Olson Kundig, is an American architectural firm based in

Seattle Seattle ( ) is a seaport city on the West Coast of the United States. It is the seat of King County, Washington. With a 2020 population of 737,015, it is the largest city in both the state of Washington and the Pacific Northwest regio ...

, run by architects Jim Olson and Tom Kundig. Founded by Olson in 1966, the firm’s work has grown to encompass museums, commercial and mixed-use design, exhibit design, interior design, places of worship, and residences, often for art collectors. Olson Kundig was awarded the 2009 AIA Architecture Firm Award (as Olson Sundberg Kundig Allen Architects) from the

American Institute of Architects The American Institute of Architects (AIA) is a professional organization for architects in the United States. Headquartered in Washington, D.C., the AIA offers education, government advocacy, community redevelopment, and public outreach to su ...

History

The firm, founded by Jim Olson, has been in business since 1966. Principal and owners have included Jim Olson, Tom Kundig, Rick Sundberg, Kirsten R. Murray, Alan Maskin and Kevin M. Kudo-King. The firm changed its name from Olson Sundberg Kundig Allen Architects to Olson Kundig on January 1, 2010. The firm launched an interiors studio in 2000. Their first line of accessories, The Tom Kundig Collection, debuted in 2012. In 2022, the firm expanded to New York City, its first office outside of Seattle since 1966.

Notable works

Olson Kundig designed a space for the Gethsemane Lutheran Church in downtown Seattle. The project involves renovation of an existing 1950s building to integrate it into an evolving urban context and construction of 50 new housing apartments. In 2016, Olson Kundig won the competition for a children's museum annex to the

Jewish Museum Berlin The Jewish Museum Berlin (''Jüdisches Museum Berlin'') was opened in 2001 and is the largest Jewish museum in Europe. On of floor space, the museum presents the history of Jews in Germany from the Middle Ages to the present day, with new focuses ...

. * The Burke Museum, Seattle (2019) * Noah’s Ark Exhibit,

Skirball Cultural Center The Skirball Cultural Center, founded in 1996, is a Jewish educational institution in Los Angeles, California. The center, named after philanthropist-couple Jack H. Skirball and Audrey Skirball-Kenis, features a museum with regularly changing e ...

, Los Angeles (2007) * Delta Shelter, Washington (2004) * Chicken Point Cabin, Idaho (2003) * Pratt Fine Arts Center, Seattle (2002) * The Brain, Seattle (2001) * Mission Hill Winery, Westbank, British Columbia (2001) * Ridge House, Washington (2001) * Red House, Denver (1999) * Studio House, Seattle (1998) *

Frye Art Museum The Frye Art Museum is a modern and contemporary art museum located in the First Hill neighborhood of Seattle, Washington. It was founded in 1952 to house the collection of Charles and Emma Frye and has since grown to include rotating temporary e ...

, Seattle (1997) * Hillclimb Court Building, Seattle (1985) * Gallery House, Seattle (1985) * Pike & Virginia Building, Seattle (1978) * Earth House, Washington (1969)

Awards and honors

The firm has won more than 70 regional and national AIA awards, as well as awards from the

Chicago Athenaeum The Chicago Athenaeum is a private museum of architecture and design, based in Galena, Illinois. The museum focuses on the art of design in all areas of the discipline: architecture, industrial and product design, graphics, landscape architecture, ...

. Tom Kundig was awarded the 2008 National Design Award in Architecture from the

Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum is a design museum housed within the Andrew Carnegie Mansion in Manhattan, New York City, along the Upper East Side's Museum Mile. It is one of 19 museums that fall under the wing of the Smithsonian Ins ...

, an Academy Award in Architecture from the

American Academy of Arts and Letters The American Academy of Arts and Letters is a 300-member honor society whose goal is to "foster, assist, and sustain excellence" in American literature, music, and art. Its fixed number membership is elected for lifetime appointments. Its headqu ...

in 2007, and the Emerging Architecture Award from the Architectural League of New York in 2004. Jim Olson received the AIA Seattle Medal of Honor in 2007. The firm's work has been published in the

New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

, Architectural Digest, and

Architectural Record ''Architectural Record'' is a US-based monthly magazine dedicated to architecture and interior design. "The Record," as it is sometimes colloquially referred to, is widely-recognized as an important historical record of the unfolding debates in a ...

, among other publications.

References

{{reflist

External links

Official website

National AIA Architecture Firm of the Year award

"A Glass House in Farm Country"
Juliet Chung, ''

The Wall Street Journal ''The Wall Street Journal'' is an American business-focused, international daily newspaper based in New York City, with international editions also available in Chinese and Japanese. The ''Journal'', along with its Asian editions, is published ...

'', 6 August 2010 Architecture firms based in Washington (state) Companies based in Seattle

History

Notable works

Awards and honors

Further reading

References

External links