Registration NOW OPEN!
Please join us for the upcoming Design Forum XVII on Friday, May 1, and Saturday, May 2, 2026, at the Center for the Arts at Virginia Tech in Blacksburg, VA.
Earn up to 7.5 AIA LU | Elective (submitted for approval)
Schedule
FRIDAY (2 AIA LU)
1:00 p.m. Meet and Greet, Registration Opens
2:00 p.m. Virginia Tech Architecture School Studio Walk
4:00 p.m. Welcome and Moderator Remarks | Ronald Rael
4:40 p.m. Speaker 1: Marlon Blackwell, FAIA
6:00 p.m. Reception
7:30 p.m. Reception ends (attendees out on your own)
SATURDAY (5.5 AIA LU)
8:30 a.m. Check-in and Light Breakfast
9:10 a.m. Speaker 2: Patricia Gruits, AIA
10:30 a.m. Speaker 3: Ronald Rael
11:50 a.m. Lunch & Networking
1:30 p.m. Speaker 4: Michael Reynolds
3:00 p.m. Moderator Remarks and Speaker Panel
3:45 p.m. Closing Remarks
4:00 p.m. Tour of the Center for the Arts at Virginia Tech
6:00 p.m. AIA Virginia Fellows Fete at The Inn at Virginia Tech
Location
Attendees can join us at the award-winning Center for the Arts at Virginia Tech in Blacksburg, Virginia.
Tickets
AIA Member/VANOMA Member: $265
Assoc. AIA Member: $185
Non-member: $318
Student: $63
Lodging
We have a room block at The Inn at Virginia Tech – please reserve your room HERE. The room block will be open until April 8, 2026.
Do you want to be a 2026 Design Forum Sponsor? Secure your sponsorship HERE and/or contact Jody Cranford.
Theme – Against the Grain:
There is no singular approach to being a designer. There is, however, a custom of practice built from centuries of institutional knowledge and experience. Convention provides comfort and stability in an evolving field, a traditional path for architects to follow. As the world shifts around us, Design Forum XVII looks to the vanguards of change, risk takers whose means of practice challenge the standards of what it means to be an architect. Designers that cross the organizational boundaries of traditional practice; that move outside the limits of traditional program typologies; that work to dismantle structures of embodied social injustice and inequality; that reinvent constructional traditions or return them to their origins; that recreate and restructure formal traditions.
The Virginia Design Forum is a biennial event celebrating and exploring critical topics around design. Curated by the Design Committee, the two-day event showcases the talent and work of some of the profession’s most cutting-edge designers, as well as to bring together and connect architects of all ages as we engage the pressing issues of our time.
Launched in 1994, the Virginia Design Forum continues a tradition of matching urgent topics with engaging speakers, which have included Samuel Mockbee, Tod Williams, Kai-Uwe Bergman, Anne Fougeron, Glenn Murcutt, Doris Kim Sung, and many more.
