VJAA Inc.

09/26/2026

Happy for a few clear sunny days —and thank you to Corey Gaffer for photographing the St. Croix Rest Area (I-94) and Minnesota Welcome Center on with us. A few highlights! areas

09/23/2026

09/09/2026

Thank you to Architects Newspaper for featuring our new Chemistry Undergraduate Teaching Laboratories at Fraser Hall for the University of Minnesota College of Science and Engineering (CSE) in this month’s education issue (also out in print). Article by Frank Edgerton Martin with an interview with Jennifer Yoos, VJAA and David Blank, CSE.

The culmination of a ten-year project! As always, thank you’s and credit is due to our collaborators at the University of Minnesota, especially Mark Partridge Campus Architect Emeritus, Design Project Manager Dana Murdoch and Senior Project Manager Kevin Ross; the UMN Chemistry Department Faculty and CSE, BWBR (Executive and Lab Planning Architect), Mortenson Construction, DF Landscape Architecture, Dunham and artist Dyani White Hawk.

09/08/2026

Interview with the aia journal/Jennifer Yoos on updating the design cannon and the importance of St. John’s Abbey by Marcel Breuer. https://www.aia.org/aia-architect/article/updating-design-canon.

08/04/2026

VJAAwww.vjaa.comJennifer Yoos, FAIA; Vincent James, FAIA; Nathan Knutson, FAIA; Nate Steuerwald, AIA; Clay Shortall, AIA; Dzenita Hadziomerovic; Ray Heikkila Orono HouseProject Type: New BuildSponsors: Gordon James (builder)The clients traded a busy urban life for a quiet secluded landscape. They s...

07/18/2026

This coming week, Minneapolis hosts the National Society for College and University Planning (SCUP) Conference bringing together leaders in Higher Education and Campus Planning. We are excited to be part of an East Bank Campus Tour tomorrow and walkthrough featuring the new Chemistry Teaching Facility—Fraser Hall together with University Campus Planning and Facilities leaders and our collaborators on the project Mortenson Construction and BWBR.

We would love to connect if you are here for the conference, and we look forward to seeing you there!

07/18/2026

A preview of our aia homes tour project! Parallel to Minnehaha Creek, the Orono house is sited in a wooded creek setting and a dramatic wetland landscape—a beautiful, untouched but nearly unbuildable site, constrained by difficult setbacks, a steep slope, and a high water table.

Expansive glazing, a rooftop terrace, and a series of transitional spaces strengthen the connection to the landscape, while deep overhangs extend the structure outward—providing shelter, shade, and extending the living spaces into the surrounding prairie. Material craft, orientation, and daylighting are central to the project’s approach– alongside simple construction practices, careful site restoration, and sustainable native plantings.

06/15/2026

We are celebrating 825 Arts, a 2026 National AIA Honor Award recipient for Interior Architecture (1 of 9 recipients across the US and just announced) and share the story of this amazing place and the community that created it.

A community-led and engaged design process transformed the long-abandoned historic theater to support the cultural and economic life of a diverse, dynamic neighborhood. The Frogtown and Rondo communities stopped plans to demolish the building as the abandoned theaterthrough events hosted by 825 Arts and the Frogtown Neighborhood Association. Realizing this project and saving the building was a 15-year effort by the community and a 7-year effort by the design team.   For the first 7 years, the site was held in a local land bank waiting until the neighborhood could raise enough support to acquire the site.

The project is in the most culturally and racially diverse neighborhood in the state. Originally a silent movie house built in 1915 and then a Jazz Club and Speakeasy, it was vacant for 20 years before it was proposed to be razed.  The community got the building historically listed—not for its architecture, but for its place in Minnesota Music.

The theater was the site of Moonshiners Dance part 1, the only recorded Northern US track on Harry Smith’s famous anthology of American Music with Folkway records. Twenty-five years later, this collection was part of the catalyst for Folk and an early American music revival (influencing Minnesota artists Bob Dylan and Prince) and led to the historic listing of the project as a birthplace for Minnesota music. 

825 Arts provides a variety of flexible multi-functional gathering spaces and respects the building’s historic elements and the rich palimpsests of past occupations. The reshaped interiors include accessible, high quality performance spaces for music and dance, theater and film, gallery displays, impromptu performance and teaching, and community gatherings.

Client: 825 Arts and NEOO Partners (Owner’s Rep)
Technical Consultants: MBJ, MCE, Schuler Shook, and Kirkegaard
Photography: Corey Gaffer Photography

06/15/2026

We are celebrating 825 Arts, a 2026 National AIA Honor Award recipient for Interior Architecture (1 of 9 recipients across the US) and share the story of this amazing place and the community that created it.

A community-led and engaged design process transformed the long-abandoned historic theater to support the cultural and economic life of a diverse, dynamic neighborhood. The Frogtown and Rondo communities stopped plans to demolish the building as the abandoned theaterthrough events hosted by 825 Arts and the Frogtown Neighborhood Association. Realizing this project and saving the building was a 15-year effort by the community and a 7-year effort by the design team.   For the first 7 years, the site was held in a local land bank waiting until the neighborhood could raise enough support to acquire the site.

The project is in the most culturally and racially diverse neighborhood in the state. Originally a silent movie house built in 1915 and then a Jazz Club and Speakeasy, it was vacant for 20 years before it was proposed to be razed.  The community got the building historically listed—not for its architecture, but for its place in Minnesota Music.

The theater was the site of Moonshiners Dance part 1, the only recorded Northern US track on Harry Smith’s famous anthology of American Music with Folkway records. Twenty-five years later, this collection was part of the catalyst for Folk and an early American music revival (influencing Minnesota artists Bob Dylan and Prince) and led to the historic listing of the project as a birthplace for Minnesota music. 

825 Arts provides a variety of flexible multi-functional gathering spaces and respects the building’s historic elements and the rich palimpsests of past occupations. The reshaped interiors include accessible, high quality performance spaces for music and dance, theater and film, gallery displays, impromptu performance and teaching, and community gatherings.