Teacher, designer, builder and advocate Andrew Freear, Wiatt Professor and director of Auburn University Rural Studio has been named the 2023 recipient of the Thomas Jefferson Foundation Medal in Architecture.

The Thomas Jefferson Foundation Medals — sponsored jointly by the University of Virginia and the Thomas Jefferson Foundation, the nonprofit organization that owns and operates Monticello — are awarded each year to recognize the achievements of those who embrace endeavors in which Jefferson — author of the Declaration of Independence, third U.S. president and founder of the University of Virginia — excelled and held in high regard. The architecture medal and its counterparts in law, citizen leadership, and global innovation are UVA’s highest external honors.

Freear and Rural Studio join a distinguished list of past recipients of the Thomas Jefferson Foundation Medal in Architecture, including Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, I.M. Pei, Frank Gehry, Toyo Ito, Zaha Hadid, Sir David Adjaye, and Kenneth Frampton.

More than 1,200 students have been educated through Rural Studio’s context-based service-learning curriculum, where students live and work alongside neighbors, finding solutions together. In particular, the program develops research and projects that support long-term wellbeing and sustainable rural living, focused on home access and affordability, effective and efficient use of timber, small-scale farming, and access to resources such as clean water.