Classical architecture and traditional urbanism represent a culture’s highest aspirations. Timeless ideals that have endured for centuries have become even more essential as a means of preserving our cultural heritage, protecting not only economic and environmental resources, but the sense of continuity and identity that sustains communities. Classical architecture is sustainable by definition, and traditional urban design facilitates the ways people live, work, and worship together. “Beauty, harmony, and context are hallmarks of classical architecture, thus fostering communities, enhancing the quality of our shared environment and developing sustainable solutions through traditional materials,” says Richard H. Driehaus, the Chicago philanthropist who has established the $200,000 Richard H. Driehaus Prize at the University of Notre Dame to honor a living architect whose work embodies those principles in contemporary society. The Driehaus Prize has been presented annually since 2003 to architects representing various classical traditions, whose artistic impact reflects their commitment to cultural and environmental conservation. 

Past winners include Léon Krier, Allan Greenberg, Elizabeth Plater-Zyberk and Andres Duany, Abdel-Wahed El-Wakil, and Robert A.M. Stern. Their work spans cultures and continents, establishing the Driehaus Prize as a forum for dialogue about the diversity of architectural tradition, but it is all part of a continuum that connects communities and sustains the social fabric that ties us all together. As Michael Lykoudis, Driehaus Prize Jury Chair and Francis and Kathleen Rooney Dean of the University of Notre Dame School of Architecture, says: “Within the bodies of work of the Driehaus Prize winners, these ideas form an even larger and more important truth about the human experience—that the growth of a culture or community does not need to happen at the expense of its history and established value.”