Statewide Preservation Conference in Tahlequah
Last week IQC staff and OU students traveled to Tahlequah, Oklahoma for the Statewide Preservation Conference. Director Blair Humphreys, Associate Director Hope Mander, Professor Ron Frantz, Professor Emeritus Arn Henderson, OU Urban Design Studio graduate Meagan...
IQC Students Present Projects in Norman, Pauls Valley
It was an excellent first semester for the IQC Community Workshop Course. Professor Ron Frantz, Director Blair Humphreys, Associate Director Hope Mander have led two groups of students through two great projects. This first round of student projects shows the...
IQC Students Ready to Unveil Alvis Hotel Proposal
The semester is nearing an end, and the IQC Community Workshop is wrapping up. Students in the Alvis Hotel group are ready to present their final proposals in Pauls Valley. The students have chosen to reveal the proposal during a presentation at BrickFest in Paul's...
100 Feet: Designing Oklahoma Main Streets
Our lecture series “Streets for People” has encouraged a dialogue about how streets can act as public spaces when they are not totally devoted to moving cars. The best example of this in Oklahoma is a great Main Street. Main Streets in Oklahoma, particularly in the...
Depew Fest
If you want to be encouraged and inspired about the future of community life in struggling small towns, mark your calendar for this upcoming event in Depew, Oklahoma, which has lately been responding to its challenges in a big way. (For a recap on Project Postcard in...
Two OU Teams Honored in International Urban Design Competition
NORMAN – The University of Oklahoma joined Harvard University as one of only two universities with multiple teams honored in the 10th annual Urban Land Institute Gerald D. Hines Student Urban Design Competition. One OU team received an “Honorable Mention First Place”...
Jason Roberts at TEDXOU
Jason Roberts, who gave an excellent talk at our Streets for People lecture in September, returned to OU recently for the TEDXOU Conference. Jason's Better Block Project has continued to attract national attention throughout the year, with several new projects around...
More on Overholser’s Live-Work Buildings
A few months ago, my post about Urban Design in Territorial Oklahoma included this photo of some two-story wooden storefront structures in Oklahoma City, taken sometime not long after the Land Run in 1889: I also went to the digital archives of the...
IQC Students Visit Pauls Valley
Students in the IQC's first academic course this spring recently took a trip to Pauls Valley via the Heartland Flyer to scope out the site of their first project. Owners Larry and Jenny Wallace, of Pauls Valley, gave a tour of the property to the students, along with...
Depew, Oklahoma: “Project Postcard”
A while back, we told you about Meagan Vandecar, a student at OU Tulsa's Urban Design Studio, and her project focusing on her town of Depew, Oklahoma. In mid-November, several IQC staff members met with Meagan and groups from the Tulsa Urban Design Studio and the...
OU Student Works with IQC to Improve Rural Communities
Meagan Vandecar is a second year graduate student at the OU Urban Design Studio in Tulsa. Meagan has taken a special interest in how rural and small town development can proceed in a world where the economy is always changing and increasingly competitive. She has a...
Architect Ron Frantz, AIA, joins OU Institute, College of Architecture Faculty
NORMAN – Architect Ron Frantz has joined the Institute for Quality Communities at the University of Oklahoma College of Architecture as the Director of Small Town Studios. Frantz will also teach in the College’s Division of Architecture and received a Wick Carey...