Title: AIA Atlanta | AIA Georgia Offices
Location of Proejct: Atlanta, GA
Project Completion Date: 2018
Firm Name: Houser Walker Architecture

Short Description: Forced to relocate offices on short notice only 2 years after completing a previous move, AIA Atlanta and AIA Georgia sought to take advantage of the circumstances and create a more thoughtful, smaller office that would still provide strong member services and capacity to conduct the Associations’ business. Taking a ground floor space in the historic Hurt Building, AIA envisioned a space that would represent the values of the Institute: inspiring, ecologically sensitive, functional, and timeless. The new design provides a platform that enables over 2,000 members to become better professionals for their communities, clients, and culture.

Architect's Statement: AIA is the voice for architecture, advocating for the value of design, diversity of our profession, and ecological strength of our communities. AIA Georgia and AIA Atlanta provide the platform and resources that enable over 2,000 members in the state to become better professionals for their communities. For the design of their new offices, we felt an obligation to physically demonstrate this commitment.

Both organizations have long shared a common office space and had relocated to a nearby office space in 2015. In 2017 however, the building was sold, necessitating a forced move. With the decision to locate the new offices in a 2,200 square foot, street facing space in downtown Atlanta’s historic Hurt Office building, a major design driver emerged in that the space was approximately 20% smaller than its previous incarnation. Another major design driver was a decision by both organizations to operate with a combined staff, freeing up the layout to represent a cohesive work and visitor experience. The program included office seating for six full time staff, with the ability to add additional staff or volunteers on a temporary basis, a large, flexible room that could accommodate a variety of meetings and events; a kitchenette; a restroom with provisions for a future shower, gallery space, and storage.


Our primary challenge was to fit a highly flexible workplace within a compact area. To accomplish this, our vision focused on creating a set of experiences that prioritized the need for staff to work effectively on their daily business, while welcoming members and the public at large. We began with the observation that the space was utilized solely by staff 95% of the time and that the staff desired a high degree of privacy to continue their work when member events were being held. To accomplish these objectives, zones of privacy and public access were arranged between the street and the interior atrium lobby of the building, aligned along the east/west axis of the space. with more public spaces facing the building’s interior lobby and staff workspaces being located deeper into the space, along the street front.

Spatially, one enters into a gallery space that compresses the views towards the glazed doors and, beyond, the main meeting room. Outfitted with wall-to-wall custom millwork storage, this space opens up to the existing historic plaster ceiling, houses a kitchenette, and opens to the staff workspace through an acoustically rated, glazed folding wall. When opened, this partition allows for a full and direction connection of all the major spaces. Workstations, which are in daily use, benefit from tall north-facing windows that engage the public from just above street level. Existing mechanical systems were tuned to operate at lower set points. Lighting was specified with a high degree of zoning and controllability.


Working with the Hurt Building’s existing historic material fabric, we sought to involve local manufacturing, craft, and fabrication to the greatest extent possible, as these create an equal investment in building collaborations (and, consequently, culture itself). A 100+ year old original marble floor was uncovered and restored. Existing cast-iron windows to the street were restored and a number of existing building features, including a structural column near the entry and a portion of the existing plaster ceiling in the meeting room, were uncovered and reused. New millwork was customized to highlight Georgia native wood species. Staff office areas, which retained the largest portions of original building fabric, received new full height glazed office walls to retain the generous proportions of the original space. Daylight is maximized throughout, by careful detailing at the window openings to create a new 45 degree bevel on the vertical jamb edges, as well as bringing light deep into the meeting areas through the folding door and a translucent glass marker board. A number of recycled components, including some light fixtures, glass entry doors and a custom wood and steel “donor door” were balanced by new material donations, all of which were carefully curated to align with the overall vision for the space. Finally, all of the spaces were tied together through a palate of sixteen subtly shifting shades of red at east/west walls - a move that captures the AIA’s branding but expands it to reflect the diversity of Georgia’s architectural scene.

The completed offices have been widely praised by the staff as not only increasing productivity but creating more flexibility in how they can work collectively. The gallery space is allowing AIA to publicly exhibit work in new ways. Daylighting is so readily available throughout the space that on most days, no active lighting is used unless the large multipurpose room requires it.