As we close out this year, we’re reflecting on the milestones that shaped 2025 for our clients and our practice. From industry recognition to impactful projects and community-driven initiatives, here’s a look at our 2025 highlights.

Industry Recognition for Practice and Innovation

This year brought meaningful accolades and expanded visibility for our work across regional, national, and international platforms, including:

• Best of Practice (Honorable Mention) by The Architect’s Newspaper for the second consecutive year.
• The Angeleno Porch featured at the Venice Architecture Biennale as part of Fort LA’s exhibition, extending our work onto an international stage.
• Selected for cityLAB-UCLA’s Small Lot, Big Impact competition for our project LotFul, in the Shared Futures Category
• Studio One Eleven’s office and Urban Lab featured on NBC’s America by Design, highlighting our creative workplace and collaborative culture, with a segment on SAAC slated for release in 2026.
• Long Beach Airport recognized by the Los Angeles Times as one of the “7 Best L.A. Architecture Projects of 2025.”

Fostering Creativity and Community Engagement

Our commitment to creativity and community deepened in 2025 through expanded programming, partnerships, and public-facing initiatives, including:

• Welcoming Creatives-in-Residence Nathan Amondson, Peoples Architecture Office, and Arts Council of Long Beach.
• Reviving both the LA Design Festival and the U.S. International Poster Biennial, more than doubling participation and impact from their inaugural year in 2023.
• Hosting two interns from the inaugural Urban Design Internship in partnership with the Long Beach Community Design Center.
• Producing two public art installations with Creative-in-Residence Nathan Amondson: “Shifting Tides: Evolution of Long Beach’s Waterfront” and “The Rainbow Machine,” created in collaboration with the RDC–S111 Maker Group for the LA Design Festival.
• Launching and showcasing the “10 Degrees Cooler” campaign at Long Beach Airport and during the U.S. International Poster Biennial.
• Completing a three-part workshop series on The Making of a Design District, alongside a PARK(ing) Day–inspired pop-up that transformed parking spaces into creative community hubs.
• Participating in four Art + Design Walks, collaborating with citywide institutions and Downtown Long Beach partners on public programming.
• Hosting a book launch with author DJ Waldie in conversation with Alan Pullman and launching the “Community” scent in collaboration with Creative-in-Residence Muse Apothecary.
• Organizing a community screening of Join or Die at the Art Theatre, featuring opening remarks from Mayor Rex Richardson.
• Participating in Canstruction, earning a prize, and taking part in Demo Day for the City of Long Beach’s Vacant Lots Competition, transforming underutilized sites into spaces of opportunity and engagement.

Project Awards and Milestones

Our work for clients was celebrated in 2025 for its design excellence, sustainability, and community impact, alongside significant progress across projects in delivery:

• Received 13 awards overall, including 5 AIA Awards, recognizing work across architecture, urban design, and landscape architecture.
• The Journey received an AIA|LA Design Award, while 200 W. Ocean earned an AIA California Award.
• MLK + PCH was honored with an AIA Orange County COTE Award, a COTE Honor Award from AIA South Bay / Long Beach, and four additional awards, totaling five recognitions in 2025.
• Long Beach Airport Modernization received an ASLA SoCal Award in the Transportation and Facilities Design category, was featured in Fast Company, and was ranked the #2 Airport in the U.S. by The Washington Post.
• The Sidewalk Transit Amenity Program (STAP) received a Fast Company World Changing Ideas Award and surpassed 200 deployed bus shelters across Los Angeles.
• Urban Green was featured in Anthology: Contemporary Landscape Architecture (Braun Publishing).
• Projects including Fourth & Central and Long Beach Airport were spotlighted in the Los Angeles Times and Fast Company.
• Broke ground on the Beach & Lincoln Affordable Housing Project and the Third & Alamitos Affordable Senior Housing Development.
• Completed the Partake Collective in Glassell Park, RESA Housing in Downtown Long Beach, and Do Good Daniels, a youth services organization at MLK + PCH.
• Advanced major mixed-use destinations, including West Harbor, currently under construction and scheduled to open in 2026.

Thought Leadership on National and International Stages

We advanced conversations around design, resilience, and public space at regional and international levels:

• Sinead and Shruti Co-organized and hosted the inaugural World of Waterfronts Symposium at our office in February and a followup event this fall 
  
• Shruti Co-organized the International Parklet Symposium in San Francisco.
  
• Shruti Shankar was featured on the Better Building Podcast and was a juror for the Association for Women in Architecture (AWAF) scholarship awards
  
• Michael was featured in the Inside the Firm Podcast and presented at the 88 Cities Summit, and the AIA CA webinar Adaptive Reuse: Unlocking Sustainable Conversions, as well as the CALED conference on Cluster Sites, and Toured SAAC with ULI, and ULI Marketplace about the LB Airport
  
• Appointed three new Associate Principals (Casey Roccanova, Shruti Shankar, and Ryan Caldera)  strengthening our leadership team.