Macon Magazine

LEAVING HER MARK Fickling maintained that she sees things better now than she did in her youth. "Although some architects design well from the get-go, it's more common that we learn throughout our career and improve with age," she said. Fickling's personal taste is casual — bungalows and cra sman cottages. But she was quick to note, "I love working on homes of any era. Recently I've enjoyed 1950s and 1960s ranch houses, and Macon has some very good ones." Fickling's following for new residential construction includes two generations of Macon's Liipfert family: Dawn and Richard Liipfert's home in 1997, a home for daughter LaWahna Dawn Pyles in 2012, and one for daughter Summer Sterling Grisamore, completion set for this summer. One of Fickling's favorite commercial projects is Amerson River Park, which she completed for NewTown Macon in 2015. Heralded as a Macon gem, she called it "a really good project with a really good team and budget. I got to do the fun stuff — two stone-arched pavilions near the river and the overlook on the river. I also did the bathroom next to the playground." In a profession in which a mere 17 percent of architects are female, Fickling's experiences with male architects and with men in construction are remarkably positive. "I have more memories of men who took the time to teach me than I do of those who wrote me off because I was a woman. There were jerks, but for the most part, I was helped," she said, adding that she is grateful for the "hand holding in a very positive way," which she experienced with local contractors such as Al Gerhardt, Chris Sheridan, Don Weiche, Charles Etheridge and Franco DeMichel. She also found camaraderie in former estimator Christy Kovac, now president of Sheridan Construction. She encourages young women who might be interested in architecture as a career to research the profession. "There are so many possibilities within the field, whether you have an artistic bent, or a love of technology or engineering," she said. "Architecture has been a rich, enjoyable career for me. I have no regrets." LEFT PAGE: THE HOME OF DAWN AND RICHARD LIIPFERT. DAWN SAID, 'WE LOVE OUR PORCHES AND SITTING ON THE BACK PORCH WATCHING THE GRANDCHILDREN PLAY.' BELOW LEFT: THE HOME OF SUMMER STERLING AND GRANT GRISAMORE IS STILL UNDER CONSTRUCTION. SUMMER SAID, 'EVEN THOUGH OUR HOUSE ISN'T COMPLETE YET, I LOVE THE OPENNESS AND FLOW OF THE FLOOR PLAN.' BELOW RIGHT: SHANNON WITH HER CHILDREN DRU, BILLY AND LAURIE JUNE/JULY 2021 | maconmagazine.com 55

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