Best small projects chosen at AIA Small Project Award 2026

The American Institute of Architects has announced the winners of its 2026 AIA Small Project Award. Seven projects were honored in this year's edition, whose mission “raises public awareness of the value and design excellence that architects provide regardless of the limits of size and budget.”

The awards come days after the AIA also selected the best in contemporary architecture at the 2026 AIA Architecture Awards. Meanwhile, the best new interiors of the year were honored at the AIA Interior Architecture Awards, and the best in residential architecture was honored at the AIA Housing Award. You can compare the projects recognized this year to those of previous years by following our ongoing coverage of the series here.  

In the meantime, the winners of the AIA Small Project Award 2026 are as follows: 

Augusta Quarry at Fort Dickerson Park in Knoxville, TN by Sanders Pace Architecture

Project excerpt: Augusta Quarry re-positions an abandoned industrial site within the Urban Wilderness of Knoxville, Tennessee as a City-operated swimming hole and a civic staple for hot summer months. The program introduces amenities including a vendor kiosk, restrooms and a changing room near the quarry’s entry. New site paths connect the amenity structures to overlooks and floating docks that host and animate gathering, recreation and leisure. The design is grounded in sustainable strategies that engage the site and visitors through a light touch, allowing the natural beauty of the quarry and civic life to remain a primary focus.

Bark Bar at Downtown Cary Park in Cary, NC by Machado Silvetti, OJB Landscape Architecture, Simpson Gumpertz & Heger

Project excerpt: The designers approached this pavilion—which socially and formally anchors a dynamic urban park—with an eye towards offering focused enjoyment in the midst of dynamic recreation. Taking explicit inspiration from the park’s curving paths, which themselves reflect the landscape’s topography, the pavilion is the park’s central hearth, offering a space for refreshment and pause. The floating roofs become both shaded overhangs and sculptural motifs; formal articulations and conceptual links to the park’s tree canopies and other pavilions; places for gathering and quiet solitude. Everything in the park coalesces here into a spatial, formal, and, most importantly, experiential frame.

Brooklyn Bridge Park Pier 1 Entry Pavilion in Brooklyn, NY by Tod Williams Billie Tsien Architects

Project excerpt: The Pier 1 Entry Pavilion welcomes visitors to Brooklyn Bridge Park and serves as a new civic hub for New York City. Designed to offer respite from city life, it features an elevated plaza sheltered by a large cantilevered canopy, encircled by honey locust and gingko trees. Three supporting stone clad structures provide public facilities and frame expansive iconic views, while solving circulation, accessibility and flood-resilience challenges. The pavilion is a landmark amenity, offering cafe concessions and the park’s first private family/gender-neutral restrooms, all powered by photovoltaic shingles that achieve net-zero energy for all of Pier 1.

Camp Meeker in Allenspark, CO by Renée del Gaudio Architecture

Project excerpt: In the 1930s, a family from Denver, Colorado, built the first one-room log cabin in a secluded valley near Rocky Mountain National Park. Seven other families followed. Together, they created a summer experience of fishing, hiking, and horseback riding that has endured for four generations. Camp Meeker, built by the grandson of the original family, explores and deepens the community’s future. It evokes memories of summers past while creating new possibilities for communal living. Camp Meeker’s zero-carbon design draws on the vernacular of early miner cabins while creating a new design language inspiring the community’s future.

Land's Sake Farm in Weston, MA by PAYETTE

Project excerpt: Land’s Sake Farm is a non-profit community farm located on public land that donates 30% of its produce for hunger relief to communities in need and serves as an educational venue for 8,000 children annually. The new Farmstand and Animal Barn are the result of a 7-year pro-bono effort that began with a master plan; they form the heart of the Agrarian Campus. The structures are sited to preserve the “infinite vista” through the heart of the historic site and explore the craft and materiality of “First Settlers” building techniques, with a confident nod toward modernity.

Luther George Park Performance Pavilion in Springdale, AR by Trahan Architects

Project excerpt: The Performance Pavilion at Luther George Park in Springdale, Arkansas, is a sculptural, dual-sided structure serving as both performance venue and public canopy. Spanning 150 feet with only two ground anchors, its weathering steel form appears weightless in the landscape. The material’s patina and warm tones echo the park’s ferrous soil and ochre sandstone of the Ozark Plateaus. Surrounding berms, native plantings, and trails weave through the site into the broader landscape, connecting the pavilion visually and experientially to the region’s rolling hills and natural terrain. The pavilion demonstrates a seamless relationship between structure, material, and place.

Kyabirwa Surgical Center Pavilion in Jinya, Kyabirwa, Uganda by GKG/Selemani Constuction

Project excerpt: Rooted in Ugandan cultural values of communal support during illness, the Pavilion at Kyabirwa Surgical Center provides a welcoming space for families accompanying patients. Positioned near the main entrance with sightlines to key medical areas, its open layout mirrors patient circulation and complements surrounding buildings. The sloped Mangalore tile roof, with ridge ventilation and reed mat lining, ensures thermal comfort and safety. Louvers around seating promote cross ventilation and privacy. Equipped with check-in, cashier, and triage counters, the Pavilion also accommodates public health gatherings. Built from locally sourced materials, it reflects a sustainable, community-integrated approach to healthcare architecture.

River Hub at Graco Park in Minneapolis, MN by Snow Kreilich Architects 

Project excerpt: Graco Park posits a model for urban parks centered on habitat creation and opportunity incubation. Built on a brownfield site, the park is designed to bolster migrating bird flyways and riverine ecological systems, while creating a new link in an emerging green space network along the historically underserved banks of the Mississippi north of downtown Minneapolis. The park’s net zero community center, the River Hub, includes much-needed space for community gathering and a technological makers’ space for teens. The building's simple shed-like form and wood construction conserve embodied carbon, while drawing connections to the site's history as a lumber mill.

The Chapel of St. Ignatius and the Gayle and Tom Benson Jesuit Center in New Orleans, LA by Trahan Architects

Project excerpt: The Chapel of St. Ignatius and Gayle and Tom Benson Jesuit Center was conceived to offer a place for spiritual contemplation and an inspiring space for gathering for the diverse campus community. The building’s curved spaces, which emanate to the surrounding exterior quads, fosters equitable communal intimacy for meeting, academic discussions, prayer and worship. Constructed of mass timber and clad in handmade brick, the Chapel is simultaneously contemporary and innovative in its approach to simple and sustainable construction while harmonizing with the surrounding Tudor-Gothic buildings on campus in its permanence and stability.

The Cootie Catcher in San Antonio, TX by Cotton Estes Architect

Project excerpt: A young family chose to adapt their 960 square foot 1930’s bungalow on a tiny property to remain in their beloved neighborhood as the family grows. An affordable remodel and addition provide a concise and creative answer to the family’s needs, and inspires their passion for the outdoors, play, and cooking. The Cootie Catcher is named for its pyramidal hipped roof, which relates the home to its historic context and resembles the children’s origami fortune telling toy. Like origami, the compact home unfolds with surprise and delight. Despite its size, the Cootie Catcher feels generous and connected.

Tinyleaf in Winthrop, WA by GO'C

Project excerpt: Tinyleaf is a 330‑square‑foot outpost tucked into a steep slope in Mazama, Washington, designed for year‑round recreation in the Methow Valley. Bermed into the hillside, the 15′×22′ cabin uses cast‑in‑place concrete walls, large sliding glass doors on the south façade, and a flat roof that doubles as a roof deck and snow‑holding thermal mass. An exterior of steel cladding, awning panels, and concrete complements the landscape to age gracefully. Inside, concrete and wood unify the space. Hidden storage, a raised bed with drawers, pull‑out utility panels, and a linear skylight maximize efficiency and light, making every space serve multiple roles.