The 10 Recipients of 2025 AIA Minnesota Honor Awards
By Chris Hudson | November 20, 2025
The Anna-Maria and Stephen Kellen Research Building in downtown Rochester, Minnesota, designed by HDR. Photo by Dan Schwalm, HDR.
SPOTLIGHT
AIA Minnesota announced the winners of its annual Honor Awards, the state’s most prestigious recognition for buildings designed by Minnesota architects. The 53 anonymous submissions were reviewed by a panel of three award-winning architects from around the country and evaluated using the AIA Framework for Design Excellence. The Framework outlines a holistic approach to building projects in 10 measures: Design for Integration, Equitable Communities, Ecology, Water, Economy, Energy, Well-Being, Resources, Change, and Discovery.
The jury selected 10 projects for Honor Awards, for extraordinary achievements in two or more of the Framework measures. Honor Awards submissions are made in one of five categories: Architecture, Renovation and Restoration, Interiors, Master Planning and Urban Design, and Small Projects.
The 2025 jury included Brandon Dake, FAIA, of Dake Wells Architecture in Springfield, Missouri; Katie Faulkner, FAIA, of West Work in Boston; and Helen Pierce, AIA, of LPA Design Studios in San Jose, California. LPA Design Studios received the national AIA Architecture Firm Award earlier this year.
Jury comments on the selected projects are included in the highlights below.
All photos by Dan Schwalm, HDR.
Anna-Maria and Stephen Kellen Research Building
Rochester, Minnesota
Firm: HDR
Client: Mayo Clinic
Category: Architecture
Framework for Design Excellence citations: Design for Well-Being and Discovery
This 11-story Mayo Clinic project is home to translational medical research that could revolutionize tomorrow’s cancer treatments. While research is often done in cloistered labs, screened from public view, the Kellen Building is transparent; its structure is revealed most dramatically at night when the interiors glow through the perforated outer scrim. The screen also plays a vital role in energy management, allowing light in while reducing solar heat gain. “Wet, damp, and dry” lab activities are housed in radiating rings on each floor. At the corners of each floorplate are light-filled collaborative spaces.
Jury comment: “The floor plans are extremely efficient, with the higher risk ‘wet’ labs in the core of the building and inviting work and social spaces along the perimeter. Outwardly, the building is such a gift to the community. We can imagine it inspiring young people to pursue a career in medical research.”
All photos by Michael Robinson Photography.
Energizer Park
St. Louis, Missouri
Firms: HOK + Snow Kreilich Architects
Client: St. Louis CITY SC
Category: Architecture
Framework citations: Design for Integration, Equitable Communities, and Well-Being
This 22,500-seat stadium for Major League Soccer’s St. Louis CITY SC was designed to anchor a new 25.5-acre sports district in the heart of the city. Built on the site of a former highway off-ramp and parking lot, this project marks a new generation of North American stadiums that embrace openness over full enclosure. With a below-grade pitch and openings at all four corners, Energizer Park brings its rich urban surroundings into the match experience—while the energy of the game action and cheering crowds spill out into the streets.
Jury comment: “Unlike so many stadiums that turn their back on their surroundings, this beautiful venue is exceptionally well integrated into its sports campus and neighborhood with openness and landscaped plazas and promenades that create a destination for game days and non–game days alike.”
All photos by Albert Vecerka.
Jackson Hole History Museum
Jackson, Wyoming
Firms: HGA + Prospect Studio
Client: History Jackson Hole
Category: Architecture
Framework citations: Design for Integration, Well-Being, and Discovery
This new 13,300-square-foot cultural destination weaves itself into the historic Van Vleck block in downtown Jackson with a welcoming storefront-like presence, natural materials, terraces, covered boardwalks, and seamless integration with an adjoining park. Its rooftop terrace and light-filled public interiors—flexible spaces for gatherings, and for exhibits and workshops that explore 11,000 years of Indigenous history—capture views of the community surroundings and the hills and mountains beyond.
Jury comment: “It’s easy to see how much this new hub for history, art, and people enhances its small district. The scale, proportions, and wood detailing are exquisite, and the design team nailed the blend of modern and Western character. We look forward to seeing how this building ages.”
All photos by Gaffer Photography.
Lakewood Welcome Center
Minneapolis, Minnesota
Firms: Snow Kreilich Architects + Miller Dunwiddie
Client: Lakewood Cemetery
Category: Architecture
Framework citations: Design for Energy and Well-Being
The 250-acre Lakewood Cemetery is a leader in a movement to make cemeteries places not just for mourning but also for celebrating life and connecting to nature. The institution’s historical legacy and future come together in the all-electric, net-zero-energy Welcome Center, Lakewood’s new front door. A contemporary, stone-clad pavilion with a two-story colonnade, the building welcomes and orients visitors and hosts gatherings. The second floor houses Lakewood’s administrative offices.
Jury comment: “With its simple diagram and beautiful materials, this project has an [Alvar] Aalto-esque reverence for what a cemetery architecture should be: a restrained yet inviting setting for remembrance and reflection. We also appreciated the project’s impressive array of sustainability measures.”
All photos by Gaffer Photography.
Metal Lark
Frederic, Wisconsin
Firm: SALA Architects
Clients: Bruce and Annie McPheeters
Category: Small Projects
Framework citations: Design for Economy and Well-Being
This small, hillside retreat overlooks former farm fields and a small lake, immersing guests in the gently contoured landscape via floor-to-ceiling glass and a slender, elevated deck. Reached by a foot bridge, the two-level structure is partially clad in uncoated corrugated steel, which has oxidized to blend in with the trunks of adjacent trees. Energy-efficiency features include super-insulation, triple-pane glass, and operable windows for natural ventilation. A photovoltaic array supplies most of the getaway’s annual electricity needs.
Jury comment: “This small structure is both simple and sophisticated in the way it sits in the landscape like a lone ice-fishing house or duck blind up in the air. It wants to stand out, but not in a spaceship kind of way. The design is all in service of capturing captivating views within a very small footprint.”
All photos by VJAA.
North Island Retreat
Ely, Minnesota
Firm: VJAA
Client: Anonymous
Category: Architecture
Framework citations: Design for Economy and Well-Being
This striking retreat on one of Burntside Lake’s several inhabited islands is composed of a primary bedroom suite, guest rooms, and a communal washhouse, each oriented to capture daylight and take advantage of natural ventilation in warmer weather and solar heat gain in winter. The structures perch on concrete piers and are clad in locally sourced, thermally modified wood. The architects noted that their clients’ “deep love of the landscape, its habitats and ecosystems, underpinned their ideas for the project: being immersed in the forest and lake setting, with minimal impact to the site’s ecosystem.”
Jury comment: “From the submissions we reviewed, we think it’s safe to say that no other part of the country designs lake retreats as well as Minnesota architects do. And this was our favorite. We were taken with the plan and diagram, which creates a sense of community, and with how lightly the compound touches the ground.”
All photos by Albert Vecerka.
Pennsylvania State Archives
Harrisburg, Pennsylvania
Firms: HGA + Vitetta, a DRG Architects Company
Client: Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission
Category: Architecture
Framework citations: Design for Equitable Communities and Resources
This state-of-the-art facility replaced a 1964 building the commission had long outgrown—in a new location. The 146,000-square-foot project deftly combines the stringent technical requirements for protecting historical documents with bright, airy spaces where visitors can conduct research and access materials from the collections. Notable exterior features include glazing with frit and a visually striking solar shade designed to optimize daylighting and reduce HVAC needs. The building’s strong civic character is enhanced by a pollinator-friendly public garden outside the entry.
Jury comment: “When we think of all the competing goals and technical demands a project like this had to meet, the results are even more impressive. The design creates a kind of front porch for the building that welcomes the public inside. What a wonderful way to demystify a large archive.”
All photos by Gaffer Photography.
River Hub at Graco Park
Minneapolis, Minnesota
Firm: Snow Kreilich Architects
Client: Minneapolis Park and Recreation Board
Category: Architecture
Framework citations: Design for Integration and Ecosystems
The recently developed Graco Park is the restoration of a brownfield site on the Mississippi into habitat for river-corridor wildlife, and the River Hub is a shed-like building that supports community-led programming and a creative technology space for young people. The designers note that “the building’s modular wood construction and utilitarian form are low in embodied carbon and resonate with the site’s lumber industry past while pointing toward a future of greater ecological balance.”
Jury comment: “A simple shed that sits so elegantly in the restored landscape. We cannot imagine people passing by this building and not wanting to drop in. The detailing is incredible, with the slats in the wood scrim playing so well with the ribbing in the corrugated metal roof.”
All photos by Gaffer Photography.
Treetop Trail at the Minnesota Zoo
Apply Valley, Minnesota
Firm: Snow Kreilich Architects
Client: Minnesota Zoo
Category: Renovation and Restoration
Framework citations: Design for Ecosystems, Economy, Resources, and Discovery
This project is a 1.25-mile, elevated pedestrian walkway that winds around the zoo’s Northern Trail section, taking visitors on a meandering journey through the property’s varied landscapes, vistas, and canopies. The path is complemented by pergolas, wood benches, accessible on/off-ramps, and strategically sited lookouts. Guests who’ve visited the zoo over the years will recognize the structure: The trail is an adaptive reuse of Skytrail, the zoo’s monorail system, which was decommissioned in 2013.
Jury comment: “Some may view this adaptive reuse as barely architecture, but there was so much thoughtfulness in how the platform was installed in a modular way to reduce the impact on the zoo environments, and in how the ramps meet the ground. And then to deliver that much adventure in a walkway experience. A powerful project.”
All photos by Kendall McCaugherty, Hall + Merrick + McCaugherty.
Windgate Studio and Design Center
University of Arkansas
Fayetteville, Arkansas
Firms: HGA + MAHG Architecture
Client: University of Arkansas
Category: Architecture
Framework citations: Design for Economy and Change
This project anchors the university’s growing Windgate Art and Design District southeast of the main campus. The four-story, 150,000-square-foot building brings together ceramics, printmaking, drawing, painting, graphic design, and photography—disciplines previously scattered across the main campus—into an arts hub rich in opportunities for connection and cross-pollination. It does so with a highly economical design that prioritizes flexibility and adaptability for future modifications, all while providing students stimulating spaces in which to learn, interact, and create.
Jury comment: “This level of transparency and openness, where young artists and designers can see and be seen, and create where they are inspired to create, is how a creative environment becomes more than the sum of its parts. It also a way to make a new building feel accessible to the entire campus community.”
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