“Architecture and landscape design…can give a community clarity, coherence, and order, as well as beauty and delight, and can help define a community’s identity and values. We can celebrate places that nurture our living together.”
Author Alice Meriwether Bowsher, Community in Alabama
“Good design, smart planning, creative place-making are all pillars of progressive growth that occurs as part of creative problem solving, taking advantage of opportunities and having an elevated vision for the present and future.”
Al Head, retired Executive Director of the Alabama State Council on the Arts and Alabama Native
While Auburn University’s Rural Studio gets plenty of attention, its counterpart, Birmingham-based Urban Studio, has also made a lasting and beneficial impact on Alabama communities. The Urban Studio was founded in 1991 as an outreach initiative to seek out projects to engage students and make Birmingham and Alabama towns a better place to live. Its Small Town Design Initiative, developed by former Urban Studio Director Cheryl Morgan, expanded the Urban Studio philosophy of promoting good design and planning statewide, serving more than 70 Alabama neighborhoods and communities. Alex Krumdieck is director.
Photo Credit: Auburn University’s Urban Studio
Discovering the best Alabama has to offer takes time, effort and a bit of luck. Word-of-mouth or coming across a magazine article will provide information, but chances are you’ll never be aware of everything to see and do that’s great in the state. With DesignAlabama’s ConnectLivity, all the work is done. A 12-pack of destination itineraries with maps is available or one can select a coffee table book with all 12 itineraries plus information about each destination. Each itinerary has a different theme such as arts, architecture, crafts, Civil Rights and family fun, and each contains helpful tips. All you need to hit the road and experience Alabama to the fullest.
Photo Credit: Copperwing Design
Standard Deluxe is both a graphic design shop that promotes music and a music promoter that prints graphic designs. Founded in Waverly by Alabama native Scott Peek, Standard Deluxe blends the aesthetics of rural Southern culture, contemporary serigraphy and 21st century Southern rock music. Working out of a cluster of historic buildings, Peek’s print work combines retro iconography with pop art printing techniques. Peek also hosts musical events, including the “Old 280 Boogie” held every fall and spring. The National Trust for Historic Preservation calls Standard Deluxe and Old 280 Boogie reminders “of how positive and expansive preservation can be.”
Photo Credit: Standard Deluxe
Stone carving might be the world’s oldest three-dimensional art form and one that self-taught stone sculptor Brooks Barrow has mastered with his elegant stone vessels and sculptural objects made of Alabama limestone and marble. Though Barrow primarily works with native limestone and marble, he also carves granite and slate to make his one-of-a-kind pieces that are freeform and not turned on a lathe. Old world techniques and traditional tools are used to create functional objects and works of art that have a modern, minimalist aesthetic.
Photo Credit: Brooks Barrow
Auburn University industrial design graduate Hunter Foy has made a name for himself in both the corporate world at IBM and as an independent consultant as president of OrchardDesign studio. While employed at IBM, Foy worked on the design of the Simon, the world’s first smartphone that went on sale in 1994 and featured a touchscreen, email capability and a handful of built-in apps including a calculator and sketch pad. The award-winning designer also created several tablets and notebook-style laptops, and worked on the design of kitchen appliances, outdoor lighting and medical devices. Foy was also lead designer on a diagnostic tool for General Motors.
Recognized as Alabama’s oldest bank, the Bank of Brewton opened in January 1889 and continues to operate, though it has since moved into an adjacent newer building. The original two-story brick building remains a local landmark with its façade of imported white tile decorated with a green border. Inside, the counters are made of native curled pine. Brewton citizens were given the best banks had to offer in their day. As noted in a local newspaper article: “large safes, a large fire and burglar proof vault and the very best combination locks made.”
Photo Credit: Lewis Kennedy
A turning point in Alabama’s history is the 1965 Selma to Montgomery March, commemorated at the Montgomery Interpretive Center set to open early 2019. The center is the third of three interpretive centers that connect Selma to Montgomery. Construction was completed in 2017 and the interior exhibit space is being completed by the National Park Service. The center’s primary facade captures the spirit of the march with an 18-foot-tall limestone front wall featuring a sandblasted relief pattern that replicates the march. Designed by Chambless King Architects in Montgomery, the project won the 2018 Excellence in Design Honor Award from AIA Alabama.
Photo Credit: Chambless King Architects
After decades of decline, many historic downtown districts across Alabama began thriving. It happened with gusto in Opelika. Renovated buildings along South Railroad Avenue and elsewhere downtown now sport colorful awnings and new coats of paint. Once vacant and unmaintained historic properties now flourish as restaurants, art galleries, shops and offices. The Railroad Avenue Historic District was the center of downtown Opelika when the city was incorporated in 1854. South Railroad Avenue remains a vibrant part of Opelika’s commercial core and is the site of several annual city events.
Photo Credit: Opelika Chamber of Commerce
As any Tuskegee University alum knows, “Strollin’ down the Ave” means to march along University Avenue which runs through the center of campus and dates back to the days of founder Booker T. Washington. “The Ave” also runs through the middle of the Tuskegee Institute National Historic Site. Walking east to west along the route, one experiences the westward growth of the early campus and key historic landmarks. These include the 1889 Band Cottage, the oldest building on campus; the 1910 Tompkins Hall and White Hall with its original clock tower; and the 1915 George Washington Carver Museum. “The Ave” terminates at the 1922 Booker T. Washington Monument facing the 1901 Kellogg Conference Center and the 1969 Tuskegee Chapel.
Photo Credit: KPS Group, Inc
Concerning architecture, Tuskegee University is best known for its Booker T. Washington-era buildings built by students. But the National Historic Site is also home to an internationally renowned work of modern architecture: the Tuskegee University Chapel. Built in 1969 to replace the original 1898 chapel, the monumental brick edifice was designed by famed architect Paul Rudolph and the African-American firm of John A. Welch and Louis Fry, who taught at the Tuskegee Institute. Listed by Southern Living as one of “The South’s Most Beautiful Chapels,” the structure is known for its expansive, light-filled sanctuary – a balance between the “opposite movements of space and light,” as Rudolph described it.
Photo Credit: Lewis Kennedy
Eufaula has one of the state’s largest historic districts with more than 700 structures listed on the National Register of Historic Places. Remarkably, its central business district along East Broad Street has most of its late 19th and early 20th century buildings intact. Several early structures are open to the public. In 1832, Barbour County was incorporated and two years later Captain Seth Lore began developing the commercial core with three- and four-story buildings along Broad Street.
Photo Credit: Encyclopedia of Alabama
It took 18 years for owner and amateur designer Nathan Whitfield to build Gaineswood, his vast plantation home in Demopolis completed in 1861 on the eve of the Civil War. The exterior features 18 fluted Doric columns and 14 plain square pillars that support three porches, the main portico and the coach gate. Inside the Greek Revival-style home are a series of suites with domed ceilings. Three of the original outbuildings survive. Typical of most antebellum mansions, Gaineswood was built primarily with slave labor. Gaineswood today is a museum operated by the Alabama Historical Commission.
Photo Credit: Lewis Kennedy
One of the most hauntingly beautiful cemeteries found anywhere is Live Oak Cemetery in Selma, with its abundance of weathered statuary and Spanish moss-draped live oaks. The oldest portion was purchased by the township of Selma in 1829 and called West Selma Graveyard. The newer section of the cemetery grounds was purchased in 1877 and combined with the older section to form Live Oak Cemetery. Many prominent local residents are buried here, including U. S. Vice President William Rufus King, one of the founders of Selma, and Benjamin Sterling Turner, Alabama’s first African-American Congressman.
Photo Credit: Alabama Tourism Department
The 250-acre Wynton M. Blount Cultural Park offers three venues in one – the Montgomery Museum of Fine Arts, the Alabama Shakespeare Festival and the Hannah Daye Ridling Bark Park. Outdoor sculpture is displayed throughout the grounds from the museum’s collection. The renowned Alabama Shakespeare Festival brings professional performances to the park. Bark Park is a park-within-the-park with separate areas to walk dogs. Blount Cultural Park features ponds, walking trails, a natural amphitheater and scenery reminiscent of the English countryside. Shakespearian features include a stone bridge and a thatched-roof storybook-style structure.
Photo Credit: Chris Granger
“This is the workshop full of love, information and learning to help build our community,” said a participant of Your Town Alabama, a program that leverages a town’s assets – economic, historic/cultural and natural resources – to revitalize and invigorate the town. The first workshop was in 1998, adapted from a National Trust for Historic Preservation program. Alabama was the first state to implement the program and more than 1,000 citizen-leaders have participated in the 2 ½-day workshop. Partners include the Alabama Historical Commission, the Alabama State Council on the Arts, DesignAlabama, CAWACO RC&D, University of Alabama’s Center for Economic Development and Auburn University’s Rural Studio.
Photo Credit: Your Town Alabama
Alabama Innovation Engine – the name conveys it all – converting the power of new ideas into motion. Funded by the University of Alabama’s Center for Economic Development and Auburn University’s Urban Studio, the organization is a design-based community development initiative that fosters large scale constructive change by the use of design to encourage economic development in Alabama’s rural communities. The aim is to support communities as they realize the potential of their greatest resources. Partnerships are built between mission-driven organizations and design firms to create opportunities for design to have an impact on local innovation projects.
Photo Credit: Alabama Innovation Engine
In Renaissance Europe, “cabinets of curiosities” were rooms that housed an eclectic mix of objects. Not what you’d expect to find off Highway 431 in Seale. Butch Anthony’s Museum of Wonder was described by the New York Times as: “A barnful of curiosities — the ‘world’s largest gallbladder,’ a replica of a human skeleton, a stuffed chicken — and more of Mr. Anthony’s artwork, which includes 19th-century portraits painted over with crisp white images of skeletons and old photographs affixed to paintings of mythical creatures of his own imagining.” Nearby is his Drive Thru Museum made from shipping containers with cutout windows that display a 1930s preacher’s tableau depicting hell, a stuffed two-headed chicken and other oddities.
Photo Credit: Alabama News Center
HERObike, a nonprofit bike shop in Greensboro, is dedicated to ending poverty in and around Hale County. Former Victoria’s Secret designer Pam Dorr came up with the idea to put indigenous bamboo to use and create local jobs. The premise is to build a better bike out of bamboo – yes, bamboo – which is lightweight but strong, making it ideal for a bike frame. Bikes are made on site and workshops are offered for people who want to build their own. HERO stands for Hale Empowerment and Revitalization Organization, the nonprofit group that got HERObike up and running.
Photo Credit: Alabama News Center
At Shakespeare Gardens in Montgomery, the sights and fragrant smells will take you on a sensory journey back to Elizabethan England. Plants that grew during Shakespeare’s day delight the senses. The 56,700-square-foot garden complex is part of the Wynton M. Blount Cultural Park in Montgomery. Plants and flowers referred to in Shakespeare’s works are part of the landscape design. Roses grow that are mentioned in “Romeo and Juliet,” narcissus from “Antony and Cleopatra” and leek from “A Midsummer Night’s Dream.” Gardens are surrounded by woven wattle fences built by Alabama craftsman, along with trellises, arbors and benches.
Photo Credit: Goodwyn Mills and Cawood
“Everyone in his own way is affected by his environment. The chords that are struck in people are not necessarily the ones which the architect anticipates. It seems to me the better the building, the more variety of chords that are struck.”
Paul Rudolph, Architect of the Tuskegee Chapel
Apple recently became the first company in the United States to reach a $1 trillion market value due in large part to its well-designed products, in particular the iPhone. Apple CEO Tim Cook called this monumental milestone “not the most important measure” of the company’s success, but was instead the result of its laser-sharp focus on its products, customers and company values. Cook’s degree from Auburn University is in industrial engineering, not design. Nevertheless, Cook has taken one of the largest design-driven companies in the world to stratospheric heights.
Photo Credit: Tim Cook
With her experience in design and development for major brands, Auburn University industrial design graduate Tippi Clark’s resume reads like a Who’s Who in fashion design – Banana Republic, Kate Spade, Juicy Couture, Coach and Club Monaco, to name a few. The Opelika native is currently senior technical designer at Marc Jacobs for handbags and novelty accessories and creative director for the design firm The Novogratz. At Banana Republic, Clark was production and product development manager for all accessories and she served as director of development for Rebecca Minkoff. Clark is also the founder of denim brand Holt McCall and Little Flea NOLA, a new Orleans-based flea market specializing in vintage finds.
Photo Credit: Tippi Clark
Every time you use your laptop or ThinkPad you have early innovators like Alabama native Tom Hardy to thank. Hardy studied industrial design at Auburn University under Eva Pfeil and Walter Schaer and then began a 22-year career at IBM as an industrial designer of award-winning IBM products, including the original IBM Personal Computer introduced in 1981. In 2016, two products directly influenced by Hardy were selected by Time magazine as being among “The 50 Most Influential Gadgets of All Time.” No. 5 on the list is the first IBM Personal Computer 5150 and No. 21 is the iconic IBM ThinkPad 700C. Today, Hardy is Professor of Design Management at Savannah College of Art and Design (SCAD).
Photo Credit: Tom Hardy
Made in Alabama is a message that could not be simpler or more to the point. Launched by the Alabama Department of Commerce in 2013, Made in Alabama became a successful branding campaign designed to strengthen the state’s economic development and attract investment. The marketing initiative centers on its website, which provides sharable information that focuses on Alabama’s economic development achievements and what makes the state attractive for investment. The Made in Alabama brand and website was designed and developed by Alabama-based public relations and advertising agency BIG Communications.
Photo Credit: Big Communication & Alabama Department of Commerce
Alabama graphic designers make a lasting imprint (no pun intended), both nationally and internationally. Case in point is Auburn University graduate and graphic designer Brad Copeland, who created Atlanta’s well known “5-A’s” logo for its bid for the 1996 Centennial Olympic Games. Copeland went on to create many more Olympic images as the International Olympic Committee’s official advisor on the “Look of the Games.” Graphic designs make enduring impressions and the Olympic logos throughout the years appeal to both the young and old. Reaching a wide audience – and leaving a lasting mark as the Olympic logos do – is a hallmark of graphic design at its best.
Photo Credit: Brad Copeland/ Copeland Hirther
When Montgomery-based Kershaw Manufacturing Company Inc. was incorporated in 1944, it was responding to the need for efficient vegetation control equipment for utility companies and railroads, and as a result became a pioneer in early vegetation control. Kershaw is now a subsidiary of Progress Rail Services Corporation, a leading integrated and diversified supplier of railroad and transit system products and services worldwide. In 2006, Progress Rail was acquired by Caterpillar Inc., a foremost global manufacturer of construction and mining equipment, diesel and natural gas engines, industrial gas turbines and diesel-electric locomotives.
Photo Credit: Kershaw/ Progress Rail
Alabama Power was founded on renewable hydro energy and manages 14 hydro facilities along the Coosa, Tallapoosa and Black Warrior rivers. Its hydroelectric plants provide about 6 percent of the company’s power generation. These dams impound more than 157,000 acres of water and provide more than 3,500 miles of shoreline for public use and recreation. Lay Dam on the Coosa River near Clanton was built in 1914 and was Alabama Power’s first major project. According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, Alabama is ranked sixth in the nation for renewable energy capacity, primarily because of its existing hydro generation.
Photo Credit: Alabama News Center
Many people can’t afford to purchase a Mercedes, but they can learn all about them at the Mercedes-Benz Visitor Center in Vance. In 2015, Mercedes-Benz invested $3 million to renovate the visitor center at its Alabama auto plant. The redesigned center offers an interactive exhibit of the automaker’s 128-year history. The original building was designed by Gresham, Smith and Partners in 1997 and has a swooping roof that mimics the lines of a classic Mercedes racecar. On display are cars from the horseless carriage days to those hot off the assembly line of plants including this one. The gleaming surfaces of finely crafted streamlined forms are evident throughout the building.
Photo Credit: Lewis Kennedy
Built in Tuscaloosa in the 1850s, Bryce Hospital opened in 1861 as the Alabama State Hospital for the Insane. The Italianate-style hospital designed by architect Samuel Sloan was the first building in Tuscaloosa with gas lighting and central heat. The University of Alabama bought the property in 2010, which is part of a project that includes a new performing arts center on the property. The new Performing Arts Academic Center will connect to the restored Bryce Hospital. The main hospital building is being renovated to include a welcome center, reception venue, offices and rehearsal space, along with museums dedicated to university history and the history of mental health in Alabama.
Photo Credit: Lewis Kennedy
When Prattville founder Daniel Pratt opened his cotton gin factory in 1848 it became one of Alabama’s leading industries, supplying cotton gins in the United States and worldwide. Plans are under way to convert the Daniel Pratt Cotton Gin Factory into 147 loft-style apartments in the five historic brick buildings that comprise the factory. The old gin factory is part of the Daniel Pratt Historic District, which encompasses the 19th century nucleus of the town and consists of over 200 properties, most dating from 1840 to 1930, with a high concentration between 1880 and 1920. Among these are important early industrial buildings.
Photo Credit: City of Prattville
No wonder that St. Andrew’s Episcopal Church in Prairieville is popular with photographers. The small board-and-batten Carpenter-Gothic church was built in 1853 by slaves and features wooden buttresses, gothic windows and tiny white-painted wooden crosses that embellish each roof ridge. The unaltered interior has hand-carved symbols and figures on the altar rail and in the chancel. A mixture brewed from tobacco plants was possibly used to stain the interior walls. The design may have been influenced by Richard Upjohn, a British-born architect who immigrated to the United States and became famous for his Gothic-Revival churches including Trinity Church in New York City.
Photo Credit: Lewis Kennedy
No place fits the proverb “necessity is the mother of invention” better than Hale County in west-central Alabama. It is here in the fertile Black Belt soil that Auburn University’s internationally renowned Rural Studio took root, driven by the belief that both the rich and poor are worthy of good design. Auburn University architecture students design and build context-based, socially conscious houses and community buildings using practically anything they can get their hands on: scavenged and donated materials, discarded building supplies, car parts, bottles, old road signs, license plates and carpet tiles. Many building projects are in Newbern, the Rural Studio’s headquarters, as well as the surrounding area.
Photo Credit: Rural Studio
St. John’s was organized in 1834 by pioneer settlers and is the oldest Episcopal parish in Montgomery. In 1855 a larger church was built, designed by the nation’s foremost church architects Wills & Dudley of New York, which comprises the narthex and nave of the present church. By 1869, more room was needed and the church was torn down, its bricks used to build the present chancel and sanctuary. Further expansion took place in 1906, at which time Italian mosaic tile was laid on the floor of the enlarged chancel. The church’s windows include stained glass by Charles Connick of Boston and Louis Tiffany of New York.
Photo Credit: Lewis Kennedy
Three courthouses have flanked the Monroeville Courthouse Square over the years. First was the antebellum courthouse, which was replaced with a new courthouse in 1904, followed by the present day Monroe County Courthouse. When To Kill a Mockingbird was published in 1960, the 1904 courthouse gained national fame. In 1963, county offices moved to a new building on the square. The former courthouse became the Old Courthouse Museum, which opened full time in 1991 with the first production of a play adapted from To Kill a Mockingbird performed in the courtroom. The Monroeville Downtown Historic District is centered on the courthouse square and the streets that border it.
Photo Credit: Chris Granger
One of the oldest public squares in Alabama is the Demopolis Public Square that was established in 1819. The focal point of the park – which takes up a city block – is a large cast iron fountain installed in 1895. A pavilion built in 1886 provides visitors with shade and protection from inclement weather. Two other historic buildings are in the square: Rooster Hall that was originally built as a Presbyterian church in 1843 and the old City hall building, parts of which date back to 1820.
Photo credit: Internet
U.S. history changed twice on Montgomery’s six-block Dexter Avenue. At one end is Court Square with its circa 1885 fountain and the Alabama State Capitol steps are at the other. It was on Dexter Avenue that Confederate delegates decided to fire on Fort Sumter – a decision that started the Civil War. Ninety years later, the Civil Rights movement was born here. Dexter Avenue’s historic sites include the spot where Rosa Parks boarded the fateful bus, the Rosa Parks Museum and the Dexter Avenue King Memorial Baptist Church where Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was pastor. Also on Dexter Avenue is Chris’ Hot Dogs, a restaurant open since 1917 that has served everyone from Dr. King and F. Scott Fitzgerald to Hank Williams and Elvis.
Photo credit: Lewis Kennedy
Community-led revitalization is challenging work and Main Street Alabama makes it easier by offering towns the resources, technical services and educational offerings to help navigate downtown and commercial district management. Main Street Alabama was incorporated in 2010 and before that time the Alabama Historical Commission served as the state Main Street coordinating program, providing guidance, support, services and certification to communities. Main Street Alabama follows the nationwide Main Street model that has been successful in many states by using its proven method of leveraging local assets to create sustainable and comprehensive revitalization plans.
Photo credit: Main Street Alabama
Alabama is fortunate to have many organizations working to improve the quality of life in communities. Alabama Communities of Excellence (ACE) is one of these organizations. Founded in 2002, the nonprofit ACE partners with the private and public sectors as well as universities to help communities with a population of 2,000-18,000 achieve their goals in three phases. Phase 1 is assessment; Phase 2 involves leadership development and strategic planning; and Phase 3 implementation and comprehensive planning. After completion, communities get an ACE designation and are recognized by the Alabama League of Municipalities.
Photo credit: Alabama Communities of Excellence
When A.H. Cather Publishing Company in Birmingham closed its door after 100 years, Cotton & Pine purchased its antique letterpress printing equipment to keep the ancient art alive. The Montgomery-based Cotton & Pine offers print design, video and web, and custom letterpress printing. Founded by Daniel Mims and Steven Lambert, who is creative director, Cotton & Pine offers a full-service print shop and design studio that offers all the creative services of a design firm. Its in-house shop, C&P Mercantile, sells their line of ready-made, 100 percent cotton paper goods and hand-crafted items from Alabama and throughout the South.
Photo credit: boxcarpress.com
Though the creative process is often a solitary pursuit, design is becoming more integrated thanks to such innovations as the Alabama Workshop[s] Toolkit, a guide to how craft artisans in Alabama conduct workshops. Created by Robert Finkel, associate professor of Auburn University’s Graphic Design in the School of Industrial & Graphic Design, and Sheri Schumacher, associate professor emerita in AU’s School of Architecture, Planning and Landscape Architecture, the toolkit is used to promote a network of Alabama artisans, makers and organizations that offer workshops for craft production.
Photo credit: Sheri Schumacher
No wonder that Jasmine Hill Gardens and Outdoor Museum near Wetumpka is called “Alabama’s Little Corner of Greece” with its collection of nearly 40 pieces of Greek statuary, both original and reproductions. The 20-acre botanical garden was established in the early 1930s by Benjamin and Mary Fitzpatrick who made over 20 trips to Greece to purchase art objects. The gardens include a copy of the ruins of the Temple of Hera in Olympia, Greece and a separate restored temple facade at the museum entrance as it would have looked during the 7th Century B.C. Paths throughout the garden are made from native stone constructed as a WPA project. The garden is operated by the nonprofit Jasmine Hill Foundation.
Photo credit: Peggy Collins
A pioneer in the plastics recycling industry, Troy-based KW Plastics was founded in 1981 to process used automotive battery casings into polypropylene resin – a durable and versatile material much in demand for making quality recycled products. In 1998, KW entered the packaging industry with its all-plastic, one-gallon can that’s injection molded and 100 percent recycled and recyclable. Today, KW Container is the leading global supplier with these all-plastic, one-gallon paint containers to the paint and coatings industry. KW also supplies recycled resin to many industries including automotive, agriculture and construction.
Photo credit: KW Container
An organization that was instrumental to the design career of Chris Livaudais has now appointed him to its top position. The Auburn University industrial design graduate is the new interim executive director of the Industrial Designers Society of America, one of the oldest and largest industrial design associations. Livaudais has been an active member in IDSA since he graduated from Auburn University in 2002, serving in several key regional positions. Livaudais was senior design consultant at Embraer in the San Francisco Bay Area when named to head the IDSA. Prior to this, he was creative director of InReality in Atlanta.
Photo credit: Chris Livaudais
“I always wanted to be an inventor when I grew up,” says industrial designer Lloyd Cooper, who studied mechanical engineering and industrial design at Auburn University. As co-founder and principal of PUSH Product Design in Birmingham, Cooper – who currently holds 17 patents – has achieved his childhood dream and more. PUSH has provided full industrial design services for the past 20 years, taking on a range of challenges from advanced jet-skis to new medical technologies. Among PUSH’s diverse clients are Altec, Yamaha, Gibson, John Deer, University of Alabama at Birmingham and Wake Forest School of Medicine.
Photo credit: Lloyd Cooper
Two professors of industrial design at Auburn University made important contributions to field in Alabama and beyond. Drs. Eva Pfeil and Walter Schaer, both graduates of the famed Ulm School of Design in Germany, joined Auburn’s faculty in 1960. For three decades they elevated its industrial design program and taught countless students who themselves made significant contributions in the field. Pfeil and Schaer are recognized as educators who “brought to the South a new design approach which considered user-centered research a prerequisite for intelligent and responsible product development.”
Photo credit: Eva Pfeil and Walter Schaer
Revitalizing towns should involve the entire community, and what better way to do so than provide a “snapshot” of the master plan in poster form that can be distributed to every household and displayed throughout town? Posters were part of Auburn University’s Urban Studio Small Town Design Initiative which provided master planning and design expertise to small towns and communities throughout Alabama. The posters were designed to be folded for mailing and used as a tool for recruiting, promotion and partnership building. Another plus is that the folded posters can easily be tucked into grant proposals that seek additional funding sources for projects included in the plan.
Photo credit: Cheryl Morgan
When it comes to the DesignAlabama Journal, you certainly can “judge a book by its cover.” Just as important as its content was its design, from the logo still used today to the layout and pleasing balance between positive and negative space. The first article was written by the late Philip Morris, the organization’s first chair of the board of directors. DesignAlabama was founded in 1987 and the journal was available a year later and printed through 2015. Today, it is available as a monthly digital newsletter, DesignAlabama Online. Past print journals are online through the Auburn University Digital Library. Written by then DesignAlabama director Becky Mullen in the second issue: “If response to the first issue of this journal is any indication, DesignAlabama’s future looks promising.” Indeed, it was.
Photo credit: DesignAlabama
The 1965 Selma-to-Montgomery March was a pivotal moment in the nation’s progress toward racial justice. The Edmund Pettus Bridge, which marchers crossed on their way to Montgomery, is among the most sacred places in civil rights history. Law enforcement officers attacked marchers with tear gas and nightsticks on March 7, 1965, a day that came to be known as “Bloody Sunday.” The attention the march generated helped persuade Congress to adopt the Voting Rights Act of 1965. Built in 1940, the bridge is considered a significant engineering improvement over the old bridge that had to be opened by hand.
Photo credit: Art Meripol
“I love every nook and cranny of the building, and during the restoration I was here every single day in a hard hat with the contractors,” recalls the Alabama native. “I could envision what it could be. I didn’t want to break land and create something new. I wanted old bones.”
Heidi Elnora, fashion designer and Alabama Native
Founded in 1888, Thomasville was in its infancy when a major fire in 1899 destroyed the town’s first business district. The fire destroyed the entire downtown area, burning 23 businesses and the postmaster’s residence. Because most of the businesses destroyed were hastily constructed wooden buildings, the town council passed an ordinance stipulating that only brick buildings could be built downtown. Many of these buildings remain today in the Thomasville Historic District, which features examples of early commercial, Queen Anne, Colonial-Revival, Bungalow/Craftsman and regional vernacular architecture.
Photo credit: Brittany Faush-Johnson, Alabama News Center
In the tiny hamlet of Pittsview – an unincorporated community in Russell County – are two exceptional examples Carpenter-Gothic churches that stand side-by-side on a scenic wooded street. One is the United Methodist built in 1893 and the other is the Pittsview Baptist Church built in 1897. Both are thought to be constructed by master carpenter and Pittsview resident William Marshall Burt. Both churches are white painted wood-frame with pointed arches over the windows and graceful steeples above the bell towers. Today, shared services are offered on alternating Sundays to help sustain church attendance.
Photo credit: unknown
Alabama is home to the remains of one of the country’s largest prehistoric Native American settlements. Located along the Black Warrior River just south of Tuscaloosa, the site was once a flourishing ceremonial and political hub of Mississippian culture and occupied over three centuries until it was abandoned in the 16th century. Today, the Moundville Archeological Park contains the original site with its large earthen mounds arranged in an open plaza. Also part of the park is the Jones Archaeological Museum that displays over 200 artifacts. The park and museum are operated by the University of Alabama.
Photo credit: Lewis Kennedy
Part of the historic Old Cloverdale neighborhood in Montgomery, the central campus of Huntingdon College features buildings of Collegiate-Gothic architecture that surround a pleasing park-like setting known as the Green. The Huntingdon College Campus Historic District contains 13 contributing buildings, built in the Gothic-Revival and Tudor-Revival styles. The landscape design for the campus was created by Frederick Law Olmsted, Jr. Huntingdon is private liberal arts college founded in 1854 and is affiliated with the United Methodist Church.
Photo credit: Alabama Historical Commission
One of the last structures of its kind is located in Little Texas, an unincorporated town near Tuskegee. It’s the Little Texas Methodist Tabernacle, which has been the site of camp meetings since the 1850s and was built by local black and white settlers. Worshipers camped in the open air or in temporary wooden tent-like barracks during long revivals. The tabernacle is a “post and beam” building constructed of heavy timbers without the use of nails. Still in use today, the tabernacle has a three-aisled frame with a nave center aisle, used for two rows of pews facing an altar, and a hip roof.
Photo credit: hmdb.org
Not only is Gee’s Bend home to world-famous quilters, but also the first all-electric ferry in the United States and the Western Hemisphere, making daily 15-minute runs between Camden and Gee’s Bend. The diesel-powered ferry was converted into a battery-powered electric vessel as part of the recent redevelopment of the ferry terminal, operated by HMS Ferries, Inc. under contract with the Alabama Department of Transportation. During the civil rights movement, black Gee’s Bend residents rode the ferry to the county seat at Camden to register to vote, so local authorities shut down the ferry service. Gee’s Bend residents were without ferry service for over 40 years until service resumed in 2006.
Photo credit: Goodwyn, Mills & Cawood
According to legend, as a prank students once led a cow up the tower stairs of Samford Hall at Auburn University. Though this story may not be true, what is certain is that Samford Hall symbolizes Auburn University nearly as much as football. The university’s original classroom building called “Old Main” was destroyed by fire in 1887. The following year Samford Hall was constructed in part with bricks salvaged from Old Main. In 1929, the building was named for Alabama Governor William J. Samford. An electronic carillon in the clock tower regularly plays the Westminster Chimes and “War Eagle,” Auburn’s fight song.
Photo credit: Auburn University
Communities across Alabama are thriving thanks to the ongoing efforts of DesignAlabama. Incorporated in 1987, the Montgomery-based nonprofit organization unites design professionals and citizens to create master plans for community development and downtown revitalization, along with supporting other organizations with similar goals. Programs include: Alabama Mayor’s Design Summit that brings together mayors to address their community design issues; DesignPlace in which professionals visit selected communities to offer assistance with design, planning and community identity; and Connectivity that provides itineraries for discovering Alabama’s people and places. Gina Clifford serves as executive director.
Photo credit: DesignAlabama
Gee’s Bend’s “eye-poppingly gorgeous” quilts, wrote New York Times art critic Michael Kimmelman, “turn out to be some of the most miraculous works of modern art America has produced.” The quilts of Gee’s Bend are sewn by a group of women in this small town southwest of Selma, and they make some of the most important African-American contributions to art in the United States. Their style is described as bold and sophisticated, based on traditional American and African-American quilts, with a geometric simplicity reminiscent of Amish quilts and modern art. Without a doubt, Gee’s Bend quilters have made their mark, stitch by stitch, in the upper echelons of quilt-making.
Photo credit: alafricanamerican.com
Tuscaloosa and Montgomery are two cities that have taken full advantage of having a river and both have found ways to maximize this natural resource. On the Alabama River is the Montgomery Riverfront Park whose attractions include an amphitheatre, riverboat and the historic Union Station Train Shed. The Riverwalk in Tuscaloosa offers a paved well-lighted trail along the southern bank of the Black Warrior River near downtown. Dog-friendly park areas line the trail, as well as benches, gazebos, picnic areas and shade trees. The trail also provides a playground near the public library and a splash pad for children.
http://www.rsvp-montgomery.com/app-programs/riverfront-revitalized
http://visittuscaloosa.com/attraction/the-riverwalk/
Photo credit: Montgomery Area Chamber of Commerce
Owen Foster, a 2005 graduate of Auburn’s Master of Industrial Design Program, has spent much of his career bringing design to students. He is co-founder and co-director of SHIFT Design Camp, where high school and university students worldwide meet every summer near Tuscumbia to engage in design. The Alabama native is also director at Aether Global Learning, a think tank for transformational learning and leadership, and is co-owner and designer of Fulcrum Collaborative, a multi-disciplinary design studio. The Industrial Designers Society of America named Owen Foster its 2015 IDSA Educator of Year while he was department chair of industrial design at Savannah College of Art and Design.
Photo credit: Owen Foster
The designs created by Mary Catherine Folmar for her hand-illustrated textiles and wall coverings reflect her Alabama upbringing, along with her travels through Europe, Asia and America’s east and west coasts. Her style is inspired by the “classic and timeless design of southern living while pushing the limits with contemporary patterns, colors and textures.” The Auburn University industrial design graduate founded Birmingham-based Cotton & Quill in 2012 and has been featured in a number of publications including Southern Living.
Photo credit: Mary Catherine (Clem) Folmar
Auburn University industrial design graduate Ken Musgrave is vice president and head of Global Customer Experience and Global Experience Design for Hewlett-Packard, where he leads new product, brand and user experience design and development. Before HP, Musgrave was executive director of experience design at Dell Inc., directing the design of every category of Dell products and leading the global design capability for Dell’s commercial products. Prior to Dell, he served in various product development leadership roles for Becton Dickinson, a medical technology company. He was previously at Ratio Design Labs, an emerging design & technology development firm in Atlanta.
Photo credit: Ken Musgrave
As Senior Innovation Strategist at Humana in Louisville, Kentucky, Anjuli Bedekar Clavert champions human-centered design and innovation discipline to develop solutions that reduce the occurrence of disease and slow its progression. Clavert graduated cum laude from Auburn University in 2008 with a degree in industrial design and has spent the past 10 years designing products and experiences for a wide variety of consumers, brands and technologies. She was named one of Forbes’ “30 Under 30” in Manufacturing & Industry in 2015.
Photo credit: Anjuli Bedekar Clavert
Known as a historic railroad town, the City of Opelika was recently treated to a new logo and brand identity that continues to honor this tradition. With its bold yet simple graphics, the new logo is now seen on social media, signage, graphics, buildings and the city website. A community’s qualities and distinctiveness told through graphic design is an effective way to boost economic development, tourism, local pride and connectivity. Communities throughout Alabama and across America are discovering that graphic design can communicate memorable visual narratives that make people take notice.
Photo credit: City of Opelika & Copperwing
Concerning architecture, Tuskegee University is best known for its Booker T. Washington-era buildings built by students. But the National Historic Site is also home to an internationally renowned work of modern architecture: the Tuskegee University Chapel. Built in 1969 to replace the original 1898 chapel, the monumental brick edifice was designed by famed architect Paul Rudolph and the African-American firm of John A. Welch and Louis Fry, who taught at the Tuskegee Institute. Listed by Southern Living as one of “The South’s Most Beautiful Chapels,” the structure is known for its expansive, light-filled sanctuary – a balance between the “opposite movements of space and light,” as Rudolph described it.
Photo credit: Lewis Kennedy
With its Classical-Revival façade, the Alabama Museum of Natural History is aesthetically pleasing but it is the interior that is most breathtaking. Located in Smith Hall on the University of Alabama campus, it is Alabama’s oldest museum, founded in 1831. Designed by Alabama architect Frank Lockwood, who also designed the Montgomery Federal Building, the ground level Atrium Gallery is dominated by a staircase made of Alabama marble and Alabama-manufactured iron. The staircase leads to the second floor Grand Gallery, which is surrounded by a colonnade of Corinthian columns that support a full entablature with a highly enriched cornice. A large glass roof floods the interior with natural light.
Photo credit: Lewis Kennedy
If Hollywood location scouts ever need to find a superb Greek-Revival antebellum mansion for a movie, they need look no further than Sturdivant Hall in Selma. Built between 1852 and 1856, the two-story stuccoed brick structure has a façade with a monumentally scaled portico and 30-foot-tall Corinthian columns. The portico is accessed from the second floor by a cantilevered balcony with an intricate cast-iron railing. The opulent interior features elaborate plasterwork and millwork and a cantilevered staircase. Now a museum, legend has it that Sturdivant Hall is haunted by John Parkman, the mansion’s second owner.
Photo credit: Art Meripol
Step into the main foyer of the Alabama State Capitol and what dominates the space are elegant twin stairways that reach in a double spiral to the third floor. The seemingly unsupported stairs are thought to be built by Horace King, a former slave and prominent bridge builder who applied his expert carpentry skills to design and construction. The Capitol was finished in 1851 and during the late 1920s the rotunda was redecorated by artist Roderick Mackenzie of Mobile. Gold and plum are the main colors used to complement a series of eight large murals that Mackenzie painted to depict episodes from Alabama’s past.
Photo credit: Lewis Kennedy
The National Memorial for Peace and Justice opened April 2018 as the nation’s first memorial dedicated to the legacy of enslaved black people. It was built to remember people terrorized by lynching and African-Americans victimized by racial segregation and Jim Crow, as well as people of color today burdened by presumptions of guilt and police violence. The six-acre memorial in Montgomery was designed by Boston-based MASS Design Group. The structure contains the names of more than 4,000 lynching victims engraved on columns representing each county in the United States where each lynching took place.
Photo credit: Equal Justice Initiative
Step into the lobby and take in the magnificent multicolored, three-tier chandelier created by glass sculptor Dale Chihuly, just one of thousands of works of art in store for visitors at Auburn University’s acclaimed Jule Collins Smith Museum of Fine Art. The travertine-clad museum contains six exhibition galleries, a 127-seat auditorium, and a café and gift shop. A large lake, walking paths and outdoor sculpture are also part of the 10-acre site. Recent renovations include expanding educational and public spaces, along with additional storage for collections, and improvements to lighting, acoustics and temperature control.
Photo credit: Jule Collins Smith Museum