The basic process for eons for educating architects has relied heavily on the jury system.  About once every six weeks or so, every student is asked to pin up their work in a semi-public place and a panel of jurors, usually other instructors and architects, are each given time to comment on the work after the student’s brief description of the project.  Sometimes this can be very public and as a student you might look up to see 6 or so very dour jurors staring at you along with dozens or more of your fellow students.  To say that it can be intimidating is a gross understatement.

jury at Yale, in 'the pit'

However, as someone who was very shy and frequently terrified by this kind of public speaking and criticism, I do believe that is one of the very best ways to educate an architect.  Through this often-fraught crucible, every student has to become sure of their ideas and committed to their projects.  It is a very real and early reminder that architecture is not a pursuit practiced only in isolation, but a public art, with all that that entails.

In undergraduate and graduate school I took part in and was a victim of an awful lot of juries.  (It is not really a ‘jury’ of your peers by the way – it is experienced instructors and architects that have been down the same path and know all the tricks to reveal you and your project’s shortcomings)

I have seen crying, screaming, panic and the occasional fist-fight break out.  I have seen instructors tell students that their work is so dreadful or incomplete that they should just pack it up right now and leave, and never, ever return.

jury in 'the pit' at Yale

I  mention all of this because I have heard of disturbing trend of the diminishing use of public juries to evaluate student work.  I hope I am not being an old curmudgeon, but I really do think this is a great loss.  Each year as a student the process became a little easier to the point that I looked forward to the criticism and advice in graduate school.  Now, as a working architect, I have to present my designs to my clients.  I could simply present the projects and tell them to take it or leave it.  However, the jury system has convinced me that to make really good buildings it is best to describe the projects simply and briefly and then listen.

some juror’s comments collected on the Politically Incorrect blog:

http://politicallyincorrect007.blogspot.com/2008/12/architecture-jury-critique.html

photos from the Yale School of Architecture website

Mies van de Rohe famously said, “God is in the details”.

I hope He is okay with changes in the field:

some sketches done in the field to change and clarify details

Despite our best efforts to figure out everything prior to construction, changes have to be made, especially with renovations and additions where existing construction turns out a bit different than we thought.

Field Notes brand notebooks – I keep a separate one for each project under construction

I recently took some new photos of a project we finished a few years ago, a major renovation of a house on Hurricane Hill in Nederland, Colorado

designed with my friend Jim Walker

built by Cottonwood Custom Builders

green dyed ash cabinets by Wedgewood, purple/black concrete countertops by Fisher Concrete (including acid-etched grasses motif)

In an ongoing series of a cursory analysis of Boulder’s new Compatible Development regulation slated to take affect January 4th, here is another set of consequences of part of that regulation – bulk planes.

This study was looking at a generic south Boulder Ranch located on a north-south street.  It assumes flat topography and a fairly standard size lot and existing ranch type house.

Prior to the regulations, any second floor addition was limited by the solar shadow (see the diagram below).  This is not a particularly beautiful addition, but it is the simplest kind of construction – building a simple addition that mirrors the roof of the existing ranch, has an 8′ high ceiling and is built as much as possible over the existing exterior walls.  (new bulk planes shown in red, existing house is green, addition in white)

You can see the shadow cast to the north has limited the location of the north wall of the second story.  The south gable end of this typical type of addition is in violation of the new bulk plane.

To bring this kind of addition into compliance, the south side of the second story addition would have to be move to the north by approximately 5′, resulting in:

a strange little addition

To more easily comply with the bulk plane regulations, a gable-fronted second story addition could be added on:

a bit of a monster on top of the original ranch house and very different kind of style

There is an exception to the bulk plane rule that would allow a larger, second story addition that still mirrored the roof line of the ranch.  It has to be at least 40′ long to allow for the exception to violate the bulk plane, resulting in:

a frightening looking thing – note that a significant portion of the second story at the back of the house is hovering above the ground.  The width of the allowed second story has to be 40′ – deeper than the typical ranch it sits on.

In part IV we will look at the part of the new regulations that will restrict the length of the new side walls and their articulation.  (In the example diagram above, the second story addition has to be 40′ exactly, not an inch less or the bulk plane exception would not be allowed, nor an inch more or the wall articulation regulation would be violated!)

Side Yard Bulk Planes

As part of the recently passed Compatible Development regulations, the City of Boulder has included a bulk plane restriction.  This regulation limits any new construction or addition from building beyond a projected line starting 12′ above the property lines and sloping inward at 45 degrees.

As a real-world application, the impacts to possible second-story additions are significantly more restrictive than those imposed by the previous set of regulations.  As mentioned in the first post about these regulations, the devil is in the details, or more specifically in the combination of the new regulations with the existing solar shadow ordinance.

For so many homes in the affected areas, one side of the house is within 5′ of the property line in accord with the setback regulations.  This means any possible second story addition would be limited similar to the above diagram.  The available interior space of this addition is significantly lower than previously allowed as the head height at the edge of the room is now under 6′.

Under the older regulations, Boulder pop-tops tended to be partial extensions of the floor below, weighted to the south side of the property to avoid the solar shadow restrictions.  As in the photo above, the addition to the original ranch created a distinctly either right-sided or left-sided house depending on what side of the street the property was located (again, driven by shifting this mass to the south side of the property).

The new bulk plane regulations will either shift this kind of the addition down, making it more like a series of dormers sticking out of a new roof, or shift the south side of the addition closer to the center creating a kind of bubble addition sitting on a ranch house.  There are some exceptions allowed for penetrating the bulk plane, however, most of the existing houses are not of a size to take advantage of some of the them.

So, the regulations may encourage more wedding-cake style houses with reducing layers as the building moves upward.

The former regulations lent to additions that created a kind of asymmetrical balance – playing the long, low horizontal lines of the ranch house against the vertical lift of the addition.  Weighted to one side, this composition often closely paralleled the plan of the house, with public rooms of living room, dining room, kitchen, etc. on one side of the house and bedrooms on the other.

The wedding-cake style of house creates an entirely more complex composition, being neither predominantly horizontal or vertical.  The local architects, and especially builder/designers, will need to work harder to make each house or addition sympathetic to its neighbors and architecturally worthy.

Given the Boulder County’s Site Plan Review process, both the explicit and implicit rules within, there are a number of really great buildings that would never be allowed to be built in Boulder County.

starting at the top left, clockwise:

house at Riva San Vitale, Ticino, Switzerland, by Mario Botta :  clearly violates  the height rule.  This house sits on the steeply sloping mountainside above a lake.  The design is meant to minimize the footprint of the house and, as a “tower”, presence the experience of the slope, the lake and the mountains beyond.  It is actually not that tall, but from the lowest point on the downhill slope, the upper part would have to conform to the angle of the slope.

Villa Malcontenta, Italy, by Palladio:  is not “compatible with surround topography”.  Like most of Palladio’s villas, this design is set off against the flatness of the land.  It is a mark of occupation, like a stick in the ground, taking in the landscape but clearly not merging with it.  Traditional villas occupy the land and maybe even dominate it.  But they also give scale and proportion to the land.

Villa Savoye, France, by LeCorbusier:  color not acceptable.  This house is a bit restless, looking to possibly move across the landscape.  But, by doing so, it makes the connection between the land and sky, it establishes this place of occupation in the sun and on the land.  It is not a ‘natural’ element of the landscape, but white, and sufficiently abstract to draw attention to the beauty of the landscape.

Gugalun House, Switzerland, by Peter Zumthor: incompatible with Wildfire Resistant materials and construction.  The is a forest house, extending a vernacular building built of the products of the place, wood boards and planks, logs and panels.  It is as flammable as the surround forest, as fragile, but also as timeless.

Don’t get me wrong, I am all for protecting Boulder County’s magnificent wilderness views.  But sometimes the landscape is actually improved by a building, brought into focus, given a scale.

Boulder County is not a wilderness.  It is occupied.  It has been mined, traversed, settled, abandoned, and re-inhabited all over the county.  If we had more respect for the land, for a sense of a common occupation of the land, we may not need the burdensome regulations.

However, so many people’s desire to build the biggest possible house on the tallest possible peak or ridge has corrupted the entire prospect of making meaningful architecture.  Maybe we do need to keep the regulations in place until there are enough good architects and responsible owners and builders.

In the meantime, since there is a process that requires individual, site-specific review of every new building, maybe the reviews could do the same – close, individual consideration of overall impact, location and siting, not generic rules applied without consideration to locale.

Regulations of this sort are always difficult to administer, even worse to create.  The ultimate authority on these sits with our elected County Commissioners – to approve or not all projects.  Is the will of the people clear on these issues?  Try coming to an approval meeting and see the range of comments from the public on any given project.

photo credit:  Gugalun House by Marloes Faber, Swiss alps photo from Wayfaring travel guide

The City of Boulder has passed sweeping new regulations that will effect a large number (around 13,000) of single-family homes across the city.  These new regulations become active at the first of the year and the impact on building projects will be significant.  Much of the discussion and controversy over these regulations concerned a reduction in the allowable building area (Floor Area Ration, FAR) that is to be applied on a sliding scale with smaller lots getting a greater percentage of allowable building area.  However, it is the physical location and topography of the given lot that may have a much greater influence over the allowed building area, not the FAR.  Over the next few weeks, we are going to post some analysis and review of what these new regulations will mean  for the different neighborhoods of Boulder.

East-West running streets in Boulder, typical of mesa areas:  south Boulder along Vassar and Lafayette , Chautauqua south of Baseline, Mapleton Hill, north Boulder north of Iris.  The streets predominantly run east-west because of the east-west running topography.  Not coincidentally, these lots are larger than typical (yellow is over 8,000 sf, orange over 10,000 sf).  As the existing solar shadow ordinance is preferential for this orientation because the shadows cast either into the street or onto the owner’s property, the new regulations laid over the solar ordinance have a smaller impact in these areas.

North-South running streets in Boulder, typical flat topography:  south Boulder between Table Mesa and Viele Lake, Martin Acres, University Hill, Newlands.  These streets run predominantly north-south  and more strictly adhere to a rectangular grid.  These lots tend to be smaller (dark blue is less than 6,000sf, cyan is 7,000 sf).  The ability to add on to these properties is greatly limited by the existing solar ordinance because the house’s shadow is cast upon the lot’s northly neighbor, quickly violating the ordinance with an added second story.  The additional new pops and scrapes ordinance (Compatible Development) has much greater impact on these areas of the city as the lots are already smaller and more challenged by the solar ordinance.

Over the next fews posts we are going to look at how the new and existing regulations combine for unintended consequences and produce results that prejudice some areas of the city over others, and influence the type of architecture that may be sympathetic with the regulations.  Surprisingly it is not the limited FAR that most directly and negatively impacts most properties, but the associated new regulations that cause the most difficulties.  Along with the new sliding scale FAR regulations the City ordinance contains:

1.  Maximum building coverage regulations

2.  New ways of calculating floor areas for basements (this makes a huge impact on walk-outs)

3.  Sideyard bulk plane regulations

4. Sideyard wall articulation requirements

Like all real estate, the most important thing is “location, location, location”, and so it goes for these regulations.  It is not the restrictions themselves, but how they impact specific properties in the real world, with topography, orientation, architectural styles, etc. that will have consequences unknown.

As we are a strong proponent of very site-specific architecture, of design that is grounded in a place, the potentials of the new regulations may begin to feel like an unwanted collaborative partner in the design process.

See the City’s website on the history of the ordinance and its study materials:

http://www.bouldercolorado.gov/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=9051&Itemid=3865

I graduated with a Bachelor of Architecture in 1990.  Times were tough for architects, especially inexperienced ones without good contacts.  I managed to get and keep a number of jobs in a few years that kept me in the profession, retreating to grad school along the way.

However, so many of my fellow graduates, faced with a tough economy, low pay, student loans, layoffs and mind-numbing aggravation of the day-to-day tasks of young interns, either dropped out or were forced out of architecture.  The huge glut of baby-boomer architects in front of us meant few professional jobs where actual design experience could be had and even less chance of landing one of the rare, tenure-track teaching jobs.

So it was much to my, and many of my colleagues, surprise that being an architect became cool in the late 1990’s.  There were architects on television and the movies and the explosive growth of the culture of international star architects all felt like actions taking place on a very different planet than the one we lived.  Companies and institutions lost faith in open, anonymous competitions and these opportunities dried up for all but the few, usual suspects of the invitation-only “competition”.  Gone were the days that Richard Rogers and Renzo Piano,  Jorn Utzon, and others could make their careers winning open competitions and seeing the buildings to completion.

But I think none of this compares to the bleak landscape of recently-graduated and young architects today.  The prospect of finding any job at all in architecture or a related field is extremely limited.  Past recessions have seen slow-downs in a region or a type of project (residential or commercial), but the last 2 years have witnessed almost a complete stop to all construction.  (Employment in architecture firms is down almost 20%). The cynical older architects are happy to see this winnowing of the crop, a filtering of only the most dedicated.  However, most likely this recession will only further reinforce the reality that for the most part, architecture should be pursued by only those who are either independently wealthy or willing to work for wages that won’t keep up with school loan payments.

I get a lot resumes and work samples sent to me.  There is a tremendous amount of talent and drive out there that has no outlet in architecture.  There are thousands of great buildings that will not come to be, an unbelievable loss to our built environment.  When so much of our country fears the future, the prospects for architecture are indeed bleak.  Architecture proposes the new, it looks to the future.  Even the most world-weary and hip-tragic architect gets really excited about making buildings, proposing new ideas and forms. The recession hasn’t just stopped or slowed the amount of work available, it has fostered an environment of fear, where architecture seems an expensive amenity in a threadbare future.

Let’s hope that when things turn around, there will be some architects left who are are not so cynical or set-in-their-ways, that a new generation of buildings can designed and built that celebrate life on this planet not just mere existence.

The Art Institute of Chicago has recently opened the new Modern Art wing designed by Renzo Piano.  Piano’s Design Workshop is probably the most consistently innovative and interesting big-name international architecture office out there.  Every building they execute is marked by an acute attention to detail and they all seem to serve their clients rather than the architect’s ego.

So, on a recent visit, I found myself really appreciating the building, but not loving it.  As mentioned, it is beautifully and simply put together – the spaces flow nicely, the materials are clearly and cleanly brought together.  Maybe most importantly, and in light of Denver’s Art Museum, it is clear that the building is there to serve the art that it displays, not the reverse.

However, in its simplicity and lightness, it lacks the robust material quality that I think distinguishes the best of Chicago architecture.  For while the Chicago skyscrapers and the Chicago window of the early twentieth century championed a kind of structural determinism and rationality, it exerted this as the primary formal expression.  The Modern wing more like a series of screens, horizontal and vertical, that wrap the building.  So, while this is a great response to the program of the building, to the housing and display of art,  it does not have to be the primary driver of the building.

This is a photo of the Gage Building, near the museum on Michigan Avenue, designed by Louis Sullivan.  You can feel the frame and weight of this building, the decorative medallions seeming to hold up the middle piers.  This is what I think of when I  think of Chicago architecture – taut buildings that are both light and heavy, rational and expressive.

Piano’s addition is a very good building, a great addition to the museum and the city.  But it speaks more to an international, place-less design than one rooted in a city of a great architectural tradition.

I recently was driving a round-about way to New Harmony, Indiana and passed through Poseyville.  Much to my surprise, right in the middle of town, what appears to be a bank by Louis Sullivan.

No mistaking the ornament, both in their individual designs and how they ’strap’ the building.  However, having studied Sullivan in school and later while living in Chicago, while I was familiar with many of his late career bank designs, I had never heard of this one.  It is extremely similar in its long facade to the bank in Sidney, Ohio.

However, as you can see, the Poseyville bank is more of a shoe-box than a jewel box, simply repeating the long facade ornamentation to the main entry.  The individual ornamentations however are unmistakable:

Poseyville bank

Sidney bank

Well, it turns out the Poseyville bank is not a Sullivan work at all.  Rather, it is a knock-off, by Edward Thole, built in 1924 (documented in the excellent essay “The Banks and the Image of Progressive Banking” by Wim de Wit in Louis Sullivan, The Function of Ornament. ( I highly recommend this essay as it gives cultural context to the intentions of the architect and clients of the bank projects.  Rarely are the needs and desires of the engaged clients presented or discussed in architecture books)

Maybe the Indianapolis Terra Cotta Company had the molds available for use?

Sidney bank image from the website maintained by Mary Ann Sullivan:  http://www.bluffton.edu/~sullivanm/sidney/sidney.html

In any case, it is an interesting building and though not a Sullivan original, a commanding presence in the small town and a fascinating attempt to convey strength and security for a bank without resorting to the usual Greek temple forms.