The Architecture & Design Society was created in 1981 as the support group for the Department of Architecture and Design at the Art Institute of Chicago. The Society’s general mission is to enhance the understanding and appreciation of architecture and design by making them accessible to a wider audience through a dynamic program of lectures, upper-level-member architectural tours and special events, and member-only receptions and viewings of Department of Architecture and Design exhibitions such as Figuration in Contemporary Design and Graphic Thought Facility: Resourceful Design. Internationally renowned speakers have included Yves Béhar, Winka Dubbeldam, Frank Gehry, Zaha Hadid, Renzo Piano, Gaetano Pesce, and Richard Rogers, among others. These lectures provide an essential opportunity for the general public to interact with some of the most innovative leading figures that shape our interior and exterior environments.

The Society also promotes the activities of the Department of Architecture and Design with fiscal support for acquisitions, exhibitions, publications, and public programs. The Society’s exciting biennial benefit, the Modern Ball, generates substantial contributions to the department in order to help fulfill these goals. Recent acquisitions funded by the Architecture & Design Society have included objects by Ron Arad, the Bouroullec Brothers, Matali Crasset, Konstantin Grcic, Hella Jongerius, Ineke Hans, and Ettore Sottsass, Jr., among others.

The Architecture & Design Society gratefully acknowledges the ongoing support of Park Hyatt Chicago.

For a membership brochure, click here.

For a membership application, click here.

Membership

$25 Student
$75 Individual
$125 Family/Dual
$250 Patron
$500 Corporate
$1,000 Spire

For questions or to join the Architecture & Design Society, please contact Jennifer Breckner, Project Coordinator, at jbreckner@artic.edu or (312) 443-3631.

Members of the Architecture & Design Society must also be a member of the Art Institute.

_{Marcel Wanders. Airborne Snotty Vase: Influenza, 2001. Restricted gift of Architecture and Design Society.}