THE PRACTICE OF ARCHITECTURE

ARCHITECTURAL MANIFESTO FOR THE COMING AGE

 Nature is always in season

Years of observation have led me to understand that we must nurture and sustain the natural world , or civilization will suffer the consequences of our neglect . Because of nature’s palpable force upon the human psyche and ability to stir our emotions, its hegemony cannot and should not be underestimated. Architecture can integrate nature in multiple ways. Richard Neutra established the open floorplan as a response to the advancements in the body-mind-nature connection, coupling natural light and fresh air to promote general wellness. When my projects are located in an urban setting, I search for creative ways to introduce the effects of nature, much like artist James Turrell, who creates mesmerizing sky views through an interior oculus to inspire us to explore and filter our natural experiences while acknowledging the man-made  environment. Whether a building project will be in an urban or rural environment, I believe that drawing from the surroundings while introducing well-considered degrees of natural phenomena is paramount to the perceptive life of the building.

 Living on a global island

The lessons of current environmental concerns are not lost on us. We share materials and man-made environments with nature. It’s that simple. As a defining moment in the practice of architecture, that establishes my role as citizen architect. A building’s design can be a responsible agent in reducing climate change. Knowing this compels me to not only plan efficiently but also design with an eye toward conserving resources to create buildings that share in a broader context than just the site.  The natural world is sine qua non to my thinking.

 Non-prescriptive use of technology

After years of applying sensitive site planning and building concepts, the outcomes of my work are instructive.  One home in particular, located on a barren plain in Taos County, New Mexico, encapsulates my philosophy. I recently learned from the homeowners how pleased they are with how its courtyards shelter them from the strong winds that sweep down from the mesas in the distance. Although the home is punctuated by many large windows, which allow the owners to enjoy expansive views of the surrounding landscape, I was careful to orient them in such a way as to ensure maximum efficiency. As a result, the owners’ heating and cooling bills are substantially lower than their neighbors’. Solar-assisted heating and a high-mass primary building component further help attenuate temperature swings. As with this house, well-considered site planning allows me to continue to apply the natural systems of ventilation, evaporation, shading, and sun exposure to heat or cool a building to the greatest extent possible. When these natural systems no longer meet the maximum comfort for the occupants, I introduce efficient technology in measured amounts. In this way, my buildings are sustained in large part by the mechanisms of the natural world rather than relying entirely on artificial systems for life support.

 Epicurean space, form, and delight

By using tested technologies and materials, I am able to design buildings that solve functional conflicts and site difficulties, resolve electrical, mechanical, and communication issues, and protect against climatic extremes. My sense of space, however, originates from nature. My buildings are sensual extensions of the natural world: They showcase the tactility of natural stone or wood, the animated light and darkness created by the sun and moon, the trickle of running water, the scratch of rustling leaves, the color and scent of seasonal flora, the monochromatic beauty of a snowfall, the relief of a midsummer breeze. Together, these sensations allow occupants to discover an architecture of place.

 The nature of courtyards

Creating exterior rooms in the form of courtyards or other spaces that invite us to be outdoors is another of my design objectives—in some cases, a design destination. I believe that architectural space extending into the natural world is an important transition and allows for continuity of form and the total environment of the place. I observe that living closer to nature instructs us on how to live with nature. This symbiotic relationship can also help us better understand our responsibility as shepherds of our resources.

 Space as the ultimate luxury

Today’s preference for custom material finishes can make it difficult for a client to differentiate what’s important during the design process. I therefore start with the most elemental architectural quality: resulting form from space. I am not indifferent to the physical seduction of materials, but I believe poetry in architecture is achieved by combining physical and nonphysical elements to create a container of space animated by natural phenomena that engages our senses and intuitions.

Architecture of anthropology

The idea that the built environment informs and extends society’s values can be difficult to explain, yet it certainly applies to architecture as an art form that edifies and makes visible our aspirations as a people. The Eiffel Tower in Paris, the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao, the Empire State Building in New York City—these edifices are symbolic of their cities and are part of what makes these places memorable, creating a kind of subconscious identity for both visitors and inhabitants. In this way, great architecture contributes to our sense of what is valued as a society, its dreams and ambitions and its societal neuroses.

 Modern what?

The great poet, essayist, and novelist George Santayana once quipped, “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” In the context of architecture, one might say that technological innovation, not a knowledge of history, provides liberation from the past. In Albert Pope’s book Ladders, the concept of post-modernism is laid bare. In summary, modernism relies on a historic context to derive meaning, or difference from that which is not modern. Once a context is modernized, a modern work is denied its potency, since its context is now one of similarity and without reference. Thus, one arrives at the post-modern condition through the sole iteration of modernism and achieves an architecture of technological application without context. While practicing architecture in a historic-orientated community for a number of years, I have come to appreciate the basic linguistic relationship of sign and signifier, object and context. The definition of meaning, as championed by contemporary philosopher Ken Wilber, gains greater depth with difference without reverting to a post-modern condition, or read “a Modern on Modern” layering of singular aesthetic of learned responses.

 Modern limitations

During the industrial revolution, architects officially broke the chains of past eras and cast off the yoke of historicism in favor of solutions that answered the call for new building types. A logging company didn’t need a Parthenon-style temple, it needed a simple shed to keep the elements off the men and materials. Special building types of today focus and evolve these earlier programs with rigorous specificity. They bind the building, its form and function, to the need and, in some cases, the aesthetic. The results are often stunning experiments with mathematical precision that early architectural pioneers could never have envisioned. Specificity, it seems, trumps the universalism of use. But that is just the problem, since the specificity of the program and resulting building is magnetized to a function that, like its partnering aesthetic, is evolving and not fixed to a specific need. I believe in incorporating the attributes of universalism into my buildings’ design so that they are over time in essence “reused,” having been fully integrated into the communities where they are found. Modern, yes, but not with modern limitations.

The Myth of Prefabrication

When observing the burgeoning architectural market place, Tiny Homes, Small Homes, Container Homes and Accessory Dwelling Units (ADUs) and the like, there is the promise of architecture. Architecture, it seems, has finally embraced the market place, or perhaps, vis versa. These relatively small assemblies suggest that premanufactured houses are the result of a modular building technique. What is unsaid, is the foundation upon which these "premanufactured assemblies" are built: The construction module. It may be unsexy and certainly amorphous, but present in the form of product and certainly ubiquitous. Evident in window and door products, masonry and wood products, lies the greatest "graph paper" planning tool available to both the consumer and professional market. The myth of prefabrication is the not the end "assembled result" but the foundational materials that when considered and used as planning modules, reduce construction waste and benefits from an abbreviated construction duration. In this case, the end result is a result of the base materials from which they are built from. In this sense, it is greater industry that produces and modulates assemblies— of all sizes and shapes—is where premanufactured building originates.

Borrowing, Part 1

 “Borrow means to take and use something that belongs to someone else for a period of time and then return it”

Observing the built environment in large and small American cities, including rural places, the idea of ownership seems to evade the concept of sharing space, a likely result of monetary and privacy concerns. Public or common space tends to remain in the public trust, and rarely do the two co-exist, except at the street. The streetscape is currently where form-based zoning is focused while missing sharing spaces and amenities within development programs, since they are self-administered and thought to be in the realm of the owner.  While ownership and investment value are inextricably linked, neither should preclude the idea of borrowing when developing a building program. Hence, the very idea of borrowing land, space, and amenities is an unique idea within American development. Why include a building amenity when a neighbor can provide the same amenity at little or no cost?

The concept of borrowing can be evidenced through various adjacencies and project types, uncovering new spatial relationships that suggest how property lines, ownership, and development can be organized within existing boundaries while deriving mutual benefit. The organization of space within the pressing demands of de-carbonation, reduction of waste, access to green space, and walkability, align with the concept of borrowing, namely due to the fluid transfer of spatial ideas and adjacencies that add - and subtract- from existing relationships, creating a dynamic development environment. Thus, borrowing on small or large scales can be an effective means to address current issues within real-estate development - at any scale - while creating new relationships within projects that include a broader range of design considerations.