Vote now for 2025 AIA Baltimore and AIA Maryland Board Members. 2024 board announcements will be made in the AIA Baltimore newsletter on January 6.
Note that we will not be voting in person. You must vote using this form! Voting ends on December 6.
Cast Your Vote Here
2025 AIA Baltimore and AIA Maryland candidate bios:
AIA Baltimore
Martin Marren, AIA
Nominated for the AIA Baltimore Executive Committee
(2025 Secretary/2028 President)
Mr. Marren is active in the revitalization of Baltimore neighborhoods and has served as Principal-in-charge and lead design architect for full-block historic renovations and full-block infill developments in East Baltimore and South Baltimore. He has designed assisted living facilities, co-working spaces, private homes, and condominiums, winning awards for design excellence from AIA Baltimore and for Historic Preservation from Baltimore Heritage. His current focus is on multi-family mixed-use projects in historic neighborhoods in Baltimore and Atlanta.
Mr. Marren serves as the chair of the Design Awards Committee for the Baltimore chapter of the American Institute of Architects. He is a member of the Board of Directors of the Baltimore Montessori Public Charter School and chairs the the Facilities Committee. He is also the Vice President of the Baltimore Duffer’s Club.
He is accredited by the American Institute of Architects and the National Council of Architectural Registration Boards and is licensed in Maryland, Georgia, and New York.
Brian Helfer, Jr., AIA
Nominated for AIA Baltimore Director
Brian Helfer, Jr is currently an architectural designer at Hord Coplan Macht, adjunct professor at Morgan State University, and has previously sat on the AIA Baltimore and AIA Maryland boards as student liaison. Brian was born and raised in Baltimore City, originally from Hampden, earned his undergraduate architecture degree from Morgan State University, and his Master of Architecture degree from Washington University in St Louis. Brian began his involvement in the architecture community through leadership positions in AIAS and found a passion for community engagement after completing the AIA Baltimore CivicLAB, class of 2019. Brian has been an active member at all levels of AIA including local committee and event planning, and state and national level policy advocacy.
Kelly Danz, AIA
Nominated for AIA Baltimore Director
Kelly Danz AIA, LEED BD+C, WELL AP, is a fifth generation Baltimorean, a licensed architect in the state of Maryland, and a Senior Associate at Ziger|Snead Architects. Kelly is selflessly dedicated to social impact and sustainable design. She brings valuable perspective to projects and leverages her experience and technical abilities to ensure social, environmental, and economic project goals are met. She has led a range of project types from concept through construction, including workplace, residential, adaptive reuse, cultural, institutional, and affordable housing. Kelly’s unwavering heart for Baltimore is shown through her work, community involvement, and the restoration of her very own vacated rowhouse. She was the Co-Chair of the AIA Baltimore Lecture Series Committee from 2018-2022 and the Vice President of the Neighborhood Design Center Board of Directors from 2022-2023. She earned a BS.Arch from the Catholic University of America School of Architecture and Planning and a M.Arch from the Columbia University Graduate School of Architecture, Planning, and Preservation. She was a recipient of the GSAPP Incubator prize in 2024 for her personal research project Vacants to Value 2.0: Alternative Methods to Address Hypervacancy in Baltimore.
Dustin Watson, AIA
Nominated for AIA Baltimore Director
With more than 20 years of experience as an architect and designer, Dustin Watson, has overseen projects ranging from master-planned communities to high rises and resort destinations. Watson, however, is best known for creating dense, richly detailed, sustainable, mixed-use environments, streetscapes, and neighborhoods with layers of texture, designed to work together to create a true experience and a memorable sense of place. As a result, his work has been recognized with
some of the industry’s top awards. Tackling some of the largest, most prestigious planning and mixed-use retail assignments worldwide, Watson’s work spans the globe to include projects from the Puri Indah Master Plan in Jakarta, Indonesia to the mixed-use development at Washington, D.C.’s National Harbor. As a global expert who is passionate about designing spaces that are both memorable and sustainable, he is a frequent speaker at top industry conferences and a contributing author for numerous trade publications.
Dr. Samia Rab Kirchner, Int’l Assoc. AIA
Nominated for AIA Baltimore Associate Director
Samia Rab Kirchner makes, studies, and analyzes architecture that contributes to urban civic identity. She is currently tenured Associate Professor of Architecture Urban Design at Morgan State University, where she led the Undergraduate Design Department and the Morgan Internationalization of Education Task Force. She has taught architecture, urban design, historic preservation and urban heritage management at the American University of Sharjah in the UAE, the University of Hawaii at Manoa and Georgia Institute of Technology.
Dr. Kirchner’s research and practice focus on the (trans)formative role of water in City Design, Urban Regeneration and Redevelopment. She is the Middle East Area Editor for the forthcoming Bloomsbury Global Encyclopedia of Women in Architecture, Editorial Member of the Journal of Arabian Studies, and Desk Reviewer for ICOMOS on the UNESCO World Heritage List. The Aga Khan Award for Architecture selected Dr. Kirchner as Area Coordinator for the Arabian Peninsula and she has chaired two cycles of the Kenneth F. Brown Culture and Architecture Design Award. She is Co-Chairing AIA Baltimore’s Equity Committee and has led the Leadership Committee of the Association of Collegiate Schools of Architecture (ACSA) in 2019-2020. She is currently also serving as Board of Trustee Member and Chair of the Governance Committee of the Interfaith Partnership for the Chesapeake.
AIA Maryland
Joseph Taylor, AIA
Nominated for AIA Maryland Director
Joseph Taylor, AIA, is a licensed architect with ten years of experience, primarily focused on public education projects throughout Maryland. In addition to his expertise in educational design, he has worked on athletic facilities, contributing to his well-rounded portfolio. An active member of the AIA, Joe serves as the Young Architects Representative for the state of Maryland and co-chairs the AIA Baltimore Emerging Professionals Committee. He is also a member of ULI Baltimore. Joe is passionate about creating spaces that positively impact communities and is dedicated to advancing the architecture profession.
Griffin Sanderoff, Assoc. AIA
Nominated for AIA Maryland Alternate Director
Griffin Sanderoff is from Reisterstown, Maryland, holds his architecture undergrad from Morgan State University, and is an architectural designer at BCT Design Group in Baltimore City. As a citizen architect, he is the Co-Chair of the Urban Design Committee at AIA Baltimore, serves as leadership for the Baltimore Greenway Trails Coalition, and is involved with the DEI Committee at ULI Baltimore. He is also actively engaged with BmoreNOMA, Morgan State University – School of Architecture & Planning, Neighborhood Design Center, and the Patterson Park Neighborhood Association.
