Rehana Poindexter is a 2025 recipient of the WRNS Studio Foundation Scholarship, which she will use to pursue a 5-year Master of Architecture at Howard University. She graduated from White Station High in Memphis, Tennessee in Spring 2025. She is the Foundation’s inaugural HBCU awardee. We spoke with Rehana recently about her journey and her plans for the future.

Thinking of your cultural background and lived experience, how do you envision creating a more beautiful, sustainable, or equitable built environment as a future architect or designer?

Because I grew up in a place where modern day sustainability is not practiced, I envision creating an environment of edifices both small and big that are able to open up more space for nature and less space for harmful human development. I envision myself - most likely alongside a team of likeminded people - building green environments that disconnect people from the screen and possibly refocuses their energy on what is going on around them in order to spread awareness. Our country is behind most and ahead of some other countries in terms of sustainability, but with such a large population, we have a lot of people to take care of. Cleaner air practices, cleaner energy sources, and personal recycling choices are things I would enjoy implementing into personal and public spaces for all, to protect the image of the world that we once saw as children, one without the noticeable amount of pollution, lack of vibrant colors, and breathable air both in the home and outside it. I see this being completed not by building new buildings in empty spaces but replaces the harmful buildings and opening up places. If renovation were to begin by replacing, we as a country could fix the problem at the root and branch out into a cleaner way of living. Filtered water, vents, and energy on a mass level could be my start.

Describe a creative interest or talent that brings you joy.

Outside of food and trying new restaurants, the thing that brings me the most joy is creation, more specifically seeing the finished product of anything I make and actually liking it. I enjoy creating anything, whether it be by using Legos, yarn, old cardboard, paint, or even popsicle sticks so I can't specify the activity itself, just the act of completing a creative project. That feeling I get when I tie in that final stitch or place that last spot of glue down is unmatched because I get to finally see what all of my hard work got me. I have a small crochet business and people pay me to create them things like cute hats, footies (ruffle socks) bags, etc. and I truly enjoy seeing that initial reaction once my clients open that bag or send me a picture of them smiling or sending heart eyes at what I made for them. I realized customer satisfaction and personal satisfaction after putting in hard work to do something was a feeling I began to search for and worked towards because Joy is something I'm known for and sharing it makes me happy no matter how cheesy that may sound.

More about Rehana…

A lot of things are too pricey for my family, so my experience has been limited to the classroom and the home. The most I have done with volunteer work is that I have helped do the visual setups at church a lot and decorating for birthday parties in a venue thanks to My Grandma who does it for a living. I have done a lot of practice with direct observation in my art class, I have hobbies like drawing, building online, and making floor plans for houses in my favorite games (Bloxburg, Sims, Minecraft) that I use as practice for architecture. Outside of those I love to crochet, read books, watch shows (like Hack my home on Netflix) that have anything to do with flipping a home for a family, and one fun fact about me is that I made my Prom dress! I had to figure out a lot on my own, but the finished product made me proud.  I am a very creative girl and enjoy playing with any creative hobbies, so I have tried everything from working with clay and sculptures to taking our old cereal boxes and making a doll house for my little sisters. Thanks to my mom I have been able to work with epoxy, do DIY crafts for my room, and get experience with party setups so thinking on the fly has been a skilled drilled into me. I just love art!

I have attached some of the works that gave me a 5 in my AP art exam (The peppers were in a different section) that I worked on all of the 23 - 24 school year. This portfolio on organic textures was studied for my entire time in the classroom and I had the most fun trying to decipher different textures onto my own sheet of paper. The many hours spent on each work were well worth it and I decided to put these here to show both my dedication and attention to detail that I feel are my two best strengths when it comes to my creativity and work ethic as a student. All of these works are from my own observations and photos taken that I brought to my art teacher who helped me while creating each of the pages shown below.