Lives of Consequence
Pamela Lucas Rew '81
In her 25 years at the Princeton, N.J.-based KSS Architects, Pamela Lucas Rew ’81 has helped grow the firm from a 10-person design studio to an award-winning team of 65 architects. Her decades-long work to transform buildings and learning environments for higher education institutions, both locally and nationally, is evident on the HWS campus, where she has designed several buildings and spaces including Stern Hall and Scandling Campus Center renovations.
“I see any project as a continuum of its place and that place’s mission,” Rew says. “My focus on university and institutional work has allowed me to dig in and appreciate the stewardship of any project as part of a larger whole -- the personal stewardship and passions of a donor, the needs and desires of a college, the students, and the many people invested.”
The projects at HWS, she adds, are a great example of that continuum of investment: “Stern Hall was transformative. It gave the Colleges an opportunity to think about how learning has changed in recent years, to balance formal and informal spaces in supporting a variety of learners.”
Rew, who holds a master of architecture from the University of Virginia, sees the expansions KSS has made from the Northeast and East Coast into the Midwest and South, as a chance “to get to know new people and new areas. Whenever I work on a project, I want to embed myself in the culture and the place and the values of that place.”
With this philosophical perspective, Rew has designed academic and campus centers, residence buildings and memorials at colleges and universities across the country. In 2015, her achievements as an individual, and her design contributions to architecture and to society, were recognized with her induction into the prestigious College of Fellows at the national American Institute of Architects (AIA) convention.
Based in Washington, D.C., the AIA has been the leading professional membership association for licensed architects, emerging professionals, and allied partners since 1857. The College of Fellows, founded in 1952, is composed of members of the Institute who are elected to Fellowship by a jury of their peers. This induction is one of the highest honors the AIA can bestow upon a member, with the College of Fellows representing just 2.5 percent of the 85,000 AIA members.
Rew was honored as a Fellow for her distinguishing herself as “a vibrant and visionary steward of campus architecture,” as noted in her citation. “Her designs embrace what is authentic and enriching about each place, stitching together their intimate story and strategic mission with the most applicable of leading-edge educational design.”
“The leadership of AIA-NJ and the New Jersey architecture community as a whole applaud the elevation of Pamela Rew…to [Fellow],” said Kimberly Bunn, AIA, president of AIA-NJ. “[Her] work serves as a model to all, demonstrating the influence that innovative architects can have on the lives of thousands of people.”
Reflecting on her time at HWS, where she majored in studio art and history and graduated with high honors, Rew says, “The depth of exposure, inquiry, conversation and attention of a HWS liberals arts education gave me the foundation and perspective that enriched my approach to design -- and to crafting architecture which is lasting and meaningful. HWS taught me to ‘tell the story.’”