HOK Lecture in Sustainable Design at U.Va. School of Architecture Nov. 1

October 11, 2010 — Lawrence Scarpa will give the HOK Lecture in Sustainable Design at the University of Virginia's School of Architecture on Nov. 1, from 5:30 to 6:30 p.m., in Campbell Hall, room 153. Scarpa's lecture is titled, "Ordinary and Extraordinary."

Scarpa is a principal in Brooks + Scarpa Architects (formerly Pugh + Scarpa), an architecture, engineering, interior design and planning firm based in Santa Monica, Calif. Over the last 10 years, Scarpa's firm has received more than 50 major design awards, notably 16 National American Institute of Architect Awards, including the 2010 Architecture Firm Award. In 2010, Pugh + Scarpa received the AIA National and California Council Firm Award.

The work of Brooks + Scarpa is driven by Scarpa's design vision of making the ordinary extraordinary by using everyday materials in inventive and unusual ways. They are known for rethinking the way things normally get done, from materials to form, construction, even financing.

"This produces entirely inventive work that is quite difficult to categorize. It is environmentally sustainable, but not 'sustainable design'; it employs new materials, digital practices and technologies, but is not 'tech' or 'digital'; it is socially and community conscious, but not politically correct. Rather, it is deeply rooted in conditions of the everyday, and works with our perception and preconceptions to allow us to see things in new ways," Scarpa said.

Scarpa has taught and lectured at numerous schools including the University of California, Los Angeles; University of Florida; Mississippi State University; and Southern California Institute of Architecture. He is also a co-founder of Livable Places Inc., a nonprofit development and public policy organization dedicated to building mixed-use housing on under-utilized and problematic parcels of land.

The HOK Lecture in Sustainable Design is funded by HOK, a Washington, D.C.-based sustainable design firm led by William Hellmuth, a 1975 graduate of the School of Architecture.

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