As a senior associate and enclosure design leader in the Los Angeles office of Walter P Moore, Kais Al-Rawi, AIA, solves complex building challenges through digital design. He has worked on a number of high-profile airport projects including San Diego International Airport’s Terminal 1 Redevelopment; Louis Armstrong New Orleans International Airport’s new terminal building; MLIT D-West Pier at Houston George Bush Intercontinental Airport; Guadalajara Airport Terminal 2; and the West Gates at Tom Bradley International Terminal, Terminal 4.5 Core, and Automated People Mover Connector at Los Angeles International Airport. For these projects, Al-Rawi led the technical design of the building enclosure systems, with a focus on specialty curtainwall systems that are long-span, high performance and resilient.
He leveraged design tools to set up parametric models that explored options and adapted design changes related to airport structures. The digital processes that Al-Rawi set up for Louis Armstrong New Orleans International Airport’s new terminal streamlined data interoperability between all the platforms used, resulting in a process that added value through rapid iteration of options. These processes have now become Walter P Moore’s standard practice on large-scale projects.
For his work, Al-Rawi was recognized as the 2020 recipient of Walter P Moore’s Javier F. Horvilleur Outstanding Young Professional Award and was the first architect to receive it in the firm's history.
Al-Rawi said he is proud of the award and noted it is rewarding work to be part of the entire design process, from concept to completion, of projects that span many years.
“Airport projects are unique typology that allows designers to create iconic architecture, and simultaneously it is a typology that is experienced firsthand by millions of travelers every year,” he said.
Al-Rawi holds a master’s degree in emergent technologies and design from the Architectural Association School of Architecture in London.
He is an adjunct lecturer at the University of Southern California School of Architecture and has taught and directed the Architectural Association Visiting School programs in Los Angeles and Jordan with a focus on space architecture. He served as a juror to NASA's centennial challenge competition for Martian habitats.
Al-Rawi said he is excited about the future of aviation from a technology and sustainability perspective, and how these aspects will evolve airport design with urban air mobility, clean energy flights as well as supersonic flights, and how airport designs in urban settings and distributed networks will be reimagined.
“I believe there are many exciting opportunities in the aviation and airport design industry in the future with such advancements,” he said.
