Tag: #herenow

#1

I have been off-line for a few years – navigating some rough waters (read: tragedy dragged me through an unimaginable darkness), however, ADUs and all things small dwellings remain my passion. And beauty and nature guided me into new work that is actually the work I came into architecture for.  (the story of my coming back from a tragedy to embrace work from its source is HERE)

Boulder has done another ADU update that went live in September 2023, making ADUs more available. You might remember that I used to provide in-person and online ADU information presentations. Today, though, I thought that I would return to my ADU platform from a different perspective, so rather than giving you the code requirements, I am going to share with you what I do when making an ADU by bringing you into my studio, as it were.

The insider story: An Interview

An ADU is a small house with all the same requirements of a big house, it needs to: fit into its site; be responsive to its local and regional conditions; accomplish the Owners’ goals – this means dreams, desires, and needs; and, not at all least or last, it needs to meet local codes.

I start all my projects with an interview meeting to make sure the Owners’ agenda matches the work I am interested in.  Yes, the work I am interested in. Post-tragedy, I no longer do any work that does not have the capacity to soar.  Life is far too precious to squander on side tracks. I got sidetracked for a number of years. There were even projects where we had to break up. But even those that did not work out taught me something. What I learned was that I must always include this preface, even, and especially, when the project appears to be simple and uncomplicated:

The architecture we make requires an authentic and rigorous approach from both the architect and the client; this agreement is entered into with this intent.

This statement sets the atmosphere. We are here to work in an intentional and meaningful manner and we are here to give it our full attention. The culture has shifted in the decades I have practiced architecture. Clients come with SKETCHUP and Internet design-surfing skills. Used to be they came with loads of pictures they had cut from magazines. We meet where they are at. But here is the thing, I have a 5-year professional Bachelor of Architecture degree including studies in Mexico City where I got to study and meet the famed international minimalist architect, Luis Barragan. Then I studied at the prestigious SCI Arc (Southern California Institute of Architecture), taking a semester in Europe with the illustrious founder, Ray Kappe, where we gained access to all the master architects’ studios in Europe as Ray’s reputation preceded us. SCI Arc granted me a Master of Architecture. I am a consummate learner, keeping current with the highest performing building systems and most intelligent building materials, and am constantly growing a highly skilled team. My building system, Poche_Truss, has a patent pending. However, the accomplishment that I am most in awe of remains the fact that I am a published poet with two lines of poetry that were published in UA’s monthly magazine in the 1970’s. I was unabashedly capable of exposing my true self.

The point of bringing all this up? Trust. If we are going to work together, we have to trust each other. Trust is something that seems to have gone out of fashion as everyone can second guess anyone including their medical doctor given the vast highway of Internet information. I am a fan of dialogue, after all it is YOUR house. But don’t forget the path that got me on this side of the table. Making Architecture is like slow food, it takes time to settle and have effect. At the end of the day, however, you will get ever so much more than a good building.

I was on a long walk with a group recently and I found myself walking with a woman who had recently completed a house boat project where she and her husband now lived. When she asked me about my work, an audaciously clear answer came forth: I am interested in the magical mystical qualities of space, this is where the person living in the house gets to feel so alive.

Oooooh she sighed, I wish our architect had offered that. We got a perfectly fine house but… what you offer was never on the table…

The resonance between me and the client will reveal itself at the initial interview. Making the powerful kind of architecture that I am interested in is a true team effort. Not every project is ready for deep collaboration toward manifesting the goals. But if it is, I am prepared to offer an Agreement with the forward: The architecture we make requires an authentic and rigorous approach from both the architect and the client; this agreement is entered into with this intent.

#2 The insider story: what are your goals:  needs…desires…dreams?

I have a spreadsheet (of course I do, right??) whose purpose is to make space for the needs and desires of your goals to be programmed and their use to be dreamed.  It is a matter of provoking the conversations to come through your mind and also your heart. We often risk articulating needs and desires through a lens of consumption: can my bathroom look like the one in Dwell? Or that I imagine while walking down the aisles at Crate and Barrel?

Instead of something like this: I need a shower, (never take a bath even though they always look so peacefully serene sitting next to a wall length of glass with daylight pouring through)… I need a lavatory and toilet…(a bidet? what is that?).  Needs are usually established with fixtures or appliances and dimensions of space. In a bathroom this might look like a lavatory, shower, toilet and the space to use them, they are quantifiable. Once the needs are laid out, the conversation moves to consider desires such as: would you like a sauna or maybe a dressing area or how about a green wall of plants? These are things that require articulation as well and expand or build on the capacity of the needs but they go beyond the fundamentals.

Then we arrive at what makes life interesting – dreams: how do you want to feel in the space? How is the space going to influence your state of being? This is a bold notion to be sure, but think about how, as you go through your days, where walking across a park or riding your bike alongside traffic changes your emotion. If even for a moment. Our emotional body reacts. So consider what you want to experience as you groom as simply stretching into that emotional body experience. My go-to strategy to engage this begins with…in a perfect world…then your heart opens up and imagination flows as you propose that your bathroom is, in a garden!…maybe you step outdoors to shower?…and there is lots of daylight, even sunshine, alternately you might be thinking of it as a sanctuary as it might be the one place you can go to be alone. We inhabit our spaces uniquely and although the fixtures may be identical, not every bathroom has the same dream.  

If we are working toward obtaining a project where the magical mystical qualities of space resound and you get to feel so alive, the dream needs to speak. This is not linear information, however, and giving it space with words on a spreadsheet requires enhancement through intuitive input so I often scribble in an image or maybe a line of poetry. The qualities of a dream arise from the intersection of physical space and the supple essences of light and shadow and color and senses, not quantifiable but poetic. I have been bringing information back from this intersection my entire career, decades in however, the process of getting something built wore down the translucency of this dimension and it took a tragedy to shake me back to this source. We all have this beautifully persistent tether to life, it might send a shiver up our spine or draw a wee smile into our cheek but conscious or not, our body connects.   

I was considering a situation one day recently where I realized that I was tired of looking with my eyes and hearing with my ears and instead wondered: what does my heart see and hear? In that moment I looked out my window at the tall grasses from last years’ growth standing above the vinca patch and my eyes recognized that they should have been trimmed back months ago and I began feeling urgency to get that chore done. STOP, what if I asked my heart to look at those same grasses? Without changing anything else, here is what came forth: I now saw tall yellow stems whose fluffy heads were swaying without a care in the world as the frigid wind blew them to and fro. They were elegant and joyful and a smile came as I suddenly felt quite blessed to have this beauty in my winter yard. Minutes. These two scenes were minutes apart with only the means of engaging changing. I made a little move that shifted my relationship to the present moment from my thinking mind to my heart. This is how the information on those spreadsheets gets expanded, and as we consider how to engage the heart, something in your dream begins to inform value.

I hear you say a bathroom in a garden and my heart begins to see mottled light. Or you seek refuge and my heart begins to feel shelter. I cannot know these things before we have the Goals conversation for even if I have worked on dozens and dozens of bathrooms with the same fixtures, they are not your bathroom for they do not have your dream values.

How many self-help or feel good books have your read? Hearing about a non-linear process or even getting detailed instruction often times does not yield satisfying results. I had a daily yoga practice for almost 2 years before I found myself in that non-thinking state with my body easily folded completely over. I was quietly startled: this is yoga – union of body and mind! That very thing – an instantaneous and always remarkable moment of being aligned – is what happens when we step into the intersection of physical space and the subtle. I practice this as it is what keeps me passionately invested in this work. Not every architect knows how to bring back the clues from this intersection and I have found that inspiring as this process sounds, it also requires a willingness on your part to expose your story. Hence, trust. Not everyone is ready to do that. But if you are, I am prepared to take that journey with you under the watchful eye of our forward: The architecture we make requires an authentic and rigorous approach from both the architect and the client; this agreement is entered into with this intent.