ASHED wins the National ACSA Design-Build award

The Association of Collegiate Schools of Architecture (ACSA) awarded Associate Professor Jason Griffiths from the University of Nebraska’s College of Architecture a prestigious 2020 Architectural Education Award. Griffiths’ PLAIN Design Build Studio project titled “ASHED South Sioux City Community Orchard Facility” was one of only three projects to earn an award in the Design-Build category. With the competition’s 14 percent acceptance rate, Griffiths joins an elite cohort of educators honored this year by the ACSA.

According to the ACSA, the Architectural Education Awards are designed to honor architectural educators for exemplary work in areas such as building design, community collaborations, scholarship and service.

“The award-winning professors inspire and challenge students, contribute to the profession’s knowledge base and extend their work beyond the borders of academia into practice and the public sector,” said the ACSA award administrators.

The ASHED design-build project was completed in 2018 in collaboration with the City of South Sioux City to design a storage building for the city's community orchard, the first public structure in Nebraska to use cross-laminated timber. The project is a showcase for South Sioux City’s ash reclamation program created in response to the growing concern of ash tree depletion by the Emerald Ash Borer beetle and a need to prepare students with knowledge of engineered lumber construction.

This is the second ACSA design-build award earned by Griffiths and his students (a collective known as PLAIN). The 2019 ACSA design-build award recognized the “BAXA Cabin” studio project, designed and built in 2016-17 as a scholars’ residential cabin for the Cedar Point Biological Station near Ogallala, Nebraska.

“We are very proud to have Jason Griffiths’ master level Design Research Studio be recognized by the Association of College Schools of Architects for the second year in a row,” said Interim Program Director David Karle. “Jason’s leadership in teaching, research and community outreach is exceptional as acknowledged by this award.”

Credits
Project: ASHED South Sioux City Community Orchard Facility
Client: South Sioux City
Instructor: Jason Griffiths
Students:
Abdullah Alghamdi, Allen Phengmarath, Andrew Hicks, Aubrey Wassung, Bingcheng Wang, Dayna Bartels, Farheen Mohammadi, Joe Croghan, Julio Munoz, Kevin Baitey, Phung Hong, Rachel Plamann, Scott Kenny