Architect and sculptor. Won national design competition for the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington, DC She was then 21 and still a student at Yale. Although her simple and stark design was initially controversial (it wasn't the heroic monument many expected of a war memorial), the "wall" has come to be greatly admired and a major tourist destination. Other works include the Civil Rights Memorial in Montgomery, AL. and a landscape sculpture called "The Wave Field." She also authored "Boundaries," where she describes how she goes about her creating her designs. She was inducted into the National Women's Hall of Fame in 2005.