Photo by Morgan Sheff.

MINNEAPOLIS, August 27, 2025—The FAIR School for Arts in downtown Minneapolis, designed by Cuningham, is the 2025 recipient of the 25 Year Award.

Established by the American Institute of Architects Minnesota in 1981, the annual 25 Year Award celebrates a 25- to 50-year-old building or group of buildings whose architecture has stood the test of time. Projects competing for the award must be designed by firms with architects registered and practicing professionally in Minnesota.

The Cuningham Group Architecture (now Cuningham) project team for the FAIR School for Arts included John Pfluger, FAIA, John Cuningham, FAIA, Daryll Pratt, AIA, Janet Dray, Kathy Wallace, AIA, and Jeffrey Mandyck, AIA. Cuningham’s 2014 third- and fourth-floor renovation team included John Pfluger, FAIA, Bridget Hale, and Tunde Olusanya. Project consultants and contractors included Clark Engineering Corporation, Knutson Construction Services Inc., Michaud Cooley Erickson & Associates, and Rippe Associates Inc.

Opened in 1999 as the Interdistrict Downtown School, the FAIR School for Arts represents a groundbreaking model in public education and urban design. Conceived as a collaborative, interdisciplinary learning environment rooted in the arts, the K–12 magnet school was the first of three desegregation efforts launched by the West Metro Education Program—a partnership among Minneapolis Public Schools and eight suburban districts funded by the State of Minnesota.

The school was placed atop a city-owned parking ramp, surrounded by civic, academic, and cultural institutions. Instead of shielding students from the urban context, the design fully integrates with it, leveraging nearby external partners like Orchestra Hall, the Minneapolis Central Library, and the Orpheum Theatre as extensions of the classroom.

Clad in red brick, zinc panels, and ochre precast concrete, the building features a glass-enclosed, cantilevered stairwell that animates the Hennepin Avenue facade, open-plan “educational houses,” a flexible town-square gathering space, and robust structural expression. The design’s transparency, durability, and contextual sensitivity continue to reflect the school’s commitment to experiential learning, social equity, and community connection.

Soon after its completion, the project received an AIA Minnesota Honor Award and a CEFPI James D. MacConnell Award.

“The design team added something delightful and memorable to this entry to downtown Minneapolis, skillfully scaling and breaking up the massing of the building so that it steps up as the urban fabric transitions from lower density to the downtown core,” noted one 25 Year Award juror. Added another: “For an arts-focused school that was trying to do something new in the downtown context, the flexible, industrial, not-too-precious interiors were the right choice. The award submission talks about the teaching spaces as laboratories. I can see how the industrial aesthetic would engender that sense of exploratory learning.”

Serving on the 2025 25 Year Award jury were AIA Minnesota member leaders Simona Fischer, AIA, Jody McGuire, AIA, Paul Mellblom, FAIA, Aniket Nagdive, Assoc. AIA, and Ken Sheehan, AIA.

The FAIR School for Arts and its architectural team will be honored at an awards event at the A’25 MN Conference on Architecture on Monday, November 3, 2025. Learn more about the 25 Year Award here.

The American Institute of Architects Minnesota, founded in 1892, is dedicated to advancing a vital profession, vibrant communities, and architecture that endures. For more information on the organization and Minnesota architectural firms, visit our website and subscribe to ENTER, our digital monthly newsletter that explores the people and ideas shaping a better built environment for Minnesota.