05/12/2026
Architectural designer Catherine Chen has been named winner of the 2026 James Harrison Steedman Memorial Fellowship.
Selected for her proposal, "Solar Communities: Architectures of the Energy Transition," Chen will receive $100,000 to support her research. Her work explores how the shift to renewable energy can reshape collective ownership and public space.
Established in 1926, the biennial Steedman Fellowship is organized by the College of Architecture and Graduate School of Architecture & Urban Design at WashU’s Sam Fox School, in partnership with the American Institute of Architects St. Louis.
This year’s theme, “Collective Form/Forums” honors the legacy of celebrated architect and former WashU professor Fumihiko Maki (1928-2024) by taking inspiration from his text, “Investigations in Collective Form.” Neeraj Bhatia, the fellowship’s jury chair and 2026-27 Rome Prize winner, shared that the theme “asks us to reconsider the nature of the collective — how it is constituted, how it is spatialized, and architecture’s role in both convening publics and giving form to shared arrangements.”
https://samfoxschool.washu.edu/the-school/news/1432-catherine-chen-wins-2026-steedman-fellowship-in-architecture
