A Valentine s Day Tribute to DAAP Romances

DESIGN ALUMS: ADAM AND CHRISTA BRADY

In their first conversation while graphic design students in the University of Cincinnati’s School of Design, Adam and Christa Brady talked for two or three hours.

That first conversation touched on everything from design, politics and Christa’s growing up in California, and it was a fitting start to their relationship since communication and conversation have helped keep them together ever since.

Christa recalls, “We began dating right after meeting in the early 1990s at DAAP, but we were in separate cities on co-op. And even when we were on campus together, we were both heavily involved in campus life. So, we learned early the importance of communication.”

But even the challenges they faced as a couple and in communication turned out to be opportunities. For example, since they

co-opped

in different cities, they found opportunities to visit one another and to experience a new city together, specifically Baltimore, Los Angeles and San Francisco.

“And,” adds Adam, “Since we were a couple in DAAP, we could be helpful to one another in critiquing each other’s work.” Fortunately, that did not turn into competition between them since, according to Christa, “Adam is far more competitive with himself.”

In one way, it’s lucky that the two ever came together in the graphic design program at all. Christa, a 1997 alumna who is now associate director of global design strategy for Kao Brands Company, first entered DAAP’s interior design program. It was only later that she switched to graphic design.

And Adam, a 1998 graduate who is the central region vice president of workplace investing for Fidelity Investments, had the option to go to other schools on scholarship but chose to set his sites on DAAP even when he wasn’t certain he would get in. He recalls, “When I was applying to the graphic design program at UC, I turned down scholarships from other schools – that’s even when I couldn’t get into DAAP at first. I took other classes at UC and transferred into DAAP my sophomore year.”

But, once in DAAP, he confesses to noticing Christa before she noticed him: “She was an orientation leader, and I noticed her right away. Part of that was that I’d gone to an all-male Catholic high school. I saw her at my orientation, and I quipped to the guy next to me: ‘It’s good to be in college.’”

And, the couple can still be found in college, returning to spend time on campus as members of DAAP’s Campaign Leadership Committee, working to benefit the future of the college where they got their start as a couple – continuing the conversation they began nearly 20 years ago.

FINE ART ALUMS: AARON AND AMY HILDEBRAND

For DAAP photography alumna Amy Hildebrand, you might say that her affection for her future husband, fellow student Aaron Hildebrand, developed over time.

And appropriately enough, it began in DAAP’s photo dark room.

She recalls, “It was our freshman year at DAAP. I’d skipped class to go into the dark room to try and make progress on a project that wasn’t going well. And just after I’d gotten everything set up (in terms of the light-sensitive chemicals and paper), a whole class barged in.”

She was, she admits, huffy.

Aaron, who was using the enlarger next to her, tried to engage in conversation. Amy even recalls his first question: “Do you live in West Chester?”

Her terse reply, “No.”

“And,” according to Amy, “What I was thinking was far worse, more along the lines of: “Go away. I’m busy.”

She admits, “I was rude.”

It’s, perhaps, a good thing that Aaron couldn’t read her mind at the time because, he says, he had a good feeling about Amy right away. “In that first conversation, I felt like I’d talked with someone who was going to be important in my life, perhaps a good friend,” he states, while also agreeing, “But, yes, she was cranky, which is why I was trying to lighten the mood with some small talk, but it came off kind of stalker-like asking if she lived in West Chester.”

But it turns out that Aaron, a fine arts major concentrating in print making, had indeed seen her in West Chester, Ohio, near to where her parents lived at the time.

Later, after that first conversation, they took a photo class together and then, spent almost every evening for a week together when Amy had surgery and was recuperating at her parent’s house. During that week, they watched movies and – appropriately enough for two DAAP students – talked till 4 a.m.

Their friendship grew naturally, gradually, as they saw each other through high and low points as friends. Their first official date was in 2005, when sophomores. They married in 2005 and graduated in 2007 (with Amy seven months pregnant with their first child).

Amy laughs that they married while still students because “it’s better to pay for one apartment rather than two.”

While some DAAP couples find it stressful to be part of a committed relationship while also handling the notorious college workload, Aaron says it was just the opposite for him: “Being with Amy was like going on vacation. I’d forget about any stress. With that kind of feeling, I just wanted to be around her all the time.”

That being the case, he advises that today’s DAAP couples today can pursue a balance between work and relationship: “You can have both.”

And, true to form, Amy and Aaron have not slowed down in terms of their relationship or the challenges they take on. Now the parents of two young children, they are living in and restoring a historic home in Lebanon, Ohio. And that’s on top of recently beginning their own business, Best Day Ever!

PLANNING ALUMS: JESSICA AND VINCENT KLINE-PARKER

As a planning student in 2002, Vincent Kline-Parker, appropriately enough, tried to carefully plan the best way to ask his future wife, Jessica Kline-Parker, out on a first date after having met her at an off-campus party.

Conducting research as any good planning student would, Vincent went to the DAAP Café to ask some fellow students and friends what approach he should take. One of those friends, whose name was Sarah, provided some helpful advice.

And at the exact moment of receiving that advice, Jessica and a friend of hers walked up to Vincent and his friends.

Introductions were called for, and those introductions very nearly ended any possibility of a romantic relationship between Jessica and Vincent.

Vincent recalls, “I was introducing Jessica, and I accidentally called her ‘Sarah’ instead of ‘Jessica.’ It was because I’d just been talking to Sarah and getting her advice on how to best ask for a date with Jessica and what to do. I was focusing so much on Sarah’s advice that her name just slipped out.”

Vincent admits that he knew he’d messed up and hadn’t made a very good impression. He adds, “I had an intramural game to go play. Needless to say, I didn’t do very well in the game.”

Jessica remembers that moment as well: “When he introduced me by the wrong name, I just said, ‘My name is Jessica,’ and I left almost immediately. I was upset because I was interested in him and disappointed that he didn’t even seem to know my name.”

A salvage operation was called for, and that same evening, Vincent found one of Jessica’s friends and got her phone number and called to apologize.

Jessica recalls, “He was upset enough at himself that he managed to track down my telephone number. He explained that he’d just been getting Sarah’s advice on asking me out when I walked up, and that’s why he transposed the names.”

She laughs, “He seemed sincere, and I guess he was because it’s nearly ten years later, and he’s still telling the same story. It hasn’t varied at all, so it must be true. We’ve gotten a lot of laughs out of the story since.”

It was during that same phone call that they made plans for their first date.

And after that bumpy beginning, the two planning students were able to offer one another a lot of support in the program from which Vincent graduated in 2003 and Jessica in 2006. Both understood the demands of DAAP and could sympathize when the other had to pull an all nighter.

Jessica says that because Vincent was ahead of her in the program, she was able to borrow textbooks and get advice on the most useful classes. She, in turn, proof read his thesis. And both bounced ideas off one another.

Today, they live in Montpelier, Ohio, with their three young sons. Jessica is working on behalf of New Home Development, a non-profit that offers housing assistance for those on limited incomes and those recovering from mental illness, by writing grants and conducting program/project development, while Vincent serves as environmental health and safety coordinator at CK Technologies, LLC.

And while DAAP brought them together as a couple, they say that the college is also the source of other rich relationships as well.

States Jessica, “DAAP is a unique community of its own. There’s no place like it. My advice to anyone in DAAP today is to embrace and enjoy the experience and all the people it brings your way. You won’t get an experience like DAAP again, and while it might seem stressful and demanding at the time, it’s exceptional. Just going to DAAP is an unforgettable relationship experience in and of itself.”

ARCHITECTURE AND INTERIOR DESIGN ALUMS: JIM AND TAMMY LATHAM

While DAAP students and in the years since, Tammy and Jim Latham have always had the reputation as being the most stable of couples.

It’s an irony they both enjoy since they very nearly never became a couple at all.

Jim, a 1979 architecture grad, and Tammy, a 1981 interior design graduate, met in 1976, during Tammy’s first year at UC.

Jim recalls, “Actually, after we first met, I was first interested in Tammy’s roommate, Paula Dudt-Fudge (also a 1981 interior design graduate). But when I found out Paula had a boyfriend back home in Pennsylvania, I asked Tammy out.”

And the rest is, very clearly, history.

They initially met because their respective roommates (Paula Dudt-Fudge and Mike Lucas, a 1979 architecture alum) were not only from the same home town but even the same home-town street. That being the case, Mike’s mother asked that he look in on Paula and make sure she was settling in O.K.

“But,” as Tammy recalls, “Mike did more than that. He arranged an entire day touring Cincinnati for a small group of us, including me and Paula. That’s when Jim and I first met.”

And the fourth-year architecture students Jim and Mike made a very good impression on Tammy and Paula on the day-long tour of Cincinnati’s seven hills, which included parks, Skyline chili and even an unofficial tour of the dome at Union Terminal.

“Yes,” says Tammy, “Mike and Jim took us up to the exposed roof structure over the dome of Union Terminal. They even shimmied out to the center of a catwalk for a cool view of the rotunda below. At least it was cool till someone turned out the lights on us, and we call had to climb down some winding staircases in the dark.”

In fact, because of the friendships begun that day between Jim and Mike and Tammy and Paula, other friendships between the fourth-year architecture students and the entering class of interior design students of 1986 began.

Tammy explains, “We found we had good mentors in the older architecture students. You might say they were senior advisors to us. They were like having TAs (teaching assistants) on call. We thought this was quite normal until in later reunions, we found that other classes didn’t always have strong friendships with classes before or after them.”

And many among their circle of friends also lived in the same building, the Lookout Apartments on Riddle Road where Jim was the manager while putting himself through school.

Says Jim, “That also brought us closer as a couple and group, painting apartments and laying carpet at 1 a.m. for a new tenant moving in. DAAP was the beginning of relationships – ours as a couple and those with friends – that have lasted a lifetime.” (And the same was true for Jim’s sister, Laura Latham, who graduated graphic design in DAAP in 1984. They couple hopes the same will be true for their son, Michael Latham, currently a third-year student in industrial design at UC.)

Not surprisingly, Jim and Tammy married in 1979, before Tammy had even earned her DAAP degree, and they’ve now been married for more than 30 years, living most of that time in Annandale, Va., near Washington, D.C., where Jim practices architecture in his own firm, and Tammy is a furniture representative.

They both say that their time at DAAP still shapes their relationship. Explains Jim, “We’ve always had that shared experience and approach to life. When we’re together at the end of a day, we both understand the design ethos and background, so we can talk about and debrief on events and projects without introduction. And we still bring out the best in each other.”