Fewer than 2 percent of the 105,000 licensed architects in the United States are African-American, according to the National Association of Minority Architects (NOMA). Minority architects are rare at blue chip architectural firms and seldom seen in senior management positions at these firms.
Many observers attribute the dearth of minority architects to a lack of visibility and awareness of the profession, the recent downturn in the economy that hit the construction industry particularly hard, as well as a hard-to-shake image that architecture is the preserve of White males.
“People don’t realize it’s a career option,” says Kathy Dixon, president of the NOMA and proprietor of KDixon Architecture, LLC. “Maybe they haven’t met a Black architect or met an architect at all. They are not aware of what architects do. It’s also a very expensive major, and it is expensive to take the exam to get licensed.”
