For 2020, Design in the Hills shifts its perspective to your eyes

Photos Courtesy of local Black Hills Design Firms

Each July over the past decade, architects, landscape architects, interior designers, engineers and artists gather in South Dakota’s picturesque Black Hills for Design in the Hills, an interactive and mobile “unconference” that celebrates well-known and obscure built-environment gems across the region.

With COVID-19 pushing back our in-person Design in the Hills events to 2021, the American Institute of Architects South Dakota (AIA SD) is partnering with the Black Hills & Badlands Tourism Association to open this year’s virtual event to the public through the Design in the Hills 2020 Photo Contest. One final $150 prize to a local Black Hills business provided by AIA South Dakota will be awarded to the top photo.

The competition follows all of the same Black Hills & Badlands rules with one exception: Photo subjects should be a built environment or part of a built environment within the Black Hills. This could include current or historic Architecture, Landscape Architecture, Interior Design, bridges, public art, etc., however should not encompass sites of exclusive natural beauty such as Roughlock Falls or the Cathedral Spires. The photography in this blogpost provide examples of photography from local architecture firms in the Black Hills to set the stage of the beauty of the built environment in the area.

This should leave plenty of options, as the Black Hills region offers a unique palette of natural building materials and historic context for built environments. We are excited to see what you come up with, and we encourage you open our eyes to some of the area’s overlooked jewels and popular sites viewed from uncommon perspectives.

Click the link for more details –> Black Hills Badlands

Also, be sure to look for a “Where is it Wednesday” on July 15 and a chance to win a $50 gift card to a Black Hills business if you’re the first person to guess correctly!

AIA SD’s annual Design in the Hills, which rotates each summer between various Black Hills communities, showcases fascinating design projects in the Black Hills. Attendees tour projects and places narrated with stories of design, construction and renovation. Although the two-day event offers an abundance of continuing education opportunities, very little content is provided in a traditional classroom setting and participants get plenty of time to network and socialize with fellow design professionals. Each Design in the Hills culminates with a design charrette, with attendees splitting up into multi-discipline teams to exercise their collective design muscles in search of built-environment solutions.

Architects and design professionals from across the state love traveling to the Black Hills for this elite event. AIA SD thanks the Black Hills & Badlands Tourism Association for partnering with our organization to create this fun challenge to celebrate the region’s wealth of built-environment beauties with a worldwide audience.

AIA SD will highlight each of the past Design in the Hills events in upcoming July Blueprint South Dakota blog posts, here is a sampling of sites we have visited to help get you thinking about built environments: Main Street Square (Rapid City); Prairie Berry Winery (Hill City); Dick Termes’ Termespheres gallery (Spearfish); Art Alley (Rapid City); Mount Moriah cemetery (Deadwood); Rapid City Regional Airport Green Roof (Rapid City); PowerHouse Park (Deadwood); Spearfish Sawmill (Spearfish); Dignity Sculpture while under construction (visit sculpture off I-90 exit at Chamberlain rest stop); The Garage (Rapid City); Homestake Mine-Sanford Lab Visitors Center (Lead); Deadwood Mountain Grand: former Homestake Mining Slime Plant (Deadwood); The Abode (Custer); Black Hills Energy headquarters (Rapid City); Harley-Davidson Plaza Rally Point (Sturgis); Custer Regional Health Clinic and Healing Garden (Custer).

Grab your camera and show us what you’ve got!

Thank you to our 2020 Design in the Hills sponsors!