Welcome to our Architect Spotlight series, where we will be periodically featuring each of Kennebec’s preferred architects and showcasing some of their past projects. We will kick off this series by highlighting Birmingham based architect, Gary Justiss.
Biography:
A graduate of Auburn University’s School of Architecture, Gary Justiss sits amongst the sixteen architects who fall under Kennebec’s preferred architects list. Gary opened his one-man firm, Gary Justiss Architect, in 1993 after gaining fourteen years of experience with two established firms in Birmingham. To this day, he has designed over a hundred custom homes, numerous commercial, recreational and civic buildings. You can find most of his work in familiar urbanist communities such as Seaside, Alys Beach, Rosemary Beach, WaterColor, Blount Springs and Mt Laurel. He has worked and collaborated with firms all across the southeast like Flordia, Alabama, Tennessee, Mississippi, Georgia, Panama, Costa Rica and Ecuador. He is registered to practice architecture in Alabama (#2402), Florida (#AR0015086), Georgia (#RA012695) and Mississippi (#3882).
Creative Approach to Design:
Gary is known for his immaculate sense of style, his passion for architecture and his friendly demeanor. One of the main characteristics that seems to set Gary apart from other architects is his seemingly effortless ability to adapt his work to any environment. Whether it be a lake house, beach house, custom home, or even a chapel, he does a phenomenal job of incorporating the location of the home into the style of the home. His projects have a modern take on classical influences which gives his clients a warm and familiar new development, while simultaneously providing them with a beautiful new place to call home. In an article posted in May of 2016, Gary told C.J. Adams, author of Architect Spotlight: Gary Justiss, that his ultimate goal when any of his projects are completed that, “since most of [his] work is custom residential, [he] always aims for the home to fit the owners’ like a finely tailored suit…also [he] wants [his] designs to fit into [his clients’] context in a responsible way.”
Gary, his wife, their three children, three dogs and almost 20 chickens live in Chelsea, AL, which is only an hour away from Lake Martin—making it a familiar area to Gary Justiss. He is more than qualified, values the opinions of the client and is open to interpreting almost any and all ideas.
