There was a time when Carol Ross Barney could not have imagined winning the AIA Gold Medal. After all, “most of our work wouldn’t even be called buildings,” she says. Although her firm, founded in 1981, has a portfolio with plenty of buildings to its credit, much of the work she’s most proud of—transit stations, public parks, pedestrian streetscapes—fits a broader definition of architecture. “There’s no such thing as something that doesn’t need to be designed,” Ross Barney says.
Last month, the American Institute of Architects awarded the 2023 AIA Gold Medal to Ross Barney, 73, making her the first living woman to win the award as an individual (Julia Morgan received the recognition decades after her death; Denise Scott Brown in 2016 and Angela Brooks in 2022 each won with their partners). Ross Barney is also the sixth Chicago architect to be awarded the medal—but the first since Ludwig Mies Van Der Rohe in 1960. record honored Ross Barney with a Women in Architecture Award as Design Leader in October.
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