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Since its inception in 1965. the Endowment has provided 
 a model for design advocacy. From its visionary support of 
 The Railroad Revitalization Act of 1976, which led to the 
 adaptive reuse of dozens of historic railroad stations and 
 the reclamation of major down-town areas across the country, 
 to the sponsorship of the design competition for the 
 Vietnam Veterans Memorial, the Endowment has displayed 
 its commitment to promoting the nation's well-heing 
 and social consciousness through design. 
 
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 Leadership 
 
 The Growing Role of Design in a Changing World 
 The approaching turn of the millennium serves as 
 an ideal time to recognize how profoundly the 
 societal, economic, technological, and cultural shifts 
 of recent decades have impacted the ways in 
 which people live, work, and interact with each 
 other and with their surroundings. 
 
 Design possesses the power to connect 
 spheres of economic activity; it enables individuals 
 and communities to relate meaningfully to their 
 surroundings; and it levels barriers to new ideas. 
 Design acts as a bridge, facilitating the functioning 
 of products, services, environments, and 
 communications while delivering economy, 
 efficiency, beauty, and clarity to everyday life. 
 
 The Endowment's Role 
 
 The National Endowment for the Arts significantly 
 impacts the public realm through a series of 
 initiatives and programs aimed at introducing 
 the nation's wealth of design resources to 
 governmental agencies, nonprofit organizations, 
 foundations, and businesses as they embark on 
 projects that will affect the physical and visual 
 environment. Whether through the development 
 of public housing, the renovation of federal 
 buildings, or the conservation of ecologically 
 unique tracts of land, the Endowment provides a 
 meeting ground for all those concerned with 
 effecting positive change through design. 
 
 The initiatives, though broad in scope, are 
 unified in their demonstration of the power of 
 design to work across social, political, geographic, 
 and professional boundaries. Through these 
 programs, the Endowment offers concrete — and 
 widely felt — design solutions to the increasingly 
 complex problems affecting our nation. 
 
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 Your Town: 
 
 
 Designing Its Future 
 
 
 Preserving the Special Spirit 
 of America's Rural Communities 
 
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 The communities of rural America 
 
 are facing a range of critical problems-in some cases, heavy 
 outmigration and a loss of jobs; in others, rapid growth from suburban 
 sprawl, the location of a new facility or an influx of a retirement 
 population. These problems affect the vitality of the community, 
 its design and sense of place. Rural leaders often feel powerless to keep 
 rural towns intact and to preserve community pride. 
 
 Your Town: Designing Its 
 
 workshops focus on an important aspect of community 
 spirit and community integrity: the process of design. The 
 workshops aim specifically to introduce rural technical 
 assistance providers and rural decision makers to the role 
 of design in community planning. 
 
Your Town is intended for those who 
 provide rural technical assistance in 
 economic development or land use 
 and those who influence and make 
 decisions about the way rural 
 communities will look and work in 
 the future: civic organization and 
 business leaders, local elected 
 officials, regional and county 
 planning commissioners, board 
 members of Certified Local 
 Governments, rural electric 
 cooperative board members and 
 employees, recreation and tourism 
 officials, and federal and state 
 employees active in rural economic 
 development. 
 
 The workshops take place over a 
 two-and-a-half day period. It is a 
 participatory workshop, with an 
 emphasis on the practical application 
 of learned material through small- 
 group exercises. The culmination of 
 the workshop is a group problem- 
 solving effort. A proposed bypass, a 
 new subdivision, infill development 
 on Main Street — these are some of 
 the issues the groups must resolve 
 and present their solutions 
 graphically. The exercise is a dynamic 
 learning process in which participants 
 apply the key concepts of the 
 workshop as they learn from, and 
 teach, each other. 
 
 The workshop course material 
 addresses a range of issues in rural 
 community planning. The curriculum 
 focuses on the process by which rural 
 communities construct a vision about 
 their future, evaluate their natural 
 and cultural assets, and implement 
 decisions about how their community 
 should look and function. The aim is 
 not to promote specific answers to 
 specific questions but, rather, 
 a framework for problem solving. 
 Materials are presented in a highly 
 visual format, principally through 
 slides and maps. 
 
 Your Town workshops are produced 
 by regional institutions that have 
 been selected for the excellence of 
 their faculties as well as their ability 
 to provide on-going technical 
 assistance to rural communities. 
 Each workshop also brings in guest 
 speakers who are design 
 professionals or experienced 
 practitioners in rural community 
 issues. The workshops are 
 coordinated by the director of the 
 Rural Heritage Program at the 
 National Trust for Historic 
 Preservation and the chair of the 
 Department of Landscape 
 Architecture at SUNY Syracuse. 
 
 left 
 
 Workshop in Unicoi Lodge, 
 
 Northern Georgia 
 
 fop 
 
 Talbot Street Historic Area 
 
 St Michaels. MD 
 
front cover 
 
 Coon Valley, Wisconsin 
 
 W 
 
 National Endowment 
 for the Arts 
 
 The Nancy Hanks Center 
 
 1 100 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW 
 
 Washington, DC 20506-0001 
 
 Pageantry 100# White Smooth Cover 
 
 generously donated by 
 
 Champion International Corporation 
 
 Brochure design by Tenazas Design 
 San Francisco 
 
 Printed by Expressions Lithography 
 San Francisco 
 
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 The construction of our nation's great urban civic spaces — 
 
 Central Park in Manhattan, Boston's Copley Square 
 
 required designers, engineers, citizens and government 
 representatives to come together in a common purpose. 
 The same melding of talent must occur today to shape the 
 nation's nascent virtual civic places on the Internet. 
 
 forums 
 
right 
 Waterplace 
 
 Providence, Rl 
 
 Forums Ga,,eries : Pr0,ec,s 
 
 > 
 
 projects 
 
 resources 
 Daley Plaza in Chicago- 
 
 galleries 
 
 The goal of Civiscape is to weave 
 together the talents of the 
 technology and design communities 
 with other interested audiences to 
 help shape the online civic landscape. 
 Civiscape is a forum for 
 interdisciplinary discussions of design 
 and technology, and a laboratory 
 where online technology is 
 developed with constant input the 
 design communities and other 
 interested audiences. 
 
 As a site on the World Wide Web, 
 Civiscape provides a window into an 
 online research laboratory, where 
 designers from all disciplines can 
 experience cutting edge software 
 tools for shaping the online world. 
 The site brings designers into the 
 loop of research and development by 
 giving them a chance to experience 
 and critique emerging online 
 technology. 
 
 As a place for community building 
 among designers and other 
 interested citizens, Civiscape provides 
 interdisciplinary discussion forums 
 and virtual galleries for communities 
 and individuals to post design work 
 and receive feedback on it. The 
 program's education and outreach 
 component also sponsors non-digital 
 symposia and presentations for the 
 design community and other 
 interested audiences. 
 
 You can explore Civiscape on the 
 World Wide Web at the following 
 address: 
 
 http://civiscape.media.MIT.EDU/CIVISCAPE/ 
 
above 
 
 ©Alex Maclean /Photonica 
 
 front cover 
 © Rob Silvers 
 
 W 
 
 National Endowment 
 for the Arts 
 
 The Nancy Hanks Center 
 
 1 100 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW 
 
 Washington, DC 20506-0001 
 
 We would like to acknowledge the 
 generous contribution of Rob Silvers 
 for the use of the cover image, 
 and Photonica for the use of the 
 image by Alex Maclean 
 
 Pageantry 100# White Smooth Cover 
 
 generously donated by 
 
 Champion International Corporation. 
 
 Brochure design by Tenazas Design 
 San Francisco 
 
 Printed by Expressions Lithography 
 San Francisco 
 
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 Federal Design 
 
 Improvement Program 
 
 Fostering Design Excellence in 
 the Federal Government 
 
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Design has been a concern of our nation 
 
 since the federal government came into being. 
 Washington, Jefferson and Madison's concern for 
 the beauty and stature of the fledgling nation's capitol 
 and executive buildings evidence an understanding 
 of design's integral contribution to image, performance 
 and quality of life. 
 
 Design activity and political thought 
 

 are indivisible. 
 
 — Thomas Jefferson 
 
 HIIIII-III 
 
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 left 
 
 U.S. Capitol 
 
 Washington, DC 
 
 Wow 
 
 Computer image of redesigns 
 
 of HUD plaza by Martha Schwartz 
 
 Regard for good design in federal undertakings has both waned and 
 
 soared throughout America's history. Today, with financial and material 
 
 resources dwindling, federal officials must get the best results with 
 
 fewer dollars. How can they do this? Through understanding the 
 
 benefits of and investing in good design. 
 
 To help federal agencies understand the benefits of good design and achieve design 
 excellence in federal undertakings, the National Endowment for the Arts established 
 the Federal Design Improvement Program (FDIP) in 1972. FDIP projects have ranged 
 from the Federal Graphics Improvement Program, which helped more than 60 
 federal agencies review and improve their visual communication standards, to the 
 Federal Architecture Project, which updated the Guiding Principles of Federal 
 Architecture, helped secure the passage of the Public Buildings Cooperative Use Act 
 and produced the Federal Presence: Architecture, Politics, and Symbols in United 
 States Federal Building. Current activities include providing private sector peer 
 review for the design of federal facilities, organizing design workshops, and 
 implementing design awards programs. 
 
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 e Federal Design Improvement Program forms 
 ^■nerships with various agencies and assembles some 
 of the country's top design professionals to participate 
 n intensive workshops. The two- or three-day 
 brainstorming sessions yield useful design guidelines 
 for such diverse projects as: 
 
 The development of housing on Indian 
 reservations with the Department of 
 Housing and Urhan Development 
 (HUD); exploring how the social, 
 spiritual and cultural values of Native 
 Americans can he incorporated into 
 low-cost housing. 
 
 • The creation of an integrated identity 
 and marketing scheme, including a 
 logo, advertising campaign and all 
 communications, for the Department 
 of Education's newly launched Direct 
 Student Loan Program, 
 
 • The conservation of an ecologically 
 unique 1,400 acre trad of forest and 
 1. 1 1 in Li in I iii Maryland, and its 
 
 conversion into a nature/education 
 center for the Department of 
 Agriculture [Natural Resources 
 Conservation Service. 
 
 The rehabilitation of historic buildings 
 
 for various agencies, including the 
 Department of Treasury's main 
 building next to the \\ bite House, the 
 1930s Department of Justice 
 
 headquarters, and the DID building 
 
 and plaza in Washington. DC, designed 
 
 in 1963-65 bj Marcel Breuer. 
 
 The participating design experts advise 
 
 on such topics as adaptive reuse. 
 energj conservation, urban 
 
 reclamation, visual identity and 
 
 historic presen ation. 
 
above 
 
 Frank G. Mar 
 
 Community Housing Project 
 Oakland, CA 
 
 fop right 
 
 Ellis Island Immigration Museum 
 
 New York, NY 
 
 front cover 
 
 © Kazuya Shimizu/Photonica 
 
 W 
 
 National Endowment 
 for the Arts 
 
 The Nancy Hanks Center 
 
 1 100 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW 
 
 Washington, DC 20506-0001 
 
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 The Federal Design Improvement Program promotes good 
 design and provides models of design excellence by helping to 
 organize national design awards programs for federal agencies 
 such as the General Services Administration, Department of 
 Transportation, and the Department of Defense. The Arts 
 Endowment gives its own design awards, Federal Design 
 Achievement Awards, every four years, in conjunction with its 
 administration of the Presidential Design Awards. These awards 
 recognize exemplary projects in architecture, engineering, 
 landscape architecture, urban planning, historic preservation, 
 as well as product, interior, and graphic design. 
 Past winners include: 
 
 • A low-income housing development in 
 Oakland, California, jointly 
 undertaken by the Department of 
 Housing and Urban Development 
 (HUD), the city of Oakland, a local 
 non-profit housing developer, 
 neighborhood interest groups, and a 
 architecture firm with expertise 
 in affordable housing. 
 
 PRESIDENT 
 
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 • The rehabditation of the historic 
 225,000 square-foot main budding on 
 Ellis Island into an immigration 
 museum by the Department of the 
 Interiors, the National Park Service 
 and two architectural firms. 
 
 • A visually compelling new atlas of fast- 
 changing Eastern Europe, covering 
 geography, demographics, economy 
 and historical boundaries, executed 
 by the Central Intelligence Agency and 
 a cartography consultant firm. 
 
 • A master plan for the reclamation of a 
 waterfront site in Washington, DC, 
 sponsored by the General Services 
 Adminstration. The plan for Southeast 
 Federal Center calls for 5.8 million 
 square feet of new and adaptively 
 reused office space, plus other mixed 
 uses, and is aimed at reintegrating the 
 area into the city's urban grid. 
 
 
 We would like to acknowledge the 
 generous contribution of Photonica for 
 the use of the image by Kazuya Shimizu. 
 
 Pageantry 100# White Smooth Cover 
 
 generously donated by 
 
 Champion International Corporation. 
 
 Brochure design by Tenazas Design 
 San Francisco 
 
 Printed by Expressions Lithography 
 San Francisco 
 
Improving the Design and 
 Livability of America's Cities 
 
 w 
 
Cities are dynamic political and economic organisms 
 
 that shape the very nature of our society and 
 provide the physical anchor of our cultural identity. 
 Cities are places where ideas are exchanged, 
 where social trends are set in motion, where 
 political movements are shaped, where artists find 
 audiences and where authors are given voice. 
 
 Mayors, as the chief proponents 
 
of their cities, 
 
 can also be seen as their most influential urban designers. 
 
 They are places of commerce, where 
 business ventures are incubated, 
 deals are struck, marketable skills are 
 developed and refined and wealth 
 is generated. Cities exercise powerful 
 economic and environmental 
 influences on entire regions and 
 are home to an ever expanding 
 percentage of the population. 
 Cities are the very essence of our 
 civilization. 
 
 12th Mayor's Institute, 
 University of Virginia 
 
 Charlottesville, VA 
 
 left 
 
 City Hall 
 Escondido, CA 
 
 The mayor's desk often is a 
 checkpoint for every significant 
 development regarding the form and 
 fabric of the city. Consequently, 
 decisions made by the mayor- 
 matters of public works, 
 transportation policy, redevelopment 
 and new construction, zoning and 
 community planning-manifest 
 themselves in a physical form that 
 will endure for generations. These 
 decisions should be informed by a 
 mayor's understanding of his or her 
 role as caretaker of the city and 
 advocate for the future. 
 
 Not surprisingly, few mayors have 
 received formal education in urban 
 design, and this presents the Mayors 
 Institute with an opportunity to 
 expose mayors to the transforming 
 power of design. The National 
 Endowment for the Arts, 
 in partnership with schools of 
 architecture and urban design across 
 the country, sponsor the Mayors' 
 Institute on City Design as a forum in 
 which mayors can engage in a 
 mutually rewarding exchange of 
 ideas with experts in architecture and 
 urban planning, public housing and 
 private real estate development, 
 urban economic analysis, historic 
 preservation, transportation 
 planning, environmental 
 conservation, and other facets of city 
 building and design. 
 
In over forty sessions since its inception in 1986, the Mayors' 
 Institute has hosted over 300 mayors from more than 250 cities. 
 During each session, a team of high-caliber design professionals 
 spends three days with a select group of elected officials, 
 discussing ways in which the mayors can exercise their political 
 leadership to make their cities more economically vibrant, 
 more environmentally sustainable, more livable, more attractive 
 and more secure — in short, how to improve function of their 
 cities' many roles as home, workplace, centers of culture and 
 recreation, and supreme symbols of human accomplishment. 
 
 Participating mayors have gone on 
 to become active defenders and 
 conservators of their cities' public 
 realm through their advocacy of 
 intelligent development and support 
 of home-grown efforts to improve 
 the quality of the built environment. 
 Their efforts have resulted in a 
 number of national design awards. 
 Design professionals who have 
 participated are better able to 
 understand the complex potential 
 and limitations of the political 
 process in city building. Together, 
 alumni form a grassroots network of 
 enlightened designers and public 
 officials whose example echoes 
 through their communities long after 
 the institute has ended. 
 
 above 
 
 Overtown Pedestrian Mall 
 
 and Transit Access 
 
 Miami, FL 
 
 front cover 
 
 © Peter Vanderwarker 
 
 W 
 
 National Endowment 
 for the Arts 
 
 The Nancy Hanks Center 
 
 1 100 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW 
 
 Washington, DC 20506-0001 
 
 We would like to acknowledge 
 the generous contribution of 
 Peter Vanderwarker for the use 
 of the front cover image. 
 
 Pageantry 100# White Smooth Cover 
 
 generously donated by 
 
 Champion International Corporation 
 
 Brochure design by Tenazas Design 
 San Francisco 
 
 Printed by Expressions Lithography 
 San Francisco 
 
is to foster ilir excellence, diversity, and 
 vitality of tin- arts in the I nited States, 
 and to broaden public appreciation of the 
 arts. Through its leadership initiatives 
 the Endowment supports and encourages 
 exemplar) projects thai promote the 
 social, artistic and economic welfare 
 ol our nation. 
 
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