Our Leadership

"Long-range planning
does not deal with
future decisions,
but with the future
of present decisions."
- Peter Drucker

The driving force behind Young-Hie Kromm and David Kromm’s professional careers centers on finding the proper harmony between function and delight which leads to artful sustainability when designing spaces and constructing facilities.

Meeting this couple helps to illustrate the truly unique and interdependency of their professional and personal lives.

young-hie

Young-Hie Kromm, AIA, of KRJ Planning & Research, leads the artful side of the equation. Young-Hie speaks of “artful” to describe a space that is delightful and meaningful in context to its community’s cultural background. Young-Hie develops culturally meaningful space, that is delightful to the community of users. An artful space is not sacrificed for sake of sustainability.

Young-Hie is involved in the American Institute of Architects and its St. Louis Chapter. She shares her expertise on many local boards and is the founding chair of Gateway Korea Foundation. She served as a panelist for the Cross-Cultural Communication for the Women in Architecture Symposium at Washington University in St. Louis. She also had the pleasure of being interviewed by Dr. Blanche Touhill as part of the State Historical Society of Missouri’s “Women as Change Agents.”

david

David Kromm, AIA, LEED AP, brings a mindset for sustainability to our work. He leads the research and planning that creates energy and operational efficiencies throughout the life of the facility. His team performs whole building energy modeling studies and considers how to balance sustainability among the building envelope other building systems. A sustainable facility is not sacrificed for sake of artfulness.

David is an active member of the AIA, and the Building Enclosure Council of St. Louis, which focuses on improving the performance and sustainability of buildings. He is also a member of the Missouri School Board Association. David chairs the board of Kromm, Rikimaru and Johansen, sister company to KRJ Planning & Research.

Throughout their careers they have co-authored countless articles and have won many awards. They were recently awarded the LEED Platinum Certification from the US Green Building Council for the Missouri Alternative and Renewable Energy Technology (MARET) Center they designed for Crowder College.