Laura Pirie, AIA, who for over 28 years has designed and implemented thoughtful and integrated built environments, is the principal of Pirie Associates Architects. Her work across the country includes extensive, award-winning experience with museum, performing art, institutional, commercial/retail, and residential structures, as well as community visioning and urban design.
Laura’s work is driven by her passion to empower people to live a full and meaningful life, which she does through Pirie Associates and Conscious Pioneer, an organization she founded and leads. Her belief that the built environment has the ability to support aspirations and enhance quality of life can be discovered in the remains of ancient civilizations. With Conscious Pioneer, Laura leads groups to explore a purpose-driven life by experiencing ancient civilizations’ intentionality, connection to nature, and the places they made. Her deep understanding of these practices is reflected in the process and projects of Pirie Associates.
Brady Stone, RA has been shaping the built environment for nearly 25 years. He has worked hands-on in every phase of design and construction: as a carpenter, a design-builder and as an architect. As a Senior Associate in the firm, he brings all of this experience and a keen ability to organize complexities in clear and meaningful ways to his work at Pirie Associates.
Brady is not content unless he is engaged and grounded in the act of making where he can work an idea into its fully realized form. Guiding this passion at all scales is the notion of “fit.” Whether a structure, a space, or piece of wood, he understands that each intervention should feel well-placed, like it would fit nowhere else quite as well. His ability to craft a conceptual approach, develop a building’s tectonics, and impeccably detail spans all levels of project development and all project types.
Paul S. Butkus, ASLA has more than 20 years of experience in the fields of landscape and architectural design. His work spans many scales, complexities and continents, ranging from residential backyards to performing arts centers, museums, university campuses, urban parks, and waterfront developments. Paul brings his diversified experience to all levels of project development.
Paul has a deep interest in how buildings and objects are constructed. Almost an obsession, this interest manifests itself in the extremely thorough and journalistic quantity and quality of photographs he takes of projects before and during construction. Paul’s passion for understanding why things are the way they are is particularly useful in adaptive re-use and historic preservation projects, where unlocking the history buried behind the surfaces and integrating new with old results in more sensitive and thoughtful interventions.
Danielle Davis, RA has been with Pirie Associates for over five years after a long stint in New York City. She brings with her a wide range of expertise including master planning, and extensive knowledge of commercial, institutional, and educational project types. The granddaughter of an architect in Dallas, TX, she began her architectural career in high school through the ACE Mentor Program and has been working in the field ever since. Danielle earned her master’s degree in Architecture from Yale in 2014 after studying with such varied architects as Frank Gehry and Demetri Porphyrios.
Danielle is deeply fascinated by the unconscious way in which the built environment affects the day-to-day. The ability to improve lives with her knowledge and skills inspired her to become an architect and continues to drive her work today. She particularly enjoys the challenges of adaptive reuse—both its material realities and the hurdles of reinventing its place memory. She believes that great architecture can take many forms, but the best architecture creates beautiful spaces that express and support the goals of its inhabitants.
Laura Meade, RA, is inspired by stories told and untold. Being an architect allows her to translate these narratives- from autobiographies to fairy tales- into physical reality where they can be experienced by all.
Her path to architecture began at The Ohio State University, where she considered other mediums such as illustration, sculpture, and music composition as methods for translating abstract ideas into legible formations. Laura is an introspective person, and she started to identify the common themes of her most motivating interests (abstract relationships, narratives, tenor and form). An introductory architecture seminar course brought her aspirations into focus, and she went on to earn her bachelor’s degree. On one hand, architecture is a puzzle: there are rules, budgets, and challenging physical conditions to solve. On the other hand, it offers the freedom of artistic expression and the opportunity to illustrate contemporary human stories. Laura likes to use both hands in her work. She also likes to consider its position in a greater context, which led her to pursue a minor in City & Regional Planning, “zooming out” to study urban development trends and history.
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