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The RI Design Hall of Fame recognizes proven leaders in the Rhode Island design community. Showcasing the unique contributions of RI designers on a local, national, and international level, the RI Design Hall of Fame elevates the legends and the next generation of amazing. Honorees for Lifetime Achievement and Emerging Designer are nominated by the community and voted on by a committee of peers, then spotlighted and celebrated every year as part of DESIGN WEEK RI. Peruse this page to learn more about these amazing designers and what’s coming next.

2022 RI DESIGN HALL OF FAME

In its 9th year, the RI Design Hall of Fame recognizes proven leaders in the Rhode Island design community. It showcases and celebrates the impact of RI designers on a local, national, and international level. Honorees are inducted into the RI Design Hall of Fame at a celebratory event being held on Wednesday September 28th during DESIGN WEEK RI.

2022 LIFEtime achievement awardees

Khipra Nichols

With over 30 years as a practicing Industrial Designer, Khipra Nichols, has an impressive and vast portfolio. Currently, he is the department head of the Industrial Design Department at RISD and teaches at both Brown and RISD. Recently, Khipra partnered with professors at Brown University and started a RISD Brown University Masters in Design and Engineering dual degree program.

Paul Sproll

Paul Sproll is dedicated to the development of progressive practices in art and design by teaching and learning in K-12 schools and community-based settings. He founded and directed(till 2022), Project Open Door which provides teens attending Rhode Island’s urban core public high schools with access to high-quality studio-based learning opportunities. Sproll is a regular presenter at national forums on art and design education and frequently serves as a curriculum consultant and adviser.

Martha Werenfels

Martha is a nationally-recognized expert in the field of historic preservation. She has directed multiple phases of important preservation projects at some of the region’s most treasured landmark buildings. As an advisor to the National Trust for Historic Preservation, Martha served on a national Sustainability Task Force focused on strengthening the important relationship between sustainability and historic preservation. Martha serves on the boards of GrowSmart RI and the Historic Preservation Education Foundation. She is a Governor-appointed member of the Capital Center Commission, a member of the RIHPHC review board, and a past-President of AIA/Rhode Island.

2022 EMERGING DESIGNER AWARDEES

Rachel Rosenkrantz

Rachel Rosenkrantz is the owner and Master Luthier at Atelier Rosenkrantz, a unique stringed instruments company with a strong focus on sustainability and, in particular biomaterials. Rachel teaches within the Division of Experimental and Foundation Studies at RISD. As with her music and design, Rosenkrantz uses luthiery to combine the traditional and the new, exploring new techniques while bringing a unique perspective to a traditional idiom.

Aaron Horowitz

Aaron Horowitz is founder of Sproutel and helped found Design for America (DFA). Horowitz works to improve the lives of children growing up with an illness. Over the past decade his products have reached over 100,000 children around the world.

LIFEtime achievement inductees

The RI Design Hall of Fame Lifetime Achievement Award recognizes those individuals with generally more than 25 years in their respective fields of design that have proven a true commitment to design in Rhode Island and have made a significant impact over the course of an extensive career.

Mickey Ackerman

Mickey Ackerman

An internationally recognized design leader, Mickey Ackerman has spent decades teaching designers how to define problems clearly, then solve those problems through multidisciplinary teamwork. For 15 years as the head of the Industrial Design department at the Rhode...

Chris Bardt

Chris Bardt

Chris has practiced and taught and researched architecture for over 28 years, after earning a Bachelor of Architecture from the Rhode Island School of Design in 1983 and a Masters of Architecture II from Harvard University Graduate School of Design in 1988. His...

John Everett Benson

John Everett Benson

John Everett Benson is a calligrapher, stone carver, sculptor and typeface designer. He is the second of three generations of Bensons to run The John Stevens Shop, a 314 year-old stone carving and lettering business in Newport, Rhode Island. After a summer of study...

Laura Briggs

Laura Briggs

Laura Briggs, MA, is a Senior Critic at the Rhode Island School of Design and the co-founder of BriggsKnowles A+D, a Providence-based architectural and design practice recognized for its use of light, color and the integration of energy efficient and renewable energy...

Stephen Durkee

Stephen Durkee

Stephen Durkee founded Durkee Brown Architects in 1994, and by the time he left in 2010, Durkee, Brown, Viveiros, and Werenfels was one of the largest firms in the state and most impactful for the revitalization of Providence. Steve directed the adaptive reuse of 15...

James Estes

James Estes

James (Jim) Estes graduated from Rhode Island School of Design in 1971 with a degree in Architecture and since, has become known for his iconic place-based designs. His style of quiet modernism is reflective in his professional and personal work, designing his own...

Malcolm Grear

Malcolm Grear

Graphic designer Malcolm Grear’s work is familiar to many Americans, even if his name is not. As the principal at Malcolm Grear Designers from 1960 until his death earlier this year, he was responsible for numerous high profile projects, including the official seals...

Marc Harrison

Marc Harrison

Marc Harrison was born on July 1, 1936 in New York City. When he was eleven years old, Harrison suffered a severe brain injury due to a sledding accident in the Bronx, New York. As a result of the accident, he had to relearn basic functions such as walking and...

Martin Keen

Martin Keen

Martin Keen is an entrepreneurial leader in industrial design and brand building, and an innovator of manufacturing technologies. His design career spans more than two decades focused on two distinct and crowded product categories: footwear and furniture. He is the...

Eugene Lee

Eugene Lee

Eugene Lee’s career seems like almost too much for one person: He has been the Resident Designer at Trinity Repertory Company since 1967. As Production Designer for Saturday Night Live, he has designed the look of one of the most influential forces in pop culture...

Kyna Leski

Kyna Leski

Kyna Leski is a designer, an artist, a teacher, and a writer who seeks creative discovery or, as she puts it, “realizing you do not know what you thought you knew, while expanding what you do.” As a founding principal of 3six0 Architecture, Leski commits to creative...

Rene Payne

Rene Payne

Rene Watkins Payne is the founder and director of FAVOR design & communications, a multi-disciplinary creative studio specializing in brand identity, art direction, and graphic design. Working in the graphic design sector for over 25 years, Rene’s work has spanned...

David Pedrick

David Pedrick

David Pedrick is a naval architect and marine engineer. He learned about naval architecture – the architecture of ships – and its application to yacht design soon after he started sailing at an early age. He shaped his love of sailing, eye for aesthetics and talent in...

Aidan Petrie

Aidan Petrie

As the Co-founder and Chief Innovation Officer of the product development firm Ximedica, Aidan has built and grown a 25+ year design consultancy that employs over 120 people locally, has a marquee client list and is known on a global level. His career in industrial...

Burr Sebring

Burr Sebring

Burr Sebring has a long history of designing silverware and silver pieces in Rhode Island. After serving in the army, Sebring attended the Rochester Institute of Technology’s School of American Craftsmen. While there, he won a national competition in silversmithing....

Nancy Skolos

Nancy Skolos

Nancy Skolos works with her partner/husband Thomas Wedell to diminish the boundaries between graphic design and photography—creating collaged three-dimensional images influenced by modern painting, technology and architecture. The studio’s work came into its own...

Rosanne Somerson

Rosanne Somerson

Rosanne Somerson is a woodworker, furniture designer, maker, educator and current President of Rhode Island School of Design. Long known as a leader in the studio furniture field, Rosanne Somerson has also earned a growing reputation as an agile, adept and visionary...

Friedrich St. Florian

Friedrich St. Florian

Friedrich St. Florian’s career as an architect and educator spans more than 55 years, and though his success has taken him all over the world, his commitment to his adopted home of Providence has made him an influential figure in the city’s renaissance. Along with...

Nancy Taylor

Nancy Taylor

Nancy Taylor is the founder and principal designer of Taylor Interior Design. Since starting her firm in 1967, she has completed more than 500 projects around the United States and in the Bahamas. Taylor originally trained as a nurse before completing a certificate...

Peter Twombly

Peter Twombly

For the past 25 years, Peter Twombly has put his construction, design and planning experience to work on houses and commercial projects in and around Rhode Island. New England architecture seems imprinted in his DNA and his work both reflects and abstracts traditional...

William (Bill) D. Warner

William (Bill) D. Warner

The late Bill Warner was more than an urban designer and architect; he was an iconoclast whose vision and passion, more than anyone else’s, propelled the Providence Renaissance. From the late-1950s and the publication of the College Hill Study until his passing in...

EMERGING DESIGNER AWARDEES

The RI Design Hall of Fame Emerging Designer Award recognizes those individuals with generally less than 15 years of experience in their respective fields of design who show a talent and commitment that ensures they are the future design leaders of Rhode Island.

Adam Anderson

Adam Anderson

Adam E. Anderson is a landscape architect and artist whose diverse projects include hospital healing gardens, residential landscapes, masterplanning, campus plazas, rooftop gardens, urban parks, and public art works. Quickly becoming a leading design figure in...

Kyla Coburn

Kyla Coburn

Kyla Coburn is an acclaimed interior designer and an advocate for creative urban revitalization. Her impressive body of work includes some of Rhode Island’s most beloved restaurant and bar spaces, including The Avery, Loie Fuller’s, Salvation Café, and the former...

Asher Rodriguez-Dunn

Asher Rodriguez-Dunn

Asher Rodriguez-Dunn boasts a prodigious and accomplished career that makes it hard to believe he is not yet 30 years old. His company, Studio DUNN, has attracted accolades and awards for beautifully handcrafted wood furniture and lighting designs. That work landed...

Lois Harada

Lois Harada

Lois Harada is a printmaker bridging fine art and commercial printing in Providence, Rhode Island. Her work utilizes commercial production techniques and equipment to create printed editions that are meant to be affordable and accessible to a wide audience. Print...

Lindy McDonough

Lindy McDonough

Lindy McDonough is the creative director and co-founder of Lotuff Leather in Providence, Rhode Island. Lotuff is an in-house leather studio where classically trained artisans hand-make technically complex leather bags. With over a decade of industry experience and a...

Jason Pamental

Jason Pamental

Jason Pamental is a designer and specialist in web typography in Rhode Island. He spends much of his time working with clients to establish their typographic systems and digital strategy, helping design and development teams work smarter and faster, and running...

Joe Perez

Joe Perez

Joe Perez is a freelance creative director & graphic artist based in Providence, Rhode Island. He attended Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, CA. From 2008-2010, he helped curated Kanye West’s two blogs: kanyeuniversecity.com & gallery.kanyewest.com....

Eliza Squibb

Eliza Squibb

As a textile artist and designer, Eliza Squibb is interested in the intersection of textile arts and cultural identity. After studying textiles at the Rhode Island School of Design, she taught design workshops in three indigenous communities in the Peruvian Amazon....

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