ANGELA F. COURTNEY
Alex Foundation
SAY IT LOUD - Arkansas Exhibitor
Arkansas Based Designer
Who or what inspires you professionally?
I am the executive director for a nonprofit organization, Alex Foundation, where we introduce limited access students to architecture.
ANGELA F. COURTNEY
Bio:
The great designer, Angela Courtney is Alex Foundation’s executive director established in honor of her son, Alex who majored in architecture. Alex Foundation’s STE+AM (science, technology, engineering, architecture, and math) is offered to 8th and 9th grade students and its architecture + design summer camp is offered to rising middle school students. Alex Foundation is a National American Institute of Architects 2019 Diversity Recognition Program Honoree for its architecture + design summer camp.
How did you first learn about architecture and when did you decide that built environment profession was an area of interest for you?
I first learned about architecture on my vacation travels as a child with my family. I enjoy history and became more interested in architecture as an adult.
What do you do?
I am the executive director for a nonprofit organization, Alex Foundation, where we introduce limited access students to architecture.
What excites you in the work you do?
Seeing the students become excited, engaged and interested excites me about the work I do with the Alex Foundation.
Featured Project Name:
Historic Belmont Plantation
Featured Project Location:
Greenville, Mississippi (Washington, County) USA
Featured Project Completion Date:
Summer 2020
Role in Featured Project:
Executive Director, Alex Foundation, Project Director, Architecture + Design Summer Camp
Featured Project Description:
According to Mary Carole Miller in “Belmont Plantation History”
Built in 1857, Belmont is a blend of the prevailing Greek Revival and Italianate styles of the day. The main two-story block is red brick with a full-height portico featuring square Doric columns, turned balustrades, and a pediment pierced by a circular window. The cornice line is heavily bracketed. The roof is of shallow pitch, hipped and crowned with molded chimneys. Windows are tall and narrow, capped with stone lintels. An ell extends from the main block to the rear.
Inside, Belmont features some of the finest decorative plaster work in Mississippi. Local lore holds that German plaster artists were stranded in Washington County when the Civil War started; having no means of escape and no other work, they whiled away the war years by carving intricate molding and ceiling medallions into Belmont’s plaster. Another version relates that Dr. Worthington met a group of Italian carvers on a boat trip to New Orleans and convinced them to return with him to Belmont. Regardless of its origins, the decorative work in Belmont rivals the finest interiors of Natchez or Columbus.
