Throughout the year, the loudest works of new architecture tend to get the most attention. It makes sense; people want to know: Are the balconies at the new downtown Whitney Museum of American Art a thrilling new experience? Yes, but getting around inside can be confusing. Is The Broad Museum worth a trip to downtown Los Angeles? Definitely, but expect an adventure not an architectural experience.

There are also quieter projects that slip onto the scene with less hoopla but are equally worthy of notice, especially when they expand on definitions of what architecture can be. Here’s to looking at the buildings of 2015 that, even though commanding, don’t shout “Look at me”

Skidmore Owings & Merrill’s Center for Character and Leadership Development at the U.S. Air Force Academy
Skidmore Owings & Merrill’s Center for Character and Leadership Development at the U.S. Air Force Academy - Outside Colorado Springs, Colo., regimental tiers of classical modernist blocks at the U.S. Air Force Academy scaffold the eastern ramps of the Rocky Mountains. Completed in 1962 and designed by Skidmore Owings & Merrill (SOM), the striking centerpiece of the Academy complex is the Chapel, a stop-action layering of 17 aligned spires made of folded aluminum and glass tetrahedrons. Now, over 50 years later, SOM has returned to add a Center for Character and Leadership Development, an equally striking building meant to balance the focus on faith with a building dedicated to reason. Designed by SOM design partner Roger Duffy, the new 46,000-square-foot center sits across the Court of Honor from the Chapel on an elevated plaza. A ceremonial staircase steps down to a below-plaza-level entrance. This deferential move actually highlights the propulsive energy of a 105-foot steel-frame and glass inverted funnel—actually, a skylight—that projects through the plaza at a 39-degree tilt. The center includes gathering spaces, a library, conference space and seminar rooms, but at its core is the Honor Board Room. Here on a marble plinth officers address disciplinary issues with young cadets seated beneath the oculus of the skylight. The spot is designed to align precisely with the North Star at all times of the day and year and remind students of their own moral compass. The newly completed Center for Character and Leadership Development cost $45 million, more than half in appropriated military funds (about as much as building a standard dormitory, according to an Air Force report), and will open officially in late spring. © SOM