In 1969, Floyd McKissick bought a 5,000-acre former slave plantation in North Carolina and announced he was building a city. He secured $14 million in federal loans, laid water pipelines, and broke ground — until the project was strangled by political opposition. Soul City's blueprint proved that Black economic self-determination works.
Mariam Kamara walked away from a seven-year tech career to study architecture, then returned to Niger to build the Hikma Complex using compressed earth bricks that regulate extreme heat naturally. Her practice, Atelier Masomi, proves that the answers for African communities were in the soil the entire time.
Paul Revere Williams designed more than 3,000 structures across Los Angeles — from the LAX Theme Building to Frank Sinatra's home — while restrictive covenants barred him from living in the very neighborhoods he built. He learned to draw upside down so white clients wouldn't feel uncomfortable sitting across the table from him. He became the first Black Fellow of the American Institute of Architects.
