Jeff Williams, Founding Principal of Williams | Partners Architects, has been designing homes in the Sun Valley area since 1992. His goal, and that of his partners and associates, is to deliver quality service to the clients with whom they engage. Williams | Partners has amassed an impressive resume of projects, an illustrious listing of awards, and has enjoyed its share of notable magazine exposure. Recently, as part of our “Legends” series, AIA Idaho had the opportunity to speak to Jeff. He was gracious with his time, and we hope you enjoy learning more about one of Idaho’s own architectural mavens. When and why did you decide to become an architect? [It’s] kind of a long story. Our family moved around a lot when I was a kid as my dad climbed the corporate ladder. In those days, your success within a company depended on your willingness to relocate as needed. So, our family as a unit became accustomed to looking at houses as we moved to new areas. We would drive around different neighborhoods and discuss design and schools, etc. When I was in maybe the fifth grade, my older brother was on track to becoming an architect. He took construction drawings from a house we once thought we would build (we moved before that could happen) and made a large-scale model of the project, complete with balsa wood 2x4s and plaster walls for concrete foundation walls. His project fascinated me, and I was bitten by the bug myself. (He later changed his mind about his profession when he felt he was too weak in mathematics.) Several times after that, while still in lower grades, I took architecture or art classes with architecture emphasis and designed several houses. Years later, I headed to college, not committing to my major. I also felt I was not strong in mathematics, and my father pushed me hard to get a business degree. In the middle of my freshman year at Washington State University (WSU), I wandered into the Landscape Architecture department studios (I mistakenly thought it was the architecture department) and decided then and there that architecture was what I wanted to do, and later that week, met with the chairman of the department and committed to it. On top of all that, my great-grandfather was an architect who practiced in Denver and Seattle. And although he passed away before I was born, he was an inspiration to the extended family long after he was gone; many of my older relatives told me 11
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