Point Person: Meet the architect for Saints ballpark

Posted: 1:22 pm Mon, January 13, 2014 By NancyCrotti Finance and Commerce Tags: AECOM, HGA Architects and Engineers, James Corner Field Operations, James/Snow Architects, Julie Snow Architects, Julie Vandenberg Snow, Louis Kahn, Midway Stadium, Mike Veeck, Museum of Russian Art, Phillips Plastics Corp., Robert Cervenka, Ryan Cos. US Inc., Saints ballpark, St. Paul Saints, Vincent James 1:22 pm Mon, January 13, 2014

Editors note: Point Person is a new monthly feature about people who are making news as a result of their involvement in high-profile projects of interest to Finance & Commerce readers.

Julie Snow, who unveiled the design for the St. Paul Saints ballpark in December, has been involved in designing the 7,000-seat stadium for seven years, long before it came to the publics attention. (Staff photo: Bill Klotz)

Architect Julie VandenBerg Snow has designed homes and private office buildings, restaurants and federal customs stations.

She has also put her stamp on such divergent spaces as the Museum of Russian Art in Minneapolis and the new St. Paul Saints ballpark.

The winner of numerous awards for her restrained and minimalist designs, Snow elicited this comment in 2011 from an American Academy of Arts and Letters awards jury: She and her studio make the marvelous happen. Elegance balanced by pragmatism she is a ballerina who can dance in work boots.

The founding principal of Minneapolis-based Julie Snow Architects likes to work collaboratively. Its a philosophy she adopted as a young woman studying architecture at the University of Michigan in the early 1970s.

Youre going to be hanging out with the guys and theyre your colleagues, said the Grand Rapids, Mich., native. The real challenge is whether or not there are really great talents in your studio.

If youve got really talented, energetic people, I dont think who you are or where you came from (matters). Youre getting pushed by other people with ideas. To me that was more interesting than gender issues.

Snow has spent her career in Minneapolis, working at HGA Architects and Engineers from 1974 through 1987, when she left to form James/Snow Architects with architect Vincent James. In 1995, she formed her current firm, which also provides interior design services, custom furnishings and furniture specifications. Eighteen people work for the firm.

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Point Person: Meet the architect for Saints ballpark