Q&A: Rubeling and Associates President Al Rubeling

Al Rubeling Jr. is president of Rubeling and Associates, the Towson architectural firm celebrating three decades in business this year. If you haven't heard of the company, you've certainly seen their work.

The firm has worked on renovations at , the , the Cathedral of Mary Our Queen, , Stoneleigh Elementary School, Baltimore County's and several county community centers.

The Parkville native and Monkton resident, 57, graduated from Parkville High School and the University of Maryland. His roots in Towson run deep: His father played baseball at and what's now

Why is Towson so special to you?

I was never a downtown Baltimore guy, I was always a county guy. I went to Parkville High School and I started my firm 31 years ago in Towson and we've remained in Towson the entire time.

When we moved here [to Kenilworth Drive] a little over six years ago, we put the question to our staff: Where would you like us to be? Would you like us to be in Canton? Do you want us to be downtown, would you want us to be in Hunt Valley? Because we have people in Harford County and Pennsylvania, Anne Arundel, Baltimore City, Towson's kind of central for them.

We're a very community-based firm. Baltimore County government, Baltimore County Public Schools. They're all clients. We've done a lot of work for the Archdiocese of Baltimore in Baltimore County. A lot of projects that touch people, like the independent schools, Boys' Latin and Loyola Blakefield, they all touch people.

What's it like to have such an impact on not just area architecture but, since you're such a Towson-based firm, places you and your employees actually use and benefit from?

It's very rewarding. You feel like you've given back and you feel of value. It's one of those things that architects will always say, it's not about the money. It's about impact and it's about helping people. That's what motivates us. It's almost spiritual. But there's nothing better than going to the dedication of a school, a school library, a church and seeing hundreds of people that are rallying around one thing that is important their life.

And to think that we had the privilege, we were picked to help them do that is just in our core. It makes us who we are. It's not about the ego, it's not about the design awards, it's not about doing something that is unique. It's helping those people. It's making a difference.

You recently announced an initiative to help independent schools manage enrollment changes in the coming years. Tell me a little about that and what the impetus was for it.

Independent schools today are in a new frontier for them in looking at maintaining their enrollment and their culture and their mission. And when they're looking at the new normal we're in with the economy, the question is will society be able to afford the independent school?

And so it's quite an experience for the leaderships and the boards to call a time out and say, "If our enrollment is down five percent, 10 percent, 15 percent, what does that mean for us. We're still a great school. We still have our culture. We still have our method, we still have our pedagogy and what have you, but how are we going to survive with 10 to 15 percent less income, students?" And so we're helping them reflect back to where they were 10, 15, 20 years ago when their student enrollment was a similar size and help by using our imaginations, help them figure out what do we need to do to adapt.

Is it a change of faculty size? Is it a change of physical size? Are there things that we can do that either reach out to the community and reach out for others to use.

It certainly is not designing buildings per se, but it's being a value ... Our motto is more than design. We do so much more in helping people face ideas and help them improve their bottom line in business or improve the education in a school.

You seem to take that holistic approach to it, like it's more than architecture.

[German writer Johann Wolfgang von] Goethe said it's "frozen music." It's also been said it's frozen poetry. We view the people side, the community side, the personalities involved in the project. We have a specialty in independent schools, and we understand that breed of cat, yet every school is different and unique in their leadership style and their mission, so we need to learn those as we take on those tasks with them.

Your company has really stable niches, like education, government and corporate offices. How has that helped you weather the storm?

We're still here. People say to us when we advertise with our signs on our beltway or in different publications, the reaction is quite incredible, like "you guys are doing great." And the whole idea of that campaign is to let people know we're still here. A lot of firms have gone under. We have between 50 and 55 percent unemployment in our business, in architecture across the country. Across the country, it's not going well.

We've been saying that for a while, not to be negative, but to let people know we've been rocked. It's been quite a challenge. This is my fourth (recession) event, and this one's been the longest, and we have a ways to go yet. So we view what we do for our clients as the reason why we're still here. Because they view us as more than architects. They view us as problem solvers. They view us as a creative mind and imagination.