In 2007, Kathryn Prigmore and the late Barbara Laurie created a session for the annual AIA convention called “Riding the Vortex,” where African American women architects could connect and discuss their experiences in practice. Prigmore, who now teaches at Virginia Tech, had met Laurie when both were professors at Howard University. They enlisted Maryland-based Kathy Dixon, founder of K. Dixon Architecture, and Katherine Williams, editor for the Black Women in Architecture Network and Arch Storieswebsites, as panelists for that first program. The four women, all trained as architects and based around the Washington metropolitan area, then built on the idea of a forum on race, gender and architecture by continuing Riding the Vortex as an ongoing collective. The next year, they took Vortex to the convention of NOMA (the National Organization of Minority Architects). Melissa Daniel, also a designer, founder of AIA Northern Virginia's Women in Architecture lecture series, and host of the Architecture is Political podcast, began working with the group as Laurie’s mentee in 2009.
Over the years, the group has hosted two dozen panels, featuring speakers in the field, from students to firm owners, virtually or in-person, around the country. At this year’s AIA Conference in Chicago, Vortex won the 50th Whitney M. Young Jr. award, the annual prize named for the distinguished civil rights leader who “challenged the profession to pursue progressive values,” according to the AIA.
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