In the latest episode of the Design the Future podcast, Lindsay Baker and I talk to Nakita Reed, AIA, NOMA, APT, LEED AP, CPHC -- who, in addition to having ties to numerous organizations (a characteristic of a silo-dissolver?) is an architect with experience in preservation, restoration, and adaptive reuse of historic buildings with a focus on sustainable strategies.
Nakita is an Associate with Quinn Evans and works from their Baltimore office. She is also the host of Tangible Remnants, a podcast exploring the intersection of architecture, preservation, sustainability, race, and gender.
For Nakita, preservation and architecture have always gone hand in hand. "Just like I can't say I'm more black or more female, I am not more preservationist or more architect," she says. But those silos, and others, are everywhere in our industry, and Nakita has been trying to dissolve them throughout her career.
Nakita is co-chair of the Zero Net Carbon Collaboration for Existing and Historic Buildings. These collaborations are critical, she says, to advancing the industry. "It's time we recognized that we are not going to build our way to net zero," she says.
Nakita observes that we have gotten a bit better at realizing that sustainability is part of good design. And she feels that she is apart of a movement, too. "In the future, I hope that it will just be like breathing. It will feel normal and natural to make something sustainable and beautiful and the impulse will be to reuse and restore, not tear down."
Listen on our site (www.designthefuturepodcast.com/episodes/nakita-reed) or on your favorite podcast platform.
related links
Nakita's personal page - www.NakitaReed.com
Tangible Remnants podcast - https://www.podpage.com/tangible-remnants/
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Kira Gould Hon. AIA
Kira Gould CONNECT
Oakland CA
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