News

The SOM Foundation is pleased to announce the opening of the 2025 Robert L. Wesley Award. The award supports BIPOC undergraduate students enrolled in architecture, landscape architecture, interior architecture, urban design, or engineering programs in the United States. This year, three students will receive a $10,000 award in addition to a yearlong mentorship program that connects the students with leading BIPOC practitioners and educators. The award is named in honor of Robert L. Wesley, the first Black partner at SOM.

The SOM Foundation is pleased to announce the opening of the 2025 European Research Prize. The €20,000 prize will be awarded to a faculty-led interdisciplinary team based in Europe to conduct original research that contributes to this year’s topic, “Exploring the Potential of Mobility Corridors.” The European Research Prize was created in 2021 to cultivate new ideas and meaningful research that addresses the critical issues of our time.

The SOM Foundation is pleased to announce the opening of the 2025 Research Prize. Two $30,000 prizes will be awarded to faculty-led interdisciplinary teams based in the United States to conduct original research that contributes to this year’s topic, “Exploring the Potential of Mobility Corridors.” The Research Prize was created in 2018 to cultivate new ideas and meaningful research that addresses the critical issues of our time.

Emily McGlohn (2024 Research Prize) is a recipient of Architectural Record’s 2025 Women in Architecture Award. She and the four other 2025 laureates will be honored at a ceremony held on September 9 on the campus of the Illinois Institute of Technology in Chicago.

In the five years since Daniella Slowik was an inaugural recipient of the SOM Foundation’s Robert L. Wesley Award, Slowik’s climate-focused work in landscape architecture have taken her across the country and the world: from Harvard Graduate School to a rural community in Portugal, from a biosphere reserve in Mexico to her new home in the Netherlands. Along the way, Slowik has deepened her conviction to use her design skills to support the most under-resourced landscapes and communities. This interview, conducted by Molly Hanse, is part of a series of conversations that explores how SOM Foundation fellows are shaping the future of their field.

On Wednesday, August 6, Pablo Castillo Luna, recipient of the 2025 Researcher-in-Residence, will discuss his research project “A Permeable Atlas.”

The SOM Foundation is pleased to announce that the 2025–2026 awards cycle will focus on the topic of “Exploring the Potential of Mobility Corridors.”