What I've Learned
Insights on life and design from the Triangle Architectural Community

February 2010
DONALD REED CHANDLER (1931-)

Chandler was born in Morrisville NC and started at the NCSU School of Design in 1950.  Service with the Coast Guard and a few years off delayed his graduation until 1960 with a degree in architecture. Chandler was friends with Robert Burns and they both worked 1957-1958 for EJ Austin in Southern Pines NC.

Chandler moved to New York City where he worked for Skidmore Owings and Merrill. In 1962 he relocated to Washington DC, where he worked for Chloethiel Woodard Smith and later Mariani and Associates.  In 1968 he opened his own office in McLean, Virginia. After his first wife passed away in the early 1980's, Chandler founded, directed and taught at the Spectra School of Design in Flint Hill, Virginia, of which Henry Kamphoefner, Duncan Stewart, and Horatio Caminos were on the Board of Advisors.  This noble, experiential school where design students learned self-awareness in an open curriculum format lasted three years.  Details on Spectra:  pages one, two, three, four, five.  Chandler maintained an office in Northern Virginia until he moved with wife Denise in 2001 to Rappahannock County in the Blue Ridge Mountains.  He actively practices architecture from a studio in Washington VA.

What I've Learned:

The people who lived where I grew up in rural North Carolina were my first teachers and the ones who mattered most. They were straightforward, truthful and did the best with what they had. Their principles influence everything I do.

I learned more from building houses with my father than I did from my academic education, but it was a high school teacher who forever changed the course of my life. She saw my love of drawing and that I enjoyed carpentry and suggested that I enroll in NC State’s School of Design.

It was there that Professors Duncan Stewart and Horatio Caminos were most inspiring, teaching me to “expand my vision and to always see the big picture.” They wanted students to understand the relationship of buildings to the far-reaching physical surroundings and their influence on society, not just to the client.

In a career that spans over 50 years, I’ve learned that creating is timeless. At age 79, I am designing three significant residences for clients. Homes are still my first love. I enjoy developing close personal relationships with my clients and thrive on knowing that some believe that I have enhanced their lives.

I learned:

A college degree in architecture does not provide students with enough knowledge to practice residential architecture. If at all possible, they should be a client for themselves first; obtain a site, acquire financing, be the contractor, and with their hands help build a house of their own. Frank Lloyd Wright taught his students to design and build their shelter, work the fields, tend their gardens, quarry the stone, cut the trees etc. A true “hands on education”.

I learned:

Architects affect people with the houses they create for them. They are responsible for a large portion of their clients’ lives. I feel the clients’ needs should be the driving force, not the architect’s ego.

I learned:

Good architecture should be simple, understandable and guided by use and honest principal. The same applies to designing a log cabin, Falling Water or the Taj Mahal.

For me, The Vietnam Memorial in Washington, D.C., by student Maya Lin, is one of the best examples of simplicity, strength and beauty. (How the design got past the politicians is a miracle to me). The monument is as close to nothing as could be created, and yet allows visitors to learn, feel, laugh, cry, remember and maybe go home healed. Architecture students should spend time observing the interaction of people with the memorial. It indicates what architecture can do. It is still the most visited memorial in the United States. 

I learned:

The tighter the valid restrictions, the better the architecture. One of the most exciting and challenging homes I’ve designed was dictated by the existing conditions of a small California site near Yosemite: Code requirements, earthquake protection, an extremely narrow building envelop on a fault within a flood plain, and a snow load of 125 pounds per foot! And I still was able to take advantage of a fantastic view of a beautiful 12,000’ waterfall.

I learned:

Houses that don’t relate to the environment and surrounding community are houses that you can look at but can’t become a part of. I designed, built and live in a simple, mostly glass house with a beautiful panoramic view of the Blue Ridge Mountains. The house is of little importance when compared to the surroundings. The design allows my family and I to be part of the exceptional beauty and serenity all around us.

I learned:

If the architecture is a “style”, such as Georgian, Colonial, Modern, Contemporary, etc., it obviously has been done before. If it is “organic”, like nature, it will be new every time and relate to the existing conditions.

Early on I learned to let principle, not “style” become my mantra. Some times I ignored this philosophy and designed some houses of which I am not proud. I have spent the money I made but unfortunately the disappointing houses are still standing for everyone to see!

Like all styles, The Bauhaus movement of the 30s was a revolution that turned into a style with no place to go. Frank Lloyd Wright’s architecture is organic, a progressive evolution, always changing and growing.

As you can tell, I’ve learned from and am greatly influenced by Frank Lloyd Wright.

I learned:

“Beauty is only skin deep” applies to architecture as well as people. At this time, when we look at a house we see only about 15 to 20 percent of the true cost. With continuing technology, we will see even less!

I learned:

Artificial building materials really upset me, including fake stone, phony plastic siding and compounds made to look like wood for floors, etc. It’s like a plastic flower without the aroma and it is dishonest. I just don’t like being lied to.

I learned:  

I’d rather use the term “respect for our environment” than the shallow term “green.”

I learned:

I am not and never will be an intellectual. I would rather create it than dream about it or talk about it.

I learned:

To love residential architecture.

To like doing public-use buildings.

To dislike working with developers.

I learned:

I don’t like being part of any organized group. I briefly belonged to the “American Institute of Architects” and won some awards. But I soon realized that these architects design for acceptance and accolades from the other members. I’d rather have approval of one client than all the AIA members put together.

I have not learned

To keep my mouth shut!

December 2009
FREDRICK STEWART

North Carolina native Fredrick Stewart was educated at the NCSU School of Design and at Boston Architectural Center. Prior to starting Fredrick Stewart Architecture in 1987, he worked for architects and interior designers in San Diego, Boston, New York, and Hager Smith Huffman in Raleigh. In 2000, he moved his office from Raleigh to Efland.  He designed expansions for Chapel Hill's Southern Season in Eastgate Shopping Center as well as extensive renovations to their flagship store in University Mall.

1.  Architecture is design, not art.  As designer, the architect must stick to problem-solving.  The pursuit of art must be saved for one’s own dreams.

2.  The most important ingredient of good architecture is figuring out what the problem (program) is.  The better and more accurately the program is defined and the more it remains the guide, the better the building. 

3.  A well-defined program results from combining the things a client requires, the things the site requires and the things the architect knows a good building must possess.  No one of these should be allowed to dominate the other two.

4.  Identifying and developing a big idea from the program brings logic to the process and substance to the result.

5.  The process of good design is not linear.  It requires flexible, essentially simultaneous, checking of the progress with the three main ingredients of the program: client, site and the architect’s own database of tools.

6.  It is important to bring both humility and strength of conviction to every project.  Every client is different, but they all want their desires to be met and they want to believe their architect has the ability to exceed their desires.  An architect must meet the client’s requirements, but remain the leader of the process.

7.  Keeping structure evident is the easiest way to instill order and visual logic to a building.

8.  For most buildings, the most important non-functional quality an architect can imbue in a building is serenity.  This will be different for every client and can result from a number of attributes: lack of visual clutter, limited palette of materials and colors, rhythmic repetition of structural and other elements, skillful use of natural daylighting, a clear and ordered layout.

9.  There need to be enough orientational cues in a building to empower the visitor to understand it early without undermining the delight that comes from surprise or sequence.

10.  The most elegant buildings result from rigorously adhering to the well-defined problem and finding the simplest way to solve it.

September 2009
BRYAN BELL, JR., AIA

I am in awe of the talent we have in this region. Kenneth Hobgood, Frank Harmon, David Hill, Ellen Weinstein, Dale Dixon, Victoria Ballard Bell, and Fred Belladin are a few of the many.  I think Phil Szostak’s house, designed for his family, is the ideal of a beautifully designed home.  There are many things shared among the work of these designers that we can find in the best designs nationally, and we could fairly call these Modernism.  But I think what we should also appreciate is what these designers, all very tied to our home here, have to say about the Triangle in their work as well. This is a clarification of our own culture we that should all consider and we should all appreciate.  When this is defined, I think the most important local jobs will no longer go to designers not from this region (as they often do). Some clients don’t really understand the talent here or the reason this talent is the best choice for these most important jobs. Just like Steven Holl designing for Berlin, they can’t understand what it means to build here as well as these great designers do who live here. To better define what makes design in the Triangle special is a good challenge. While we recognize the best Modern qualities in much local work, it is what they also have of the regional that makes them exceptional.

---

August 2009
BRIAN SHAWCROFT, AIA

Brian Shawcroft finished his Masters in Architecture at MIT and Harvard University in 1960. From that date until 1968 he was an associate professor of architecture at the NCSU School of Design. In the early 1960's his firm was Shawcroft, Burns, and Kahn.  In 1968, he joined with Dan MacMillan to form MacMillan, MacMillan, Shawcroft and Thames which broke up in 1970. With Clay Taylor, he then established the firm Shawcroft-Taylor in 1971. From the 1970's through the late 1990's, he designed almost all of the modernist house inventory in the Triangle.  In 1991, Shawcroft was awarded the Henry Kamphoefner Prize.

I knew I wanted to be an architect at age 16, on leaving high school in 1945, they were still knocking buildings down with V2’s.   I was misdirected into the profession of quantity surveying.  I started work on war damage – and learned that it was non-creative and that whatever the good cause, people will cheat, (such as) fictitious lists of employees submitted by contractors to be paid by the government.

Started in City Planning with the London County Council’s County of London Plan  created at the height of the war in 1943 – excited that we were going to rebuild London.   But it was 17 years before any work began on a 50-acre road roundabout project at the Elephant and Castle.   Learned that I didn’t have the patience to be a city planner.  Fortunately, I had a good boss who encouraged me to register in architecture school.   Was draftable so went into the Army – sent to Germany and saw the results of bombing of major cities far worse than London.   Learned to reject the concept of war in any form as a means of solving differences. 

On leaving the service, attended a lecture on goals in life.  If you aim for the top you might make it halfway, but if you aim only for halfway, you will not even get a quarter of the way.

Came out with new attitude to excel in architecture school.   Started work in London with a well-known firm and took a course in creative photography at the Central School of Arts and Crafts.  Worked with an architect who had visited the United States and attended Harvard School of Design.   Tried to get a visa to the US but ended up in Canada instead.  Spent three very productive years in Toronto, both as an architect and a photographer for the Canadian Architect magazine.

Approaching 30 years’ old, remembered I wanted to go to graduate school; was accepted at both Yale and MIT (which I attended) and took landscape design at Harvard.   Worked for Eduardo Catalano who recommended me to Henry Kamphoefner to come to Raleigh to teach at the School of Design.  Formed a partnership with Bob Burns and did several houses together before he went to MIT.

Formed other partnerships, the most successful being with Clay Taylor, a former student, which lasted for 17 years.  It was a good symbiotic working relationship comprising a synergy of different skills. 

When the first energy crunch came in 1973, spent three years on a study of passive energy design using computer modeling techniques to produce some approaches to design through performance and not prescription, like the engineering approach that would be incorporated in the building codes.  I hoped that this would be a new start for modern architecture with a valid purpose, but we got post-modernism instead.

Thirty years later, we now have “rediscovered” energy design methodology and we call it “green architecture,” so that we are now judging buildings by a numbering system, not aesthetics or enjoyment.  While working in the field of commercial buildings, I learned from John Portman that if you invest in the project financially, even at a modest level, you gain design control. 

During my time connected with the School of Design and the support of the local profession, my time in the Triangle, which is reaching 50 years, has been very rich and rewarding.

---

July 2009
CHARLES HOLDEN

Charles Holden graduated from NCSU with a Bachelor of Arts in Philosophy, a Bachelor of Environmental Design in Architecture, and a Bachelor of Architecture Degree, Cum Laude.  Between 1994 and 2003, Charles worked with Frank Harmon, contributing to over fifty projects and many award-winning buildings, including the the Penland School of Crafts Iron Studio. Notable projects from this period included renovations and additions to a unique Byron Franklin house in New Bern NC.  Holden left Harmon to start Tonic Design with Shelley Gruendler and, later, Tonic Construction with Vincent Petrarca.  While at Tonic from 2003-2006, he was involved in the design of both the McCowan and Chiles Residences, the latter recognized with a 2006 AIANC Honor Award.  Holden runs two firms, Oxide Architecture for design and Oxide Structure for construction. 

Notes from What I Have Learned, Oxide Points (40123):  Charles Holden, Architect-Builder, year 37, late July

Long before choosing architecture as a profession, I learned from Tolstoy’s use of  “fatherland” in War and Peace, the importance of context; the influence of both the “matter” in and around us and the “patterns” that drive and are driven by us.  For me, this duality is mother and father – mater and pater – of architecture, of life.

The Bauhaus inspired curriculum of site, structure, and culture at North Carolina State University’s (then) School of Design reinforced this appreciation for context (as well as the act and art building). This extended my childhood experience among North Carolina swamps, creeks, forests, and beaches; fecund places for man and nature, my “motherland.”  Floods, fires, hurricanes, and time reveal architecture that weathers; natural forces highlight essential materials and their generative power. My mother asked our Cub Scout troop to frame one square foot of earth and record what we saw. The diversity reflected that of the larger world.  Alternately, the railroad trestles we glided past in the sluggish tannic waters of my father’s canoe trips hinted at the extension of manmade lines into the raw landscape, but now only an archeological shadow of its former activity. Objects now returned to nature, just as Camile Paglia’s Sexual Personae argued that man could never be separate from nature:  the ebb and flow of fluid, epigeal feminine forces and visual, ethereal masculine forces, rarely in noticeable balance, defining cultures over centuries. Whether in larger or more delicate scales, these forces shape modernism and equally, its popularity and obscurity.

But like those old railroad rails, good form, material, and spirit outlive the functions, economies, and inspiration that generate them. Good projects weather a change of owner with grace. Periodically I mentally apply a "salvage test". I imagine what in a design might survive an untimely death of the architect, an unfortunate change of client, or an arbitrary cause to demolish the building soon after construction. Within seconds, shortcomings are highlighted, especially regarding the professional context and social value of the work.

Through Priya Hemenway’s Divine Proportion, I discovered that geometry was first conceived and taught without numbers.  Conception – through lines and drawings for clients – is a consequence of reflection, bearing fertile duality; the joys and pains of birth.  But that architecture depends on the particulars of that place, that spot of earth. To this we must adopt materials and forms that bring substance and honor to the space and its denizens. Yet the architectural thread that binds structure to place, the basis of its integrity, is generated by the passions and dreams and needs of the client.

It must be fun!  A colleague, Christopher Newton, once described a building that we hoped to build as a “cool-ass fort”. This evokes an important business model taught by Frank Harmon: “do good work, have fun, and stay in business.”  You can improvise and demonstrate your virtuosity, but it must support and complement what is around it, and who occupies it.  And it should be built to endure, enhancing in value through care and nurture; never disposable.  Under the tutelage of Elizabeth Lee, I learned not only how to hold a pencil, but the importance of simple pleasures and needs in architectural design.  Christopher Alexander and others express this beautifully in their book, A Pattern Language.  But building a house, especially for couples, engenders enormous stresses analogous to marriage, divorce, or death.  Clients, such as Bill and Meta Ellington, have confided that had they known the challenges they might not have built, but in hindsight, cannot imagine not making their dreams concrete. Success like theirs most often follows clients who bring their own images – however inchoate and piecemeal on scraps of paper, pictures from books, old photos – to the creative process.

We modernists are not alone and we are evolving.  Our success is the result of paying attention to our mater and pater, to our context and client’s dream, and in so doing, the sustainable modern movement is poised to address many of the economic and social challenges that have hindered classic modernism for a century or more.

---

April 2009
FRANK HARMON, FAIA

Born in Georgia, Frank Harmon went to NCSU's School of Design and moved to London to study at the Architectural Association School of Architecture.  He interned briefly with Edward Loewenstein 1963-1964.  Harmon returned to the US in 1970 and worked for Richard Meier for three years.  After working again in London for six years, he founded his own firm in Raleigh in 1981.  Harmon also taught at the School of Design.   For many years he taught an adult education course in Raleigh called "The Design of Your Home."  He was very close to Harwell Hamilton Harris.  Since 1992, Harmon’s firm, Frank Harmon Architect PA, has won more AIA Design Awards than any firm in North Carolina. In 1995 he was awarded the Henry Kamphoefner Prize.  In early 2008, he won the design competition for the AIANC headquarters.  

The single most important decision an architect makes is how to place a building on its site. Orientation to the sun, cross-ventilation, hydrology, aspect and prospect are all determined by this single decision. This is why we team with a landscape architect on all of our projects from the beginning. All good buildings begin with the land.

Orientation (for sunlight and cross-ventilation) and the “bones” of a building (shape and structure) account for 80 percent of the “green” elements of a building. It is a common misconception that relatively exotic systems, such as photovoltaics, geothermal ground-coupled heat pumps, and vegetated roofs, make a building “green.” In truth, the fundamentals of orientation and massing contribute far more to a building’s sustainability than any high-tech system.

Let the good air in. Whether the project is a 30,000-square-foot visitors center or a garden room, we design our buildings for natural cross-ventilation and as much daylight as we can afford.

Bring natural light into every room from two sides, preferably three. Light from many sides creates an even, dispersed illumination ideal for reading, working and other tasks, but most importantly for good communication. Communication is not only conducted with words and voice but with facial and body expression. Good light makes good relationships.

One of the great challenges for our residential clients is to ask for what they really want. As children we ask for what we want, but later in life we become more shy and circumspect. Thus, clients find it easier to ask for what they think someone else would like – their parents, for example – or for the hypothetical “resale.” Then they wind up getting a house for someone else.

One of our favorite questions for a residential client is: What was your favorite space as a child and how did it make you feel? Then we begin to design their answer. One client grew up in a large, boisterous family and his favorite place was under the stairs where he could be by himself yet in touch with others. We designed a house for him with small, cozy rooms that opened into each other and outside to small garden rooms.

We encourage our clients to think “smaller and better” in quality rather than “big” and “good.”

Of the three variables in any project – cost, size and quality – the client gets to choose two. The architect gets to play with the third. For example, if a client determines budget and size, the architect can control quality.

We tell our clients that the quality of a building is like food: Food may be good, cheap, and fast but not all three. You can choose two – good and fast, for example – but it won’t be cheap.

Privacy and openness are not mutually exclusive.

Most of the big ideas for our projects arise from small ideas, such as how to give children many corners in which to play in a nursery…how to give every employee in a large office building a view over a wooded creek…how to protect the windows of a house from a hurricane…

The buildings I learn the most from now are built by farmers or mechanics who don’t know they are architects.  Wallace Stevens observed that poetry is language without the unnecessary words. The humble buildings in our landscape – barns, cabins, sheds and gardens – that are built from instinct, are like poetry.

Broad roof overhangs protect the windows, walls and foundations below, provide shade, and create a sense of shelter.

Wherever possible, use materials in their natural state: polished concrete, galvanized iron, brick and stone. Unpainted wood siding, properly detailed, will last 100 years and weather beautifully. I have visited wood-shingled beach cottages at Nags Head that are over 100 years old and are good to go for another century.

In our climate, porches, terraces and outdoor rooms are a gift of nature. In spring and fall, our weather is like that of Southern California -- without the earthquakes! Outdoor spaces convenient to a house or a workplace extend the indoors to outdoors at relatively little cost. And there is hardly a week in the year, including winter, when there isn’t at least one good day to sit outside and enjoy the sun.

Before 1940, all buildings were sustainable. They had to be. There was no such thing as air-conditioning. People sat on porches and talked in the evenings, enjoying the prevailing breezes. Natural building materials, like wood and brick, came from nearby. Few architects can build as sustainably today as a farmer who built his house and barn in 1920. He built them a certain way because he had to – because the health of his family depended upon it.

For the young architect, foreign travel can be transforming. In our native country, preconceptions and the many layers of meanings we take for granted often keep us from seeing clearly.  We see what we are accustomed to see. When we travel abroad, preconception is scraped way. (Travel abroad also allows us to more fully appreciate where we live.) We look with fresh eyes. Le Corbusier’s only school of architecture was travel in Europe and the Near East. Brian McKay Lyons lived and studied in Italy and Japan before starting his practice in Nova Scotia. Glenn Murcutt spent his early years in London and, since then, has traveled extensively. When I visited Chaco Canyon with him in New Mexico, he, an Australian architect, led the tour!

There is more wisdom in African-American gardens and yards in the rural South than in a million McMansions.

 

---

March 2009
JOHN REESE, AIA

Reese worked with Pei Cobb Freed and Partners in New York and Kevin Roche John Dinkeloo Associates in New Haven, Connecticut.  After moving to Raleigh, he worked with Clearscapes PA and now is at Duda/Paine.  Reese currently serves as an Adjunct Professor of Architectural Design at NCSU and has held academic positions with University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and Oklahoma State University.

 

---

October 2008
CHARLES WOODALL, AIA

Woodall attended the NCSU School of Design then worked for three years with John Latimer.  He then went into business with his college roommate George Smart to form Smart Woodall.  Max Isley joined later, as did Troy Herring, and the firm was called Smart Woodall Isley and Herring.  Woodall left in 1974 to join Alpha Design Group with Ron Collier. He has since retired but runs a limited practice out of Deep Run NC.

 

*  I learned at age 9, in 3rd grade, as a shy introverted country boy in a city school that when I drew my best "butter cup flower", 25 classmates circled around my desk -- I liked it !

*  Drawing opened unknown doors for me!

*  TO SEEK THE ULTIMATE TRUTH!

                                            in life

                                            in community

                                            in design.

*  THAT THE ULTIMATE TRUTH WILL ALWAYS BE JUST OUT OF YOUR REACH!

                                            in life

                                            in community

                                            in design.

*  TO DO THE BEST YOU CAN-- IN THE TIME YOU HAVE-- WITH THE MEANS THAT YOU HAVE--  AND MOVE UP !

                                            in life

                                            in community

                                            in design.

*  TO RECOGNIZE HUMAN SELFISH NATURE-- FOR SUCCESS-- SET THE STAGE TO NURTURE THE HUMAN SELFISH NEED!

                                            in life

                                            in community

                                            in design

*  THAT THE BEST IS YET TO BE!   

                                            in life

                                            in community

                                            in design. 

*  THAT'S IT!

---

September 2008
BILL WADDELL

After earning a BA in both Environmental Design and Architecture from NCSU, Bill Waddell worked with Jim Smith at Hager Smith Huffman in Raleigh and Arthur Cogswell in Chapel Hill.  He ran Sun Forest Architecture with Keith Brown for ten years then launched his own firm Distinctive Architecture.

 

1.    Even though a great many people in the Research Triangle region would like an architect’s involvement during the design a their new home or remodel, the time, effort and cost required to achieve this through traditional architectural practice techniques are daunting and off-putting.

2.    Except in unusual circumstances, the cost of building a custom home is above “market value” in comparison to the cost of similar-sized homes in speculative neighborhood developments. To counteract this requires the use of materials, details and methods replicated through the low-cost labor practices employed in the construction of speculative neighborhood developments.

3.    The pervasive market approach to establishing what homes are worth has created a default type of economic segregation. Neighborhoods built since World War II are assumed by banks and appraisers to have roughly the same value across the majority of their homes.

4.    Improving the quality of a home’s detailing, materials, fixtures, finishes, fittings appliances, etc. will increase its marketability (the desire by others to own it), but not its market value (what an appraiser says it is worth and what a bank is willing to loan to facilitate its purchase).

5.    Assuming a home is in reasonable shape and has a serviceable kitchen and baths, the primary thing that meaningfully increases its market value is to increase the amount of its conditioned living space.

6.    As architects, we sometimes lament that our wonderful design ideas are diminished or even ruined by clients and builders. Ultimately, this is an attempt at placing responsibility for the success of the design on someone other than ourselves. It can also be an indication that we have been designing for ourselves rather than for the client.

7.    An architect’s client has both a stated set of requirements and an implied set of requirements. The implied requirements are most often very difficult for the client to put into words, but are nonetheless essential to understand in order to provide a successful design solution. It takes probing questions, careful listening and an effective means of communicating what has been heard before an architect is likely to discover and articulate these requirements on the client’s behalf.

8.    A builder who, along with their preferred subcontractors and trades people, knows how to interpret construction documents and implement a home designed for a specific site and client is a true craftsman. This skill and professionalism merits a greater level of compensation than is typical for building speculative residential homes.

9.    Matching a custom home design to a contractor with a successful track record building similar projects is more likely to result in a successful construction project than is trying to find a builder who will commit to construct the design within the desired budget.

10.  When working with residential clients, it is generally best to present only one design for consideration - focusing first on the floor plan to ensure the functional and plan relationship requirements are met before exciting them with the beauty of the exterior.

11.  The more widely traveled and well-read a person, the more likely they are to be dissatisfied with the offerings within typical speculative neighborhoods.

12.  A well-trained architect with a gift for design can create a wonderful building of any type, but specializing in one or two types greatly increases the efficiency with which the process can proceed successfully.

13.  If a design meets the client’s requirements and does not require unusual amounts of maintenance, then it is a good building…whether anyone but the client likes it or not. If the aforementioned elements are achieved and a good many other people find the building to be enjoyable, then it is a really good building. If, in general, the building is well-liked by most people who experience it, then it is a GREAT building.

14.  There is as much art to organizing, marketing and running an architecture firm as there is to designing a GREAT building.

---

Jo Ewing was born and raised in Raleigh. She started designing houses in 1961.  She went to work for Bill Poole for about six months.  She worked for Ed Mogelnickie then for Howard Perry as a designer. She started her own business in 1970.  In 1996, she "retired" for 4 years to live on a boat with her husband Arnold.  In 2000, she returned and opened Jo Ewing Residential Design.  She still draws by hand.

1.  The first house plan I designed was for my 8th grade home economics class.

2.  My first two plans that were built was for a local builder. I used my own concepts: space, exterior design, and interior design.

3.  I designed houses for builders that were standard two story saleable sub-division houses.

4.  During this time I worked with a framing crew for one week to help me understand problems they encountered in the field with floor plans. I had to do the same work as the crew. They cut no slack for a woman.

5.  House plans have many integrated areas that can be overlooked, such as mechanical, plumbing, structural load points for the engineer to work from; the topo site so the house is designed to fit the land.

6.  My designs now are mostly custom which the most important thing is to have ability to listen to your client and put their lifestyle on paper, their dreams, children's areas, future implications that may include other family members; furniture space layout, orientation, which may include “Green” building features they would like include. Ask questions about routine daily life, morning to night.

7.  The final objective for the client's personal home for the enjoyment of the family the years, perhaps even passing the home to their children someday.

8.  If they are excited and happy with their plans that is what it is all about.

July 2008
KC RAMSAY

Ramsay grew up in Salisbury NC, the son of architect John Ramsay, FAIA.  They lived in a beautiful modernist house (the only one in town) that John Ramsay designed.  KC began taking photographs at 14 with a borrowed twin lens reflex camera. He processed and printed his own work throughout high school and college while working on the newspaper, yearbook and contributing to at least one book.  A Fine Arts major at UNC-Chapel Hill, he went on to earn an architectural degree from North Carolina State University and then set photography aside for a number of years to practice architecture and help raise a family. He worked with several firms including his dad's, O'Brien Atkins, Clearscapes, and Henningson Durham & Richardson.  He opened the Raleigh office of Flad and Associates, specializing in laboratory and scientific facilities, and became a national partner.  He retired from architecture in 2006.  His favorite and most memorable projects were for university clients. Having returned to photography full time, his work reflects his love of people of all ages and his fine arts training and experience. His studio is located in Raleigh.  "My goal is to create a visual record and help my subjects open a window into their true selves."

What I've learned…

Learning has more to do with listening and doing than thinking and talking.

You can start over, and probably should.

“… it is only with the heart that one can see rightly, what is essential is invisible to the eye." --Antoine de Saint-Exupery from The Little Prince

There is a force. I don’t know what it is or how it works, but we oppose it to our peril, and align with it to our unending joy.

There are a lot of parallels between the current business climate and white water rafting. I’ve written some of them down. Others I am still discovering.

Most of the rules are bullshit propagated by people who don’t want to “ever make THAT mistake again.” Where’s the fun in that?

I have too many books, and unlike Thomas Jefferson, I believe I CAN live without them.

We will survive even this President. I’m not sure how, but I know we will.

Most of us are addicted to something. Some of the things we are addicted to are more socially accepted than others. Some of our addictions are socially sanctioned, like compulsive working, compulsive house cleaning and compulsive care-giving. That fact that most everyone in the western world shares your addiction doesn’t mean it won’t eventually kill you after it ruins your life and all of your relationships.

Refined sugar and high fructose corn syrup should be controlled substances.  If you don’t think so, try giving them up cold turkey, and then staying “on the wagon” for 90 days. Have you EVER seen a study that suggests refined sugar is good for you? Red wine, yes. Refined sugar, no.

Elliot Jaques was a genius that most of the world has never heard of. Jerry Harvey is a genius, and a saint for exposing me to the work of Elliot Jaques.

The older I get the more I realize the importance of taking responsibility for everything, being honest first with yourself and then everyone else, and cleaning up your messes daily.

Preaching is only effective for 15 minutes on Sunday morning, if at all. Sharing your experience with someone who wants to hear it and is ready to hear it is valuable 24/7.

It is good to have a friend you can call every day at 5 o’clock.

---

June 2008
ELLEN L. WEINSTEIN, AIA

Ellen Weinstein is a partner with Dail Dixon in Dixon Weinstein Architects in Carrboro, North Carolina. The firm has received numerous design awards, been published in local, regional and national press and in 2003 received the North Carolina AIA Firm Award. A native of New York City, Ellen earned a bachelor’s degree in Landscape Architecture from Ohio State University and Master of Architecture from NC State in 1987. Ellen regularly teaches design studios at NC State and has also offered a short-course on small houses at Duke University. Active in the AIA, Ellen is currently President of the Triangle AIA.  In 1999, she received the highest design honor for mid-career North Carolina architects, the Kamphoefner Prize.

 

 

---

Born in Raleigh, Rice graduated from NCSU in 1941 with a BS in Architectural Engineering then served in WWII.  He worked for H. A. Underwood, Carter Williams, and Cooper and Maybin.  He left to go on his own for year, then rejoined what would now be called Cooper, Haskins, and Rice as a partner.  After Cooper's death the firm became Haskins & Rice, a partnership with Al Haskins that would last for decades.  Rice is known for many churches and schools in the area, One and Two Hannover Square, and the 1989 renovation of Memorial Auditorium.

Here are some of my thoughts about architecture:

• I particularly dislike architects who take all the credit for good designs when their associates or employees did all the designing.
   
• My pet peeve is having to take boring courses each year to maintain my architect’s license.  I learn little from these sessions.
   
• When I go into a house I have designed I usually feel like rearranging the furniture or throwing it out.
   
• In practice I never could find an electrical or mechanical engineer who could satisfy me. Some structural engineers were o.k., not all.
   
• I believe it is true that “he who copies from the most sources is the most original.”
   
• My admiration for Frank Lloyd Wright has been expensive for I have traveled to many places to see his projects and have bought a number of his furniture pieces for myself and my three sons.
   
• Although Henry Kamphoefner was a close friend of mine, I did not appreciate his calling us architects who graduated from NCSU before he formed the School of Design “Engineers.”  Only “Architectural Engineering” was available at NCSU prior to his becoming Dean. 

March 2008
THOMAS G. CROWDER, AIA

1.  I love the innocence of kids. For one thing, they assume that everybody else thinks the way they do, or they should.

2.  I was drawn to architecture not only by the art form, but also because of the way it can inspire you emotionally. It’s not two-dimensional or even three-dimensional. The power is the space within, which impacts your life and psyche. That’s the fourth dimension – space.

5.  You can build a legacy without having your own name attached to it. Raleigh was built by a lot of nameless, faceless people (to many of us, anyway) who made this the great community it is.

6.  Architects are artists, builders, problem-solvers…and psychiatrists…and sociologists. We have to get inside the heads of our clients, understand how they think, what they see, how they live, and then come up with the best possible solutions to meet their needs.  I love how we are able to learn so much about our fellow man and other professions. 

7.  Like any artist, we work for benefactors. Because of who they may be, I think our profession is often times intimidated to be outspoken on social issues. But part of our job is to educate them about the impacts of the choices they may make, and go out on a limb sometimes. That extends to the general public and the political arena.

8.  I’ve never subscribed to the notion that perfection is the enemy of the good. I say, strive to come up with the absolute best possible solutions given the challenges you’re given and the constraints and context you’re working in.  Why would you not?

9.  I think the true architects are the lawmakers and the politicians who design the framework for our communities, the country and the world. That’s what drew me into politics.  Who better to address our community’s and nation’s challenges than the problem-solvers?

10.  I do like politics. It’s not about fame and definitely not about fortune – if it were, I do not believe I would like myself.  It is about the soapbox, the chance to extend one’s influence by putting ideas and solutions regarding our future out there for the public to ponder.

11.  Great environments don’t have to be gold-plated, or vast, or elitist. Great environments are the ones that lift people up regardless of their economic circumstances. There is no shame in being poor, just allowing our poor to live in poor conditions.

12.  It’s interesting that economics are so foremost in our decisions. We often forget what drives economics – that beneath it all, there’s something important that’s sustaining any economy, and it’s our quality of life. I do think enough is enough. We used to pride ourselves in the South on getting along with our neighbors, bless their hearts.  In an agrarian society you must often depend on your neighbors for help on the farm.  Because of that codependence on each other, you were reverent and respectful of your neighbor’s feelings. I do worry about the increasing narcissism of the present day – we seem to be losing our sense of neighborliness.

13.  My strongest belief is that good design truly doesn’t cost more.  It costs less…in the long run.

14.  When Jefferson talked about life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, he was talking about individual liberty but also the pursuit of the common good,  Happiness was about living in a community and insuring our fellow man equal access to their happiness.

15.  I am very proud of my profession, because I think we do try to have a global vision, take a moral high road and address issues of sustainability and a social imperative.  We have a lot of work before us.