SOM Foundation Announces Jury for the 2023 Robert L. Wesley Award

Debbie Ahmari is a seasoned professional hailing from the vibrant city of Chicago. With a strong academic foundation in interior design, architecture, and urban planning, she earned her degrees from the University of Miami, honing her skills to become a prominent figure in the field. Throughout her career, Ahmari demonstrated an unwavering passion for urban planning in the private sector. Her expertise in the realm of New Urbanism set her apart, and she played a pivotal role in shaping sustainable and innovative urban environments. Now retired, Ahmari continues to make a positive impact on her community through her dedication to volunteer work. She wholeheartedly believes in giving back and remains actively involved in various philanthropic initiatives. Beyond her professional pursuits, Ahamri has a profound love for the arts, specifically watercolor painting. Her creative endeavors allow her to explore her artistic side, bringing her joy through her colorful compositions.

Joseph Kunkel, a citizen of the Northern Cheyenne Nation, is a principal at MASS Design Group, where he directs the Sustainable Native Communities Design Lab based in O’ghe P’oghe (Santa Fe, New Mexico). He is a community designer and educator focused on sustainable development practices throughout Indian Country. His work includes exemplary Indian housing projects and processes nationwide. This research work has developed into emerging best practices, leading to an online Healthy Homes Road Map for tribal housing development, funded by the US Department of Housing and Urban Development’s Office of Policy Development and Research. His professional career has centered on community-based design, material research, fabrication, and construction. From 2013–2016, Kunkel led the development of the Wa-Di Housing Project, a forty-one-unit affordable housing development supported by the National Endowment for the Arts and ArtPlace America. In 2018 he received a SEED grant from the Robert Rauschenberg Foundation. In 2019 Kunkel was awarded an Obama Fellowship for his work with Indigenous communities and a 2019 Creative Capital Award. He is a Fellow of the inaugural class of the Civil Society Fellowship, a partnership of ADL and The Aspen Institute, and a member of the Aspen Global Leadership Network. The University of Maryland’s Alumni Association awarded Kunkel the 2021 inaugural Elaine Johnson Coates Award. Most recently, he was named a 2022 Rubinger Community Fellow by the Local Initiative Support Corporation (LISC).

Ann Lui is a registered architect, founding principal of Future Firm, a Chicago-based architecture and design research practice, and Assistant Professor of Practice at the University of Michigan. Previously, she practiced at SOM, Ann Beha Architects, and Morphosis Architects. Lui was cocurator of the US Pavilion at the 2018 Venice Architecture Biennale titled Dimensions of Citizenship. She coedited Public Space? Lost and Found (2015) and Log 54 “Coauthoring” (2022). Lui was recently named Newcity’s “Designer of the Moment” (2018) and Crain’s Chicago Business 40 Under 40 (2018). She holds an SMArchS from MIT and a BArch from Cornell University, where she was awarded the Charles Goodwin Sands Medal and the Clifton Beckwith Brown Memorial Medal.

Dawveed Scully is Managing Deputy Commissioner of Planning and Development at the City of Chicago. Trained as an architect and urbanist, Scully has a strong passion to make design an essential tool to enhance the lives of everyday people. He has experience working on a variety of projects from vision strategies that create a framework for execution to developing implementation strategies that allow those visions to be realized. Prior to joining the City of Chicago, Scully was an Associate Principal in the urban design and planning studio at SOM in Chicago where he worked for almost fourteen years on development around the world including that focus on housing, neighborhood and community planning, transit-oriented development plans, corridor plans, campus planning, inclusive placemaking and design equity. Scully is a graduate and currently an adjunct professor at IIT School of Architecture and featured in Crain’s Chicago Business 40 under 40 2020, ULI Young Visionary 2018, and Leadership Greater Chicago Class of 2021.

Robert L. Wesley (Chair) joined the Chicago office of Skidmore, Owings & Merrill (SOM) in 1964 and became its first Black partner in 1984. During his nearly four decades with the office, he worked on an impressive range of civic, commercial, entertainment, master planning, and infrastructural projects in the United States and internationally, including Algeria, Australia, Canada, Mexico, and the United Kingdom. As lead project administrator and liaison with clients, Wesley managed and coordinated the execution of several complex projects—working closely with the client’s representatives, the construction manager or general contractor, and special consultants to ensure each project’s successful completion. Wesley retired from SOM on September 30, 2001.