The Gold Medal is the AIA’s highest annual honor, recognizing individuals whose work has had a lasting influence on the theory and practice of architecture.

While many were introduced to carbon attributable to buildings and Edward Mazria’s research and insight in Metropolis’ October 2003 cover story, “Architects Pollute,” Mazria, FAIA, had long been sounding the alarm on climate change. He has built his distinguished career around motivating the profession to enact positive change and take immediate action. An amalgam of architect, researcher, advocate, and influencer, Mazria’s impact on the AEC industry is profound, helping to plot a new course for practice in the 21st century.

“Ed Mazria’s ‘voice in the wilderness’ about architecture’s potential to change the projected path of impending global climate change seemed a formidable if not unattainable goal in 2003,” Thompson Penney, FAIA, the 2003 AIA president, wrote of Mazria. “In the ensuing decades, his unwavering voice and leadership have shown that it can be done and in fact is being done!”...[+]