"I've probably been the luckiest person in the world." That's the perspective of Edith Cherry, longtime architect, University of New Mexico professor emerita and former school of architecture director, historic preservationist and winner of a 2021 lifetime achievement award. It's been a full career for the 81-year-old Cherry, who still lives in the UNM "student ghetto" house she and her husband designed in the 1970s. (They were at the vanguard of modern solar design back then, and though there have been some changes, the couple is still "nearly net-zero" in home energy consumption, Cherry says.) She is retired from UNM - where she was the first full-time female architecture professor - and from Cherry/See Architects, the firm she and her husband started. But her schedule is stuffed with activities that continue her love of the profession. Architecture "is all about coming up with a physical solution that somehow not just makes sense but has an aesthetic boost," Cherry says. "I couldn't always do it … both the functional stuff and the beautiful stuff, but that's what I wanted to do. That's what I love about it." Now, she and husband Jim See are developing a website for the New Mexico Architectural Foundation that shows off some of New Mexico's standout buildings. "There's about 50 buildings on it now, and we're still cranking them out," she says. The couple travels, too, and that means Cherry gets to indulge her ongoing interests in geology and anthropology, which she studied at UNM. "I have the notion that there's a kind of architecture in everything," Cherry says. "I've gotten a real interest in geology because just through physics, it makes these beautiful forms. Bryce Canyon. I wish I could do that."
