Our staff are passionate about the work they do at VIA design, but their passions don’t end there. Below are some of the passions that our staff have outside of the office.
ANDREW MCKINLEY
Building and making! I became an architect because I have always enjoyed the craft of making something with my own hands, from a painting to kinetic sculpture, to home improvement projects. My choice of profession is an expression of my passion at the largest scale! I’ve always preferred DIY projects, including design and construction. These photos illustrate my latest personal project – a renovated and expanded back deck to share with my family!
Blair Horth
I’m lucky enough to live in a spot, Shore Drive of Virginia Beach, that provides me the magic of both sunrises and sunsets over the water on a daily basis. I’ve always been interested in sunrises, my dad actually shares a picture of the sunrise with me every morning – and has since 2012!!!! During the course of the pandemic, when we weren’t physically as close as ever before, going to the bay to watch the sunrise always made me feel connected to my father, even through we were not actually together. To me, sunsets on the bay happen to be the best way to end the day.
This is my “Big Guy!” Big Guy is my grandfather and we have done so much together throughout my whole life. Big Guy is the one who encouraged me to jump off a diving board for the first time. Big Guy taught me essential skills in the kitchen and inspired a passion for cooking and baking. Big Guy is comfort in a hug and always tells me his “best advice is to not listen to my advice”. Big Guy always brings out the greatest in me. We even call each other the greatest. In these photos, you can see Big Guy and I making pies, which is an activity that we love to share together.
Bradley Foster
Donna Phaneuf
Every waking moment is an opportunity to imagine a new design + how I want to curate that time. Whether I’m cooking experimentally or prepping for a gang – which seemingly happens a lot! – everything is designed, arranged, laid out and positioned to be a beautiful fun experience. My gardens, home + dinner tables are a destination and we have become the “GO TO” joint for the entire family of which continues to grow. Overwhelming at moments? – Yes, but I wouldn’t have it any other way!
Living, sporting and exploring outdoors, observing and partaking in all that nature offers threads itself heavily into this equation. The time I spend studying the environments of the animals I procure; whom become the ingredients of my tables, is such a satisfying sense of accomplishment – to fully honor the life of a creature by presenting it beautifully and celebrating its life and contributions to my family’s health and wellbeing. The woods and waterways are my church and it is here that I reflect, grow, and learn how to be a better person. Nature offers infinite wisdom.
To this note: Our home is known as Bill + Donna’s “ FIN, FEATHERS and FUR camp”!
Ethan Curtis
When I tell people that I’m studying architecture the next question always seems to be asking if I grew up drawing, playing with Legos, or if I was always an “artsy” person. To their surprise my answer is a resounding no. In fact, I didn’t sign up for an art class until I was looking for a stress-free elective to fill out my schedule during my senior year of high school. Luckily, I stumbled my way into pursuing architecture and my creative side has been sparked ever since.
I began to pick up instruments I hadn’t played in years, took sketching classes, and recently got into photography thanks to being gifted a camera for Christmas. While art hasn’t always been my thing, being outside and exploring new places, sights, and scenes has. Therefore, capturing these moments of exploration with photography has quickly become one of my favorite hobbies and the challenge of framing the perfect photo is one that keeps me excited for the next adventure.
Haley Morgan
I am passionate about supporting my husband and through that I have fallen in love with the game of baseball. After spending countless hours supporting my husband as he played D1 baseball throughout college, I learned the game and became very involved. I love going to watch him coach, play, and we love going to games together. Our goal is to travel to every MLB stadium!
Haoye Xu
I am passionate about wandering in every city I live in. As a newcomer to Norfolk, taking the advantage of the late sunset in summer, I use the time after work, before the sky getting dark, to explore this area. The temperature is not much high, the sunlight projects on everything in a lower angle, the sky is always blue after storm…all these constitute a picturesque scenery in every angle of the city.
Jacqueline Childress
Greetings to all my fellow horticulture enthusiasts. Botany plants lately? Say aloe to my little friends. 🌿 I have fully embraced my green thumb and it has fully embraced me, and a rather large portion of my home. I love getting to nurture each one of these little seedlings, old timers, new comers, fresh propagations, and even rehabs. I also enjoy learning all about the different things that make them unique. Watching them grow helps release the dopamine and serotonin in my brain and has also proven to be very calming and therapeutic for me. This is my happy place.
Jada Crittendon
I am passionate about my collegiate sport, softball. Through softball, it has given me the opportunity to travel and see numerous places and their various architecture up closely. After many years of playing, the game has taught me many life lessons that can be applied on and off the field such as resilience after hardship, hard work, discipline, time management, picking up new skills quickly and appreciation for the details.
Keith Oliver
While finishing my landscape degree in Tucson I became friends with a community of talented artists and spent a lot of time in their studios. I assisted an accomplished ceramist for part of a year, and learned the process of surface patterning through pit firing where the piece is manipulated in an open fire, and the coals, branches, smoke and strategically placed materials like pine needles are burned. The patterns are only partially controlled and are definitely organic, recording the interaction of fire and the pot, which captivated me.
My brush with fire continued in the hot shop of two Chihuly protégé’s who were doing amazing work in a converted Tastee-Freez. I had never personally seen glass being blown and cast, and was drawn in by the process and the celerity of the work. But by then, I was focused on my landscape architectural career and never took the opportunity to learn how to work with hot glass. Flash forward a few decades and I took some classes at Tidewater Community College, which provided a great way to scratch the itch. Whereas my landscape projects can happen over months and years and sometimes requires meticulous calculation, the immediacy and fluid nature of hot glass demands a whole different level of awareness of the impact of every decision, movement and breath, and physicality that is a good tonic.
Lukas Weidner
I’m an ideas guy through and through. Nothing thrills me like the sensation of opening a door to a new vision of life, either for myself or someone else. My dad was an art teacher and taught me countless artist forms, so ever since childhood I’ve admired ancient artists and thinkers and have always dreamt of forging a similar path. I see art as a vital way to learn about unlikely patterns and relationships; a dialogue with our hands, our eyes, and each other about what order and beauty mean in our world. So I practice painting, drawing, calligraphy, sculpture, and more. It’s all about staying curious!
Marshall Dreiling
I’ve always been fascinated by infographics, maps, family crests, and flags. Each can carry so much weight with what they’re showing and what they aren’t. Things like a Soviet map that doesn’t show West Berlin are amazing to me because they tell a story about what life was like. Why wasn’t West Berlin shown? Was it to hide what was happening so that East Berliners wouldn’t want to flee to the West? And flags are similar. What symbols were picked and why? Why does a grain of wheat show up on Norfolk’s flag? Why does a windmill show up on New York City’s? What colors were picked and what meaning do they carry? Each flag or map tells a story and I love digging into those stories to see what I can find.
These are a few of the flag redesigns that I’ve been working on. There is an excellent TED talk / Podcast by Roman Mars of 99% Invisible about City Flags where I got a lot of my inspiration, so I thoroughly recommend you check that out. “Why city flags may be the worst-designed thing you’ve never noticed | Roman Mars”
Mickey Chapa
Hi, I’m Mickey. I like to cook. I’ve been working at it fairly consistently for years and enjoy spending an evening making a meal. A lot of times this means eating late, or making these just for myself, but I enjoy it all the same. #CameraEatsFirst
Rachel Julius
Hi, I’m Rachel! I love to draw, even outside my job. Drawing is a great way to reduce stress while simultaneously stimulating your creativity, self-expression, and patience. I am proud to say I have started selling my work on Etsy and even had a good number of sales.
Rachel - Drawing
Rachel - Drawing
Scott Campbell
I love all things outdoors and strive to spend most of my out of office time just that, OUT of the office! My family purchased a tremendous 3-acre parcel of waterfront property in Norfolk and have fully transformed both the house and the landscape, with gardens, pathways, playhouses, decks, with future plans for a workshop, guest cabin, and dock to keep our outdoor haven growing! Throw in all of the great beaches, gardens, parks, and outdoor events in Norfolk and our region beyond, more often than not I’m enjoying the outdoors with my family.