AIA Central Virginia hosted a firm crawl in Harrisonburg on January 24th for JMU Architectural students. The tour started at the JMU Architectural school, where Jori Erdman, AIA gave a short presentation about the program at James Madison. Hannah Ahmad, NOMAS and Meghan McNeil, AIAS joined us to talk about specific projects that students are working on followed by a tour of the studio space and woodshop.

The tour continued at the Gaines Group Architects office a block away from the school. Charles Hendricks, AIA, CSI, CDT, CGP, CAPS, LEED AP BD & C and Deborah Smith, MBA, AIA, CSI, CDT discussed small firm life with those in attendance. The tour concluded at LDDBlueline where Welby Layman, AIA spoke about working for a large firm with offices in multiple states. Boyang Li and Lydia Schwab, ASID, NCIDQ spoke about working at LDDBlueline and their experiences transitioning into their career after recently graduating.

After the firm crawl several of the group joined other local designers and AIA Board members, Sid Griffin, AIA NOMA, Deborah Smith, Charles Hendricks, and Jonathan Moore, AIA for a happy hour at Pale Fire Brewing. There was discussion of design in Harrisonburg, running a firm, BIM, and recent design successes. Future meetings will be planned in Harrisonburg to continue to build community among valley designers.