Design Perspectives By Clair Enlow

July 17, 2002

A/E diversity means freedom to pursue dreams

What does the glass ceiling look like? The following view from the perspective of a female Hispanic architect gives form to standard metaphor for a firm’s refusal to promote those who are different.

Kathryn Anthony, "Designing for Diversity: Gender, Race, and Ethnicity in the Architectural Profession," quotes a 31-year-old Latina/Asian American female: "If I were to draw a diagram of it, it wouldn’t be a horizontal glass ceiling. It would be stepped like a ziggurat, but each horizontal tier, which represents the level you’re at, gets longer and longer."

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Previous columns:

• Today's land use rules give as well as take, 06-26-2002
• Can art be the basis for expanding architecture?, 05-22-2002
• Community design movement comes of age, 04-17-2002
• Home is where the park-and-ride is, 03-20-2002
• Row house renovation renews community, 02-20-2002
• Habitat protection for those who walk in Seattle, 01-23-2002
• Design's ultimate clients, the users, are too often forgotten, 08-15-2001
• Design Perspectives: A case for political space, 06-20-2001