CAPLA Student Reef Townsend earned national recognition for Arid Futures Pavilion, a design that explores how contemporary architecture can respond to the Sonoran Desert through thoughtful site integration, material choices and sustainability.

CAPLA Student Ella Parsons earned national recognition for Aguán, a project that looks to the Sonoran Desert’s longstanding building traditions to inform a sustainable relationship between architecture and the natural world.

“ISAPD in Our Hands: Student Chapters Shaping the Future” explored how student chapters of the Indigenous Society of Architecture, Planning, and Design (ISAPD) can foster learning, cultural engagement, advocacy and professional growth within universities and their communities.

Last spring, CAPLA students partnered with Community Gardens of Tucson to explore new possibilities for the Mary Meredith Community Garden. Led by Architecture Lecturer Chris Tucker, students in the BA.DAP program’s Spatial Design Studio developed design proposals for the garden’s school-side grounds, considering how the space could support children’s outdoor experiences and the surrounding ecosystem.

For Javi Barcelo, B.Arch ’27, architecture is deeply connected to place, culture and community. His City Immersion Scholarship gave him the opportunity to explore those connections firsthand in Mexico City, an experience that ultimately helped shape the direction of his capstone project.

CAPLA faculty, students and researchers joined SCORCH’s Greenspaces and Health Photovoice Study, a participatory project that invited community members to document how parks, trees and other green spaces shape their health and daily lives. The collaboration highlights CAPLA’s interdisciplinary approach to research and design, connecting community voices, public health and the built environment.