Summary: A touching tribute to a well-respected AIA leader, Donald C. Axon, FAIA. And a shout out (with photograph) about how Big Red really does improve the Dallas aesthetic.

A Dear Friend of the Institute Remembered
Donald C. Axon, FAIA, FACHA, FHFI, FRSH, SASHE, a leading health-care architect and AIA leader, died on May 6, 2007, at age 76 in Baltimore while traveling to a professional meeting. His educational background included a bachelor of architecture degree from Pratt Institute and a master of science in architecture degree from Columbia University with a major in hospital and health facility design.

Don devoted his professional life to health-care architecture, holding leadership positions in many professional organizations including the AIA Academy of Architecture for Health, national AIA Board of Directors, AIA California Council, and the Architectural Foundation of Los Angeles.

He served as a California regional director on the AIA Board of Directors from 1987 to 1989. Don was elevated to the College of Fellows in 1992, the same year he was awarded the Distinguished Service Citation by the AIA California Council. Don served as president of AIA/Los Angeles in 1986. A teacher and mentor, he was a visiting professor as well as a guest lecturer at UCLA, USC, Texas A & M, and the University of Texas.

Don was a founding member of the American College of Architecture for Health and served on its Membership Committee. For many years he represented the AIA and the AIA Academy of Architecture for Health as an official member of the Union of International Architects/Public Health Group. He was also an involved participant in the American Society of Hospital Engineers, Health Care Forum, Royal Society of Health, the USC Architectural Guild, Society for Critical Care Medicine, Health Facility Institute, California Building Safety Board, and California Building Seismic Safety Commission.

Don’s wife, Janice Axon, Hon. AIA, served as executive director of AIA Los Angeles from 1980 to 1988 and was elevated to AIA Honorary Membership in 1994. They raised 7 children, who in turn presented them with 20 grandchildren and 6 great-grandchildren. Don’s warm, loving nature, his wonderful sense of humor, and his dedication to the profession made him special to all who knew him. The health-care architectural community and all who had contact with him are saddened at his loss.

W. H. (Tib) Tusler, FAIA, FACHA Emeritus, San Francisco
Editor’s note: The AIA’s Academy of Architecture for Health Foundation has established a memorial fund in Don Axon’s honor. For more information, visit the AAH Web site.

Dallas’s Big Red and Its Gorgeous New Tower
What a near miss on the article on Dallas' West End and "Big Red," the Courthouse. Quite possibly this renovation has been complete for six months, and yet you ended up showing the "before" and the "before before" pictures and kind of forgot to show the "after" shot.

I know we are architects and don't grasp journalism, but even welders get that the "after" picture is needed to complete the story. What happened? Was this "story" just sitting in the "useful filler" box left for the summer days when nothing is going on? Did the staff forget to call and say, "Hey, was that renovation of the Courthouse ever finished? We are about to go to press with the story."

The finished product is exquisite. It is what a renovation should be and clearly demonstrates why it was both necessary and why it was done. That courthouse has been sitting there for as long as I have been in Dallas (35 years) as a clumsily beheaded architectural oddity testifying to how Dallas County simply isn't terribly sophisticated in the worldly arts like architecture. It was our Venetian Glass Vase being used as a spittoon. How Texas can you get? Yee-haw and all of that. Now the courthouse is the Big D "Aha!" architectural punctuation, again anchoring downtown with a gem that isn't also a concrete and glass style statement for the turn of this century's Brutalism done by some trendy Italian or Japanese Architectural pop star. Surrounded by Pei and HOK mirrors, it stands like a narcissistic chorus line girl proudly decked out in her Tammy Fay Baker make up! It is, in a word, it is simply gorgeous!

David Baillif, AIA, Dallas

Editor’s note: Per a request subsequent to Mr. Baillif’s letter, he submitted the accompanying photograph, which proves his case eloquently. Photography by Patricia Baillif, CPA