Park City-based DesignBuildBLUFF expands

(Park Record) Park City architect Hank Louis has been doing his part to change the world, and recent changes will allow him to triple his efforts.

Since 2000, Louis has been leading University of Utah students in both designing and building projects.

Louis said he's disenchanted with most methods of higher education that graduate students without teaching what they really need to know to be members of the profession. For example, they know how to operate a Computer-Aided Design program, but have no idea how something is actually built. Also, many students have dreams of becoming the next Frank Lloyd Wright but very few architects are privileged to do design, most must find their niche elsewhere, he said.

So Louis started a course in which students built things and eventually founded DesignBuildBLUFF, a not-for-profit group giving school credit for building homes for members of the Navajo Nation.

Until this month, the organization supported the College of Architecture + Planning, but Louis has worked out a way to include more schools, more students, and build more houses and it requires the schools to support him.

Instead of setting aside funding for administrative costs, participants in his program from the University of Colorado, the University of New Mexico and the University of Utah will pay him tuition, which will cover administration.

Now every penny raised through fundraising will go toward the home getting built, he said.

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