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Kirah Cahill

Kirah Cahill

Philadelphia, PA, US

 
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About 

I am a third-year Master of Architecture candidate at the University of Pennsylvania Stuart Weitzman School of Design and a Summer Architectural Intern at Skidmore, Owings & Merrill. I hold a Bachelor of Science in Business, Economics from Indiana University Kelley School of Business, where I graduated Summa cum Laude in 2020. 

Elsewhere:

Employment 

Skidmore, Owings & Merrill (SOM), Chicago, IL, US, Summer Intern - Architecture

Jun 2023 - current
 

Education 

University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA, US, MArch, Master of Architecture

Jun 2021 - current
 

Indiana University, Bloomington, IN, US, Bachelors, Business, Economics

Aug 2018 - Dec 2020
 

Awards 

E. Lewis Dales Travel Fellowship, Award

The E. Lewis Dales Traveling Fellowships established under his will in 1963 for travel abroad during the summer prior to the student's final year as a candidate for the first professional degree in architecture. Competition for these awards is conducted by the Department of Architecture in January.

Students are selected for the Fellowships through an anonymous portfolio competition judged during the first week of the spring semester by a committee comprised of standing and core studio faculty. The Dales Fellowships enable the Department to encourage students to begin the documentation and presentation of their work, a process that is integral to the development of a design ethic and to interviewing for a job.

The Weitzman Architecture Faculty Jury (see list below) evaluated 60 anonymous portfolio submissions. They were asked to score each portfolio and submit short statements on what they valued while assessing each portfolio. The 2023 Dales Fellowships will be awarded to the highest-scoring submissions.

Mike Avery, Gisela Baurmann, Jonas Coersmeier, Brian DeLuna, Richard Garber, Nate Hume, Hina Jamelle, Ferda Kolatan, Ben Krone, Daniel Markiewicz, Larry Mitnick, Brian Philips, Laia Mogas-Soldevila, Eduardo Rega, Andrew Saunders, Robert Stuart-Smith, and Danielle Willems

2023
 

Starchitect's Chair Honorable Mention, Honorable Mention

Architecture is about designing experiences. Starchitects go to great lengths to curate an amazing experience for their users. This obviously includes the walls, roof and floors, but often also extends to designing other details like paintings, lights and furniture. A detail that many starchitects find important is the chair.

As long as architects have been designing buildings, they’ve also been designing the chairs that feature within them. Starchitects like Frank Gehry, Mies van der Rohe, Le Corbusier, Zaha Hadid and Eero Saarinen, have all designed iconic chairs. In order to have complete control over how users experience their buildings, they have masterfully crafted chairs that complement their design language.

Frank Lloyd Wright once said, “… it is quite impossible to consider the building as one thing, its furnishings another…”. While architecture sets the scene and provides the framework, a chair can have a strong influence on a room’s character. The Barcelona Pavilion is incomplete without the Barcelona Chair and so is the Villa Savoye without the LC4 Chaise Lounge.

The Starchitect’s Chair design competition is looking for the next iconic chair.

Jury: ROOSHAD SHROFF, KRISZTIÁN TÓTH, VEERAM SHAH

2022
 

Merit Scholarship, Grant

Awarded a scholarship based on academic merit from the University of Pennsylvania Stuart Weitzman School of Design Department of Architecture.

2021
 

Highest Distinction Graduating Honors, Award

Graduated Summa cum Laude from Indiana University Kelley School of Business with a Bachelor of Science in Business, Economics in December 2020.

2020
 

Areas of Specialization