown of west Omaha. Committed to sustainability, the new global headquarters design is targeting LEED Gold certification for commercial interiors and WELL Gold certification. The exterior of new office building features sleek metal panels and high-efficiency glazing system. The east and west curtain wall system not only captures the great view of surrounding green space and introduces natural light into interior space, but also showcases Valmont products — custom-made perforated metal panels used as sun screens.  

Park at the parking lot to the east of the building. Meet under the building overhang at the Northeast Corner of the building. 

Tour led by Tyson Fiscus, AIA, and Xin Zhao, AIA of HDR, Inc.; Kurt Cisar, AIA and Brittany Miller, AIA of Holland Basham Architects. 

Limited to 30 participants.

Tour: 3:00 pm - 4:00 pm | UNL Dinsdale Family Learning Commons [1 HSW]

University of Nebraska-Lincoln - East Campus, 1625 N. 38th Street, Lincoln

Built in 1973 in the heart of UNL’s East Campus the CY Thompson Library stood relatively unchanged for nearly 50 years.  In 2015 UNL along with DLR Group began the process of transforming the existing building into a 21^st century library and learning commons.  Following Programming and Schematic design UNL went on a 3 yr fundraising effort and in 2018 DLR Group was released to finish design.  The building was stripped down to its super structure, maintaining the classic order of the original while completely rearranging circulation and adding transparent envelope that radiates the active student life within.

Parking is available at the UNL East Campus Student Union, North side. 

Requirement: Masks are required on UNL Campuses. 

Tour led by DLR Group, Daniel Siedhoff, AIA. 

Limited to 50 participants.

Please select the dates you are able to attend. 

Discounted Rates: Receive $25 off your registration when you register for all three conference days.

AIA Nebraska Member Registration

Associate AIA Member Registration (Non-Emerging Professional)
Associate AIA members not seeking licensure

Associate AIA / AIAS Nebraska/Newly Licensed (Emerging Professional) Member Registration
Complimentary Conference Registration (tours excluded) for Associate AIA & AIAS Members that are considered Emerging Professionals. Defined as students, recent graduates, associate members seeking licensure and architects licensed within the last year (September 2020 - September 2021).

Non-Member Registration

You must be a registered conference attendee to participate in the tours.

September 9, 2021

Registration has closed for the following tours:

• Restoring the former Blackstone Center into the Kimpton Cottonwood Hotel
• Tri-Faith Center

September 30, 2021