Michael G. Imber

Michael G. Imber is a native Texan who grew-up exploring the unique landscapes of the West and the architecture built by its rugged inhabitants. After graduating from Huckabee College of Architecture, he did his apprenticeship on the East Coast where he worked on projects such as the Deputy Secretary of State’s office and the University of Virginia. Michael returned to Texas and formed his own firm over twenty-five years ago in San Antonio. Michael was awarded the Distinguished Alumni Award by Texas Tech Huckabee College of Architecture in 2016.

Today, Michael G. Imber Architects is internationally known for architecture reflecting landscape and culture. As well as work spanning the U.S., Michael G. Imber Architects has worked in over a dozen countries. Its projects have ranged from churches and seminaries, colleges, hotels, and town centers to ranches and houses—all a unique reflection of the places in which they are built.

Michael’s work has been widely published and he was recently named one of twenty-five ‘leaders’ in a “Who’s Who in Traditional Architecture” by Traditional Building Magazine. He was the recipient of the Arthur Ross Award in 2007 for his contribution to civic and traditional architecture, and has won eight national Palladio Awards and eleven Staub Awards. In 2013, Michael released his first book, Ranches, Villas, and Houses serving as a monograph devoted to his work, and in 2022 was named the Robert A.M. Stern Visiting Professor of Classical Architecture at Yale.

Nina Rappaport

Nina Rappaport is an urbanist, architectural historian, and educator. She is coordinator of the history/theory program at the School of Public Architecture. As director of Vertical Urban Factory, a think tank and consultancy, she focuses on the intersection of production spaces, architecture, and the role of the factory worker. She is author of Vertical Urban Factory (Actar 2015, paperback 2020) and curator of the eponymous traveling exhibition (2011-2022) which was displayed most recently in Brussels (2022) and Rotterdam (2023) and will travel to Vienna next year. Her book of the conference Hybrid Factory/Hybrid City at Politecnico di Torino was published in 2023 (Actar). She organized the symposium Hybrid Urban Factory at Yale School of Architecture in November 2023. She co-authored Design for Urban Manufacturing (Routledge 2020).

She is Publications Director at the Yale School of Architecture where she edits the magazine Constructs, a book series, and exhibition catalogs. She has written significant essays on urban production including for Lifelines (Politecnico di Torino, 2022) Production City, AD 2021, Industrious City (Lars Muller 2020), Twisted (Actar 2019), Harvard Design Magazine (2019), City Made (010, 2018), The Built Environment (2018), and Encountering Things (Bloomsbury, 2017), Praxis 2003, Perspecta 2012 and 2023, and Parsons Scapes 2008.

Rappaport has been a Visiting Professor the Politecnico di Torino and Sapienza, in Italy and has taught at numerous New York City area universities and lectures internationally.

Tye Farrow

Working at the intersection of architecture and neuroscience, Tye Farrow is a world-recognized pioneer tackling how what we create either gives or cause health. With award-winning projects around the globe that enact salutogenic design - design that actively incites health - he is the first Canadian architect to have earned a Master of Neuroscience Applied to Architecture (University of Venice Iuav), and has a Master of Architecture in Urban Design (Harvard University), and a Bachelor of Architecture degree (University of Toronto).

Tye is a sought-after speaker who has presented to respected organizations and universities in over forty cities on six continents, including the Salk Institute, The Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Mayo Clinic and The Cleveland Clinic, and has been called a global leader making “a significant contribution to health and humanity through the medium of architecture” (Stockholm World Design & Health Congress) and “one of the world's most prominent practitioners of, and advocates for, human-built environments that enrich our lives through neuroarts choices” (Susan Magseman, Founder and Director, International Arts + Mind Lab, Johns Hopkins Medical School, “Your Brain on Art”).

Paul Foster

January 27, 2025

Paul W. Foster is the President/CEO of Foster CM Group, Inc., a professional Program/Construction Management firm established in 1992. Headquartered in San Antonio, the firm has additional offices in Austin, Dallas, Fort Worth, and Houston, Texas; Orlando, Florida; Phoenix, Arizona; Denver, CO and Seattle, Washington.

Paul, a San Antonio native, is responsible for the day-to-day operations of management teams within each office. During his 40 years in the industry, Paul has been involved in managing more than $7 billion in construction projects and programs within the United States. He is a graduate of Texas Tech University, where he earned a Bachelor of Architecture degree. He is a Certified Construction Manager (CCM). In 2020, Paul was inducted into the CMAA College of Fellows (FCMAA), in 2023 he was elected to the National Academy of Construction (NAC).

Additionally, Paul has served in Board positions and advisory roles for the Texas Tech Alumni Association – National Board of Directors (2012-2019), Texas Tech Architectural Alumni Assoc. (2001-2006), National CMAA Board of Directors, National CMAA Foundation Board of Directors, Hemisfair Park Area Redevelopment Corporation – Board of Directors (2013-2016), and the Greater San Antonio Chamber of Commerce (2005-2008).

Paul is married to Anna Foster, and they have three children and two grandchildren.

Aleksandra Jaeschke

February 10, 2025

Aleksandra Jaeschke is an architect and an Associate Professor of Architecture at The University of Texas at Austin. Born and raised in Poland, she holds a Doctor of Design degree from the Harvard GSD and an AA Diploma from the Architectural Association in London.

Aleksandra holds a professional license in Italy where she practiced at AION, an architectural firm she co-founded and co-directed with Andrea Di Stefano until her move to the U.S. In recognition of the work developed by AION, she received the Europe 40 Under 40 Award for 2011 conferred by the European Centre for Architecture Art Design and Urban Studies and the Chicago Athenaeum. In 2013, AION held a solo exhibition Eco-Machines in the Wroclaw Museum of Architecture in Poland.

Jaeschke was the winner of the Harvard GSD’s 2019 Wheelwright Prize and the DigitalFUTURES's 2021 Mark Cousins Theory Award. She contributed to Log 51 and Log 56, participated in Log’rithms held in the Italian Virtual Pavilion at the 17th Venice Architecture Biennale, and was part of Model Behavior, a group exhibition curated by Anyone Corporation and presented by The Cooper Union Foundation in New York in 2022. In 2021, she curated Plant Potential, an event series focused on human-plant relations––www.plant-potential.world. A book based on her doctoral dissertation, entitled The Greening of America’s Building Codes: Promises and Paradoxes, was published by Princeton Architectural Press in December 2022.

Jenny French

February 24, 2025

Jenny French is a founder of Boston-based French 2D, an architecture studio she founded with her sister and partner, Anda French, AIA. Their work centers collaboration across multiple scales, from participatory events and installations to urban-scale textiles and buildings for collective living. French 2D has been recognized by numerous awards and publications, including a Progressive Architecture Award from Architect Magazine, and a Design Vanguard award from Architectural Record. Recently French 2D has been nominated for the Mies Crown Hall Americas Prize and was a Finalist for the Architectural Review’s Emerging Award. Their work has been featured in Domus, AZURE, PLOT, Metropolis, The Architect’s Newspaper, and exhibited widely, including at the Chicago Architecture Biennial, MoMA, the Venice Architecture Biennale. Jenny is an Assistant Professor in the Practice of Architecture at the Harvard Graduate School of Design and serves on the Faculty Advisory Committee for Harvard’s Joint Center for Housing Studies.

Jett Butler

Jett is a designer, strategist, educator, entrepreneur, aspiring flâneur, and the blind ambition of FÖDA™.

Raised by an artist and an airline man in a rural setting, the above descriptors seemed inevitable: his father showed him the world, his mother taught him how to see it, and he had time on his hands to read. He was never going to do just one thing.

IBM’s Quantum Division, NYCxDesign, SXSW, Pecha Kucha, Brand New’s ‘First Round,’ the Texas Society of Architects, and various chapters of the AIA, AIGA, and Ad Fed have invited him to speak. The studio’s work has been celebrated in numerous magazines and published by Gestalten, Communication Arts, Bon Appétit, and others.

To put teeth to the trans-disciplinary claim, Jett has led FÖDA to 18 AIGA awards, 2 James Beard Finalist Nominations, IIDA MADA Gold, Gold/Bronze Addy™ awards, and AIA recognition. His studio has collected a Gold Pixel award for digital and stakes in a Silver Telly™ with Revelator in broadcast media. FÖDA even share an FAA award (yes, the FAA) with Hufft™.