How Two Texas Architects Became Leaders in Sustainable Design
David Lake and Ted Flato won the American Institute of Architects’ 2024 Gold Medal award for their uniquely Texan approach to green building.
Two-feet-thick walls of rammed earth keep this Lake|Flato Architects–designed Marfa ranch home cool in the summer and warm in the winter.
Photo: Casey Dunn
Sustainability means something just a little bit different in Texas. Bleak winters and punishing summers make the state a land of hard contrasts. A high regard for both individualism and tradition only draws out the contradictions. It’s not a state that usually favors environmental mandates, despite the love that Texans feel for their landscape.
So Texas is an unlikely place for architects to rise to prominence for their sustainable practice. Yet David Lake and Ted Flato, the founders of the 40-year-old firm Lake|Flato Architects, have done just that. Their San Antonio-based practice has won more of the field’s top honors for sustainable design excellence than any other.