AUSTIN, Texas—Angela Lauer, a student of interior design in the School of Architecture at The University of Texas at Austin, is the recipient of the $30,000 Angelo Donghia Senior Scholarship in Interior Design, the largest interior design scholarship in the United States.
To be eligible, students in their junior year must submit a residential and a commercial project they have designed. Each student must also meet grade-point average and portfolio requirements and they must be nominated by their interior design faculty members.
For the commercial design, Lauer submitted renderings and materials of a new high-rise building being designed in Austin, Texas. For the residential design, Lauer submitted a work-live environment in the historic Schneider Building in downtown Austin adapted for an architectural archeologist.
The University of Texas at Austin has been eligible to apply for the awards during four of the six years since the program’s inception in 2002. In all four years, students at the university have won awards. In 2003-04 the university had one awardee. In 2005-06 it had two awardees (the only public university awarded two that year). In 2006-07 it had two awardees, and this year it had one awardee.
Each student is awarded funds based on a submitted budget for their final year of studies. The scholarships fully cover each student’s tuition, board, maintenance, books and other student materials.
The judges are top New York City interior designers and editors.
Angelo Donghia (1935-1985) was an American interior designer whose contemporary design innovations include upholstery on overstuffed furniture, shiny lacquered walls and unusual combinations of fabric textures and patterns. He became widely popular through shrewd marketing arrangements for products carrying his name and was the first U.S. designer to endorse a line of interior products. His Dongia Studio showrooms are international and exist in the finer market places today, with about 70 showrooms in the U.S. alone.
Lauer was also recipient of the School of Architecture’s Debra Ann Rock Scholarship in Interior Design, 2006-07.
For photos and graphics of Lauer’s submissions, contact Nancy Kwallek, director of interior design, 512-471-6249.
For more information contact: Nancy Kwallek, director of interior design, 512-471-6249; Amy Maverick Crossette, Office of Public Affairs, 512-573-1078.
