TRANSCRIPT

00;00;00;00 - 00;00;05;16

Doug Patt (DP)

Let's go inside the vault. The design vault.

00;00;05;19 - 00;00;34;08

Todd Poisson (TP)

They wanted to expand the building, and a vertical expansion is taboo for individual landmarks. So, in order to get them any significant square footage additions up there, we wanted to go bold. Why not propose a more robust, bold roof scape? And given the history of Chief Tamanend being the namesake of Tammany and with this desire to really honor the Lenape, why not be inspired by the Lenape's origin story of a rising turtle coming out of the water, shedding water?

00;00;34;11 - 00;03;33;28

DP

This is my guest, Todd Poisson. I'll share more about him shortly. In this episode from the Design Vault, we’ll highlight Todd's project, 44 Union Square.

44 Union Square sits at the northeast corner of Union Square Park in Manhattan. The project includes a remarkable contemporary steel and glass dome addition to the storied landmark building on Union Square's northeast corner for Redding International Ink.

The new building expands the usable square footage of the historic building and adds an iconic anchor to Union Square. The building's former life was as the last headquarters for the political machine, Tammany Hall, an American organization founded in 1786, famous for controlling New York City and state politics for a time.

The restoration and expansion of the building includes preserving two facades, new bronze storefronts in the likeness of the original 1928 design and a three-story rooftop addition. This wild steel and glass building cap is composed of a self-supporting free form shell grid dome atop a reconstructed hipped roof with gray terracotta sunshades.

If you're wondering, the New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission unanimously approved this incredibly creative design.

Hi, I'm Doug Pat and this is Design Vault.

Today we're talking to Todd Poisson. Todd received his Bachelor of Architecture degree from Cornell University. He became a partner at BKSK in 2007 and has over 30 years of experience in the architecture profession. Todd has been responsible for the design and construction of some of the firm's most ambitious projects, ranging between residential mixed use and institutional works. Recent award-winning projects include the Gansevoort Row redevelopment for Aurora Capital and 44 Union Square, which we'll discuss today.

Other notable recent projects of Todd's are 200 East 21st Street, a 20 story, highly sustainable residential tower in Gramercy for Alpha Development and 470 Columbus, a passive house, multifamily development on the Upper West Side for the Rowe Corporation. Todd is currently a volunteer with the American Youth Soccer Organization and a long-term coach of regional athletic leagues.

In addition, Todd is a lecturer and volunteer interviewer for Cornell University's College of Architecture, Art, and Planning. So welcome, Todd. Nice to have you with us today.

We're going to talk about 44 Union Square. But before we do, I should mention that we recently interviewed one of Todd's peers at BKSK, David Kubik. He told us a bit about the firm. But for those who haven't listened to that episode, tell us a little bit about BKSK in New York City. Where are you guys located? What's the size of the firm and what type of work do you do?

00;03;34;01 - 00;04;31;07

TP

Sure. So, thank you for having me. BKSK Architects is headquartered in New York City in Manhattan, not too far away from your center here on West 38th Street in the garment center of Manhattan. We've been in business since 1985 celebrating 38 years. David and I are kind of second-generation partners. We've been in business about 38 years. We have over 200 built projects. David and I both joined the firm about 20 years ago plus and were made partners about the same time.

BKSK specializes in many things. We like to say if you know New York, you know our work. Our work is kind of separated between, generally speaking, cultural, institutional work, libraries, religious structures, parks, and commercial buildings and residential buildings. Residential projects ranging from new condominium buildings, towers or private residential projects, combining units or renovating someone's home.

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DP

Do you guys do residential projects outside of New York City?

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TP

We do. In fact, we have a little annex office out in Oklahoma City that we had so much Midwest work. Now we have private residential projects, upstate New York and in Connecticut and in New Jersey.

00;04;45;23 - 00;04;53;11

DP

So, tell us a little bit about yourself. How did you end up at BKSK? How long have you been there – I believe you just said that. What's your role in the office?

00;04;53;13 - 00;05;49;13

TP

Well, I joined back in 1998. So, 25 years ago I answered a New York Times wanted ad – remember those, actually where you had to get the newspaper Saturday, the Sunday paper? You got to subscribe to get them a day early to rifle through the want ads. And I answered a want ad for a project manager at an architecture firm called Burns, Kendall, Schieferdecker, with this crazy name. I thought it was a law firm. Back then there was no websites. You couldn't look up the firms. You had to go to these places, and you'd open the front door and you'd be disappointed but had to sit through the interviews to see what kind of work they did.

But the moment I met George Schieferdecker – he interviewed me 25 years ago, he's still there, one of the founding partners – knew immediately that I had found the mothership. You know, these guys knew each other from school way back. They were so intellectual. They all had lives outside the office. This was not a sweatshop kind of architecture firm that one sometimes encounters. And I've just had just a great time with them.

00;05;49;16 - 00;06;05;23

DP

It's funny, when you were saying that, all these awful memories started flooding in of making one phone call after another and going through the phone book and then showing up and knowing nothing about the work of that architect, and endless interviews. So where were you working before BKSK?

00;06;05;25 - 00;06;23;21

TP

I was here in Manhattan already. I was working for Stephen Jacobs Group, an architect who specialized, at the time, in new construction residential work. So, I really cut my teeth as a young architect in the field, hardcore development construction experience in Manhattan, which has paid off a great deal.

00;06;23;24 - 00;06;28;20

DP

So now you're partners. So, what's your role like now? Has it changed significantly?

00;06;28;22 - 00;07;48;02

TP

Sure. So over time, our roles change as partners as we grow in the firm. David and I and Julie Nelson, the other second-generation partner. Julie, David, and I really grew up there and our roles have evolved from being in the trenches and drawing every line and every detail for projects that get built. Lucky for us, our sites tend to be in Manhattan.

We're also a little bit regional. We have some work in New Jersey and Philadelphia and Connecticut, but still about 80% in Manhattan. So, we are very lucky. We could visit sites very easily to get hands on experience. And so, our roles really evolved quickly into project management, into client facing roles, consultant coordination, field work. When we were promoted to partners, our roles shift gradually into more finding work, finding new work, finding repeat clients, developing those relationships to continue getting new projects, setting the design direction for new projects, and then just kind of being the face of the project.

We pride ourselves to being involved with every phase of design as partners. We don't just disappear after landing a new project. We really stay involved in the trenches at meetings. I just came from a mechanical coordination meeting for a new hotel project we're doing. I really love that stuff. I really love the details – love the field work as well as the design and the client facing opportunities.

00;07;48;04 - 00;07;51;00

DP

I'm curious how big was BKSK when you joined them?

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TP

So, they were about 15 people, I think, in 1998.

00;07;54;12 - 00;07;55;15

DP

And now you're 50.

00;07;55;15 - 00;07;57;19

TP

We're about 50, 52 people. Yes.

00;07;57;26 - 00;08;03;24

DP

Interesting. I love the field stuff, too. I love the people stuff. It's just the best part of the job.

00;08;03;26 - 00;08;21;19

TP

The soap opera arcs during it, like a seven, eight year project are just terrific. We refer to them at project meetings or say previously on this project in season two, you might recall that the elevator consultant said the opposite of what you just said. Like years later, it's a way to keep things light at these construction meetings.

00;08;21;23 - 00;08;22;20

DP

That is really funny.

00;08;23;04 - 00;08;43;02

TP

We try to keep it light and funny, and the construction industry has changed a great deal, as you could imagine, along with everything else. But in the last 35 years since I've been working, you know, sites are tech savvy. It seems to be it's a much more civilized kind of operation, and there's opportunities to really develop great relationships with the builders and consultants.

00;08;43;09 - 00;08;50;28

DP

Great insight. Totally true. So, let's dig in here and talk about the building. Tell us about 44 Union Square. So how did your office get the project?

00;08;51;00 - 00;17;44;06

TP

So back in 2012, the phone rang. It was Michael Buckley calling from Edifice Real Estate Partners. He invited us – because of our strength of our record of getting very challenging approvals through the Landmark Commission of New York City – invited us to join, I think it was a group of five firms that competed in a competition that lasted a month of design work, and then we each presented our work to the owner, Margaret Cotter of Redding International that month.

The design happened to coincide with when Hurricane Sandy hit Manhattan. So, our office, like many offices in Lower Manhattan, lost power. So, I brought the competition work home with me, and at the time I had a five-year-old daughter, and she sat in my lap, and we drew together. It really resonates with me to this day because fast forward ten years and there we were finishing the project during a global pandemic where we all had to work from home again. So, this project really bookended two kind of catastrophes in New York City, starting with Hurricane Sandy, working from home and then ending with the pandemic and closing out the project in 2020, using my daughter's big scooter to scoot down to Union Square. During the height of the pandemic, as work was finishing up.

So anyway, Michael invited BKSK to join this limited design competition. I dived into the history of the building. We're all students of history. We feel that every project, even if it's not a landmark project, has its history, has context to learn from. And immediately I learned the story of Tammany Hall that was different from what we're all taught in school, at least in the Northeast. We're taught that Tammany Hall is synonymous with greed and corruption and graft. And while that's all true, Tammany Hall is not named after an Irish politician of the 19th century, which you might think given the Boss Tweed stories and the background of Tammany Hall, that's in the social conscious. But in fact, the namesake of Tammany Hall is an indigenous 17th century chief, Chief Tamanend of the Lenape, who signed a peaceful coexistence treaty with William Penn in 1680, an event that's documented in our Capitol's rotunda in Washington, DC, rules that really held in place for quite some time.

Chief Tamanend was revered and legendary to the European settlers as a native representative who welcomed visitors and who wanted to listen to all voices. And listening to all voices became kind of the theme of these early social clubs, which became known as Tammany Societies. We were surprised to learn that there were dozens of these Tammany societies that dotted the East Coast from New York to Cleveland in the early days of the Republic, and I think they even predated the revolution. I think they, maybe, formalized themselves after the revolution, but the clubhouses began even before the American Revolution, where people joined and sat around talking about what ideals the New Republic should represent. And they chose Chief Tamanend to represent them as a symbol of listening to all voices. Over the centuries that story was lost. The only Tammany society to make it into the 20th century was ours here in New York, only to become known for craft, greed and corruption.

So right from the beginning we thought it was an opportunity to rebrand the building in Chief Tamanend’s name – kind of erase this idea that Tammany is associated with just greed and corruption, but is associated with the indigenous population of North America, of the Northeast, especially of the Lenape. Given that background, looking at this Neo-Georgian red brick and limestone building at the corner Union Square, which was designed originally to emulate Federal Hall downtown. Federal Hall is where George Washington was inaugurated on the balcony. Federal Hall was demolished in 1812, but it looked like Tammany Hall does today, except Federal Hall had a much more robust roof line, had a big hipped roof and a cupola, whereas Tammany Hall and Union Square chose the architects Thompson, Holmes, and Converse out of Philadelphia in 1928 – chose to replicate the federal Hall facade quite literally, but they gave Tammany Hall here in Union Square a much more tepid roof.

And so, the thought was, given the brief from Edifice for Redding International, they wanted to expand the building, they wanted to rebrand the building, but they knew it was a landmark. They knew it was an individual New York City landmark. So, demolition was out of the question. And a vertical expansion is taboo for individual landmarks. Typically, the New York City Landmarks Commission approves maybe a handful each year, but they're very difficult to convince the commission that it's an appropriate addition to the base landmark. Union Square is such a vast public space that we knew immediately that even if you put like a shampoo bottle on top of the roof, it would be seen from across the square. So, in order to get them any significant square footage addition up there, we wanted to go bold. We felt that, given this Neo-Georgian base that used to have or was modeled after a building that had a bigger roof, why not propose a more robust, bold roof scape?

So, the question is what form should that take? And given the history of Chief Tamanend being the namesake of Tammany, and with this desire to really honor the Lenape, why not be inspired by the Lenape’s origin story of a giant turtle rising from the sea, creating land to give this Neo-Georgian building the dome that it would have, could have, should have had if Tammany Hall perhaps was more honest with its intentions in 1928, when Thompson, Holmes, and Converse designed this building, which really cloaked them in kind of quasi-governmental garb at this very federal style red brick and limestone building with a pediment, portico, but a tepid roof.

So, we decided to model a very contemporary glass and steel dome modeled after a rising turtle coming out of the water, shedding water as the kind of volume to hold, to house three additional floors. And the landmarks, as you mentioned, Landmarks Commission unanimously approved it. We only had to go back once to tweak the height of the dome and some of the details.

The dome kind of erupts from a reconstructed hip roof. So, we removed the slate hip roof and recreated it in the same inclined plane with terracotta sunshades that intermittently cover the beginning of the glass and steel dome. So, the glass and steel dome starts off as in the form of a hip roof, but then quickly transforms into this parametric shell that looks like classically proportioned when one stands in front of it in Union Square. Looks like any other dome on a classic building, in terms of its proportion. But when one turns the corner and looks more obliquely on it, its organic source kind of becomes more apparent. You kind of sense something is going on there and it's turtle like as it faces north over this arched pediment that was top of the Tammany Hall's balustrade in the middle of the East 17th Street North facade.

The original building had this odd arch pediment that was kind of just vertically cantilever in there. We didn't quite realize what it was until we looked more into the history of Tammany Hall. And sure enough, they used to – before this building was built in 1928 – they occupied a clubhouse on East 14th Street down at the other corner of Union Square. And on top of that building is a giant arched, decorative element with, in fact, a 15-foot-tall statue of Chief Tamanend. That building was demolished for ConEd’s expansion in the 1920s, and that's what spurred Tammany Hall to move to this location on the northeast corner of Union Square. Chief Tamanend is only recalled on our facade in 1928 with a headshot, a limestone medallion that faces, on the north facade, over what was Tammany Hall's front door. So, the classical portico facade that faces Union Square was really always a commercial facade. The ground floor was always a retail store location. In 1928 was a manufacturer's trust bank, for example. And now just last week, we celebrated the grand opening of Petco as the new national headquarters giant, 30,000 square foot new store in the ground floor cellar and second floor of the building.

So, it's still a retail presence. And then the upper floors are remodeled to be open office space. So Tammany Hall's front door used to be below that arched pediment facing northeast 17th Street and that's where we decided to kind of turn the turtle's head on the roof. So, the glass dome takes on a little bit more of a turtle-like form as it turns its head to give that arched pediment a little bit of a home. And we think it gives it a little bit more of a reason to exist than it ever did before. And it signals that that was Tammany's front door, once upon a time.

00;17;44;08 - 00;18;00;17

DP

Wow. Some great information. There's so much to talk about here, you know, it reminds me of - I'm still a big fan of Coop Himmelblau, it's far more organized, right – but it reminds me of that kind of approach to architecture. So, there were five entries. Did you see the entries?

00;18;00;23 - 00;18;39;25

TP

We never saw the other entries. We presented our work to Margaret at Redding, like December of 2012, after a bit of a delay because of Hurricane Sandy. We were awarded the project. It took about a year for contracts and everything to be negotiated to become their architect, but we were awarded the project so roughly late 2013. We brought it to the Landmarks Commission in, I believe in 2014. We received final building department and Landmarks approval in the following year or so, and then it took a few years to build. It was interrupted a bit by the pandemic, but we finished. Construction was finished in 2020.

00;18;39;28 - 00;18;42;16

DP

So, start to finish, how long was it then?

00;18;42;19 - 00;18;54;08

TP

From the day the phone rang in 2012 to 2020. So about eight years. We've stayed on call as the landlord's architect to help coordinate work for the tenants looking at space inside.

00;18;54;13 - 00;18;58;17

DP

And this was mostly a renovation project, but there was some new construction?

00;18;58;24 - 00;20;29;26

TP

So that's great that you ask that because it appears from a lot of photographs and even as you walk around it and even when you're in it, it's hard to realize that it's actually a new building behind the 100-year-old street walls. Everything was removed except the two street-facing walls. So, we think that's a real success, that people think it is a rooftop addition with maybe a little renovation inside, because that really was the intent to be as deferential and respectful of the historic landmark as possible. But, in fact, everything was removed. The historic masonry walls were decoupled from the structure. They were braced in place by tower braces that had their own foundation systems through the sidewalk, including through a giant vault that lines the 17th Street side that has a giant ConEd steam pipe running through it. So very complex coordination that the structural engineers at Thornton Tomasetti coordinated with our construction managers at CNY to develop this very intricate tower bracing system.

I should mention Buro Happold also as engineers of the project. So, the facades were decoupled from the structure. Everything was removed inside, including the foundation. A deeper foundation was dug to give the building a very deep cellar and six new stories. So, what was a three-story building with the little caretaker's apartment hidden behind the hipped roof at the front is now a 70,000 square foot class-A commercial building, growing from about 35,000 to begin with.

00;20;29;29 - 00;20;32;23

DP

So, you had to match the existing brick.

00;20;32;26 - 00;24;16;27

TP

So yes, finally we could talk about brick. Big part of the project was restoring those two street walls, the two 100-year-old historic street walls that are red brick and limestone, modeled after Federal Hall downtown. We researched the brick. Our design partners at Buro Happold gave us a roadmap – and the restoration contractors at Pullman – very detailed road map of the two street facades of which parts needed to be replaced. But remarkably, not a lot of the brick had to be removed. We did repoint 100% of the brick, meaning partially removing, breaking back the mortar joints and replacing the mortar. The front about three-quarters-inch of mortar on all the joints, but only replaced maybe about 15, 10%, maybe less of the brick.

The brick we found; we researched where the brick was in 1928. It was from the old Virginia brick company in Salem, Virginia. And we found an advertisement in 1929 after the building was completed, and they are bragging about their new building on Union Square, and they are linking it – as a Virginia company, they’re proud of this project for many reasons – but including the fact that Tammany Hall was linked to Thomas Jefferson's ideals and Thomas Jefferson, of course, is from Virginia and is famous for designing his home at Monticello. So, the old Virginia brick company has this advertisement that we found in the Archives of Public Library here in New York that they link the brick here at Tammany Hall to the brick used at Monticello. But if you read the fine print, it's not literally the same brick, it's not from the same kilns. They say it's, quote, “in the same size and made in the same kind of cherry and maple molds as those of Jefferson's beloved Monticello.” So even though Salem, Virginia, which is right next to Roanoke, Virginia, still is about, these days, even a two hour drive from Monticello, they wanted to connect themselves to the legacy of Thomas Jefferson with this new building for Tammany Hall, which was pretending to be or, you know, acting as a quasi-governmental building.

They were really a social agency too. We shouldn't forget that even though that they were known for terrible greed and corruption and fixed elections and did all kinds of bad stuff, they really operated as a social service organization for newly arrived immigrants here in New York City. So, they, however, used Lenape iconography in ways that weren't so appealing to us, from our point of view, looking back. They didn't care for the land of a people. They use their imagery. They used Chief Tamanend's name, but they didn't necessarily care for the Lenape people. And we wanted to reintroduce the Lenape authentic voice into this project. So early on, right after we won the competition, we reached out to the Lenape center here in Manhattan. We wanted to make sure that we weren't offending people by the use of Chief Tamanend’s clan's symbol of the rising turtle. We met with Joe Baker and Hadrien Coumans, some of the co-founders of the Lenape Center here in Manhattan, and they were thrilled. I was so relieved with their reaction when we showed them this design, a good ten years ago now. And they've been friends ever since. They've been great proponents of the project. They supported it through the regulatory process, writing letters to the Landmarks Commission, appearing with us side by side. So, they've been a great partner with this, and we've shared the design as it developed with them. So, we like to think of them as one of our collaborators in this project. It wasn't part of the brief, it wasn't part of the commercial real estate project, but we kind of thought it was very important to bring an authentic voice to this project from the Lenape point of view.

00;24;16;29 - 00;24;28;08

DP

So, we know that you guys had to match the existing brick out there. Was it challenging to find a brick that you could use, and what was that process? What did you ultimately go with?

00;24;28;10 - 00;25;50;02

TP

So, looking at the existing conditions of the brick walls, they were in remarkably good shape, considering it was 100-year-old building. We removed maybe five, ten percent of them. We used our construction manager partners at CNY, hired Pullman, incredibly talented folk at Pullman to restore the brick. They used, I think it was like a four-inch diameter grinder blade to remove the first, say, three quarters of an inch of mortar out of all the joints. 100% of the joints were repointed with mortar that we selected to match the original mortar.

The bricks themselves are an incredible mixture of Glen-Gery molded brick, and Heathcote, and spec sand DD-58, and Catawba, and a Roanoke Original. So that is all mixed in to create the dappled, dark red, velvety, rich red brick that are dappled with a very dark rowlock. Some of the rowlocks are very dark, so there's many bricks that are mixed into this, specifically chosen for each moment, each part of the facade that was being replaced. It's only about ten or twelve bricks at a time, in little clumps, that had to be replaced where there was a crack that was going through them. So that's how we restored the Flemish bond of the building. That bond of the landmark has a beautiful Flemish bond pattern to it that we restored.

00;25;50;05 - 00;26;02;13

DP

So, let's go back to the roof for a little bit. Was there any discussion internally when you were working on the design that it was just way too contemporary? This was not going to fly?

00;26;02;15 - 00;27;41;12

TP

Sure. So, we looked through history at examples of iconic, bold, contemporary rooftop additions onto landmark or historic structures. We looked at, specifically, for example, the Reichstag in Berlin. Lord Foster designed a striking, bold, contemporary glass dome onto the government building in Berlin. Of course, they lost their dome through war and bombing, and it was reconstructed in a contemporary fashion. But, interestingly enough the original Reichstag Dome did have glass in it. That's a fascinating case study for us.

We also looked at other freeform shell grid structures. That is the technical name for this structural system that can span over vast spaces without any vertical supports. So, the entire dome, the entire roof is not supported by any internal column or wall. It rests on new perimeter concrete walls that go all the way down to the new foundation. The loads are distributed down columns that are in between all the windows, in the historic facade, down to the new foundation in the cellar. So, we looked at Foster's courtyard cover at the British Museum, for example, that utilizes the same kind of system of freeform shell grid, which is also boldly, iconically, contemporary against a landmark base. The thought here was by restoring the base, by restoring all the brickwork and the limestone, we strengthen the landmark base in order to allow it to have a contrasting style on the roof, that the roof could be strikingly contemporary as long as we paid attention and were respectful to the restoration of the base.

00;27;41;14 - 00;27;55;03

DP

So, I read a little bit about the solar insulation, light infiltration. You were concerned glare clearly was going to be an issue. Could you elaborate on the probability studies you did investigating those elements and how they impacted design?

00;27;55;03 - 00;29;31;14

TP

Our partners at Buro Happold did fascinating studies with daylight. We directed them and wanted to make sure that we weren't going to cause reflection problems with this parabolic to other buildings. There are some case studies around the world of curved glass buildings causing problems to their neighbors, including there's one in London that focuses heat to the degree that it was causing fires on the sidewalk across the street. So, we certainly did not want to be known for that. So Buro Happold helped us study the probability of reflection on to the neighbors. We pinpointed the pieces of glass that would be the culprits – the whole selection process of the type of glass, with Buro Happold's help and all their studies – it was determined that a combination of tint and clear glass was the solution to inhibit reflection, but also to prevent too much solar heat gain and also to prevent too much internal glare.

So, from the outside, the glass appears a bit dark. On sunny days, it's reflective just enough to give it a shiny kind of silvery tone, and you can see the clouds, but it doesn't reflect rays of sunlight directly, like laser beams into the neighbors. And while you're on the inside, even though the glass on the outside has a darker appearance from the inside, your eyeballs adjust and it's all color corrected. Your eyes don't see dark. They see blue sky. They see the beautiful terracotta details of the neighboring historic buildings. It was, in the end, success of glass selection to inhibit all those potential problems.

00;29;31;16 - 00;29;40;17

DP

So, did your team learn anything interesting through the design and construction process doing something this unique? I would imagine you've never done a roof like this in the office before.

00;29;40;21 - 00;30;52;21

TP

We haven’t. It's our first freeform shell grid. It was New York's first freeform shell grid. There is a similar covering at Moynihan Train Hall to their barrel vaults, but they opened six months after we did, so we are happy to say, after an eight-year design process and construction, we kept saying we're going to be New York's first freeform shell grid. We're the first one to enclose internal space. I think there's a similar system that might be on some like entry canopies. There's one for like the seven-train extension to Hudson Yards and there's one out in Yonkers, but those do not enclose covered space and they're not nearly this large. So, we're proud to say we're New York's first freeform shell grid.

They use acres of this system in Asia and Europe. It's a very common system to span large swaths of space. It is used here in this country. For example, we visited the Smithsonian Institute down in Washington, DC. The Portrait Gallery has a courtyard cover that's similar to the British Museum cover. Foster came here and did kind of an encore for us in 2007 with the Smithsonian cover. We studied that system too, in terms of how it let light in, and in our studies of glare, etc..

00;30;52;24 - 00;31;05;21

DP

Yeah. What I find so interesting about the roof is that you could have simply created a typical Mansard roof and then added glass to the top. But the whole thing is glass, which is so unique.

00;31;05;21 - 00;31;52;26

TP

And a mansard roof, of an appropriate proportion, wouldn’t enclose nearly this much square footage. So, we wanted to get our client as much square footage as possible on top of this historic building. And it needed that extra oomph. The dome portion in the middle, which would never be able to be really enclosed by a mansard of any kind of historically accurate proportion. So that's what led us to both the form and the structure to enclose it, because the freeform shell grid is kind of the perfect device to span such great distances so the interior can be super flexible.

We built three floors within it, but those could be removed, they could be remodeled, they could be reconstructed to serve any purpose because all the loads from the roof system just go down the side perimeter walls.

00;31;53;02 - 00;32;18;06

DP

It's a great project for architecture students to look at in terms of learning how to develop an idea to make form, right. It's just so clear. And yet if you knew nothing about it, you just say, “Wow, they just put a glass dome on top.” But there's so much more to it that created so many unique details and so many beautiful things and facets, and I'm sure that space on the interior is wonderful.

00;32;18;09 - 00;32;25;04

TP

It's really terrific. There's opportunities to connect all three floors interconnecting and the possibilities are endless in there.

00;32;25;06 - 00;32;40;23

DP

So, you've obviously been an architect for quite some time, over 30 years. So, what career advice would you give your younger self, looking back after practicing for all this time? What have you learned? What's an idea that you've really locked on to that you'll never forget?

00;32;40;25 - 00;32;53;00

TP

One of the founding partners at BKSK, Joan Krevlin, said to me 25 years ago when I joined the - one of the things that she always kept with her as a young architect is do your job and tell the truth.

00;32;53;02 - 00;32;55;22

DP

What great advice! I love that!

00;32;55;29 - 00;33;42;02

TP

It's a great profession. And as you said, students of architecture have a great time in design studios. And this is a project that is really right out of studio in a way. I love showing it to students because like you said, it's super accessible in terms of the visuals, but it has a great connection to social history and the importance of context, the importance of research that you just don't come into a vacuum and design a building. You look at the context, you look at history, and you look at what you can learn from it. Because this could have been, like you said, just a flat top mansard roof. But discovering the history of the Lenape connection to this building was just remarkable and a great opportunity. I've met the Lenape Center folk. They've asked me to join their advisory steering committee. It's just been a wonderful experience.

00;33;42;04 - 00;34;03;22

DP

I love what you said. You don't just come into a vacuum and design a building. You don't. You don't. And that's what you learn in school. And hopefully you get to use that information, use that process, use that paradigm when you graduate, and you become a real architect. Right. So, Todd, it's been great to have you here. Thanks so much for your time. Where can people go to learn more about BKSK architects?

00;34;03;27 - 00;34;09;06

TP

We can be found at www.bksk.com

00;34;09;08 - 00;34;11;09

DP

Todd, it’s been great to have you, man. That was really cool.

00;34;11;25 - 00;34;16;12

TP

Thanks. This was really fun.

00;00;00;00 - 00;00;05;12

Doug Patt (DP)

Let's go inside the vault. The design vault.

00;00;05;14 - 00;00;34;08

Paul Neuhaus (PN)

They wanted a full archive with plenty of space for growth into the future. The storage has different requirements depending on the kinds of documents. So, we needed to create spaces that allow them to continue to collect. And a lot of the people who come in to do research, which is another big part of what they do, they collect and preserve. But they also provide these documents to the public for access, for research, or just for curiosity and to learn.

00;00;34;11 - 00;02;55;10

DP

This is my guest, Paul Neuhaus. I'll share more about him shortly. In this episode from the Design Vault, we’ll highlight Paul's project, the PA State Archives. The new Pennsylvania State Archives Facility collects and preserves valuable paper documents while making them available to the public for viewing and research. The building is a state-of-the-art archival facility with an enhanced building envelope and HVAC system for the optimal environment to preserve historical paper documents.

The street facade features a linear, steel framed louver structure which surrounds a two-story high glass enclosed pavilion. The pavilion is connected to the main building, which accommodates the two public research rooms and staff spaces. While much of the building requires a windowless approach. A wide assortment of colored Norman size bricks were used to give the facade a varied and playful appearance.

The building used 350,000 brick equivalents in a blend of five different glazed brick colors. The building is three city blocks in size on three acres of land. The total storage area on three floors is 50,000 square feet and includes oversized, cool, cold, secure, and digital archives.

Hi, I'm Doug Pat and this is Design Vault.

Today we're talking to Paul Neuhaus, AIA, LEED AP. Paul has a bachelor's degree in art from California Lutheran University and a master's degree in architecture from UCLA Graduate School of Architecture and Urban Planning. Paul is a Senior designer for HGA. Paul is in their Minneapolis office and has been practicing for 30 years, working in their arts community and education practice group. Paul's project work includes studio arts and performing arts facilities, science labs, student centers and life science classrooms for higher ed, as well as libraries, a church and very recently, the building we will be talking about today, a paper archive for the State of Pennsylvania.

Paul strives to engender a sense of community and belonging for those who visit and work in the buildings his teams design. So welcome, Paul.

00;02;55;14 - 00;02;56;28

PN

Thank you. It's great to be here.

00;02;57;01 - 00;03;08;11

DP

It's great to have you with us today. So, before we get started, tell us a little bit about HGA architects. We know you're in the Minneapolis area. What's the size of the firm, the type of work you guys do?

00;03;08;14 - 00;03;26;05

PN

HGA is a national interdisciplinary design firm committed to making a positive, lasting impact for our clients and communities through research based holistic solutions. We’re a collective of over a thousand professionals in 12 offices nationwide.

00;03;26;08 - 00;03;30;21

DP

Wow. That's incredible. So how long has HGA been around?

00;03;30;23 - 00;03;51;26

PN

Oh, boy. We go back to the fifties. The office here in Minneapolis was the first office and Hamel Green and Abramson, the founders, started the firm. They were a well-known firm in the state for many years and grew over the years and became a dominant force here in the state. And today, they're the largest firm in the state.

00;03;51;29 - 00;03;54;09

DP

Do you have any other locations outside the state?

00;03;54;11 - 00;04;03;13

PN

Yeah, we have 11 other offices, so East Coast and West Coast mostly. We also have two offices in Wisconsin.

00;04;03;20 - 00;04;12;17

DP

That's a really big architecture firm. Tell me a little bit about the role that you play at HGA. How did you end up there and what are you doing now?

00;04;12;20 - 00;05;08;10

PN

I've been in the city practicing since 1992. As a matter of fact, I wanted to work for HGA when I first moved to the city from Los Angeles. Interviewed here a couple of times, and it just worked out that I got an offer from another firm in town and work for them. That was back in 92. And then I didn't end up working for HGA until 2014.

I was really attracted to the firm because of the high quality of the design they do. Even though they're a large firm, they really practice like a small boutique firm. There's a lot of collaboration and independent thinking here. They allow architects to really pursue individually on each project what they think the vision of that project should be. So, when you look at HGA’s work, you don't see a pattern of design that looks a certain way. Buildings and projects can go in a lot of different directions, and there really isn't a style for our firm, which is really the way it should be.

00;05;08;16 - 00;05;26;03

DP

Yeah, I mean, that's pretty unique. Most offices, you look at their work and you can spot the thread that works its way through all of the architecture, and I'm sure that's the same way with your office. And yet many offices, stylistically they're just churning out the same thing, one building after another. So that's interesting.

00;05;26;05 - 00;05;44;00

PN

There definitely is a commitment to modernism and contemporary architecture. We do that well, but we also do historical preservation. And so, we have people who are working on buildings that are hundreds of years old - that occurs too - where we have to tie into historical buildings quite often with the new additions.

00;05;44;02 - 00;05;45;23

DP

So, what is your role in the office?

00;05;45;29 - 00;06;26;00

PN

I'm a senior designer. I lead projects, teams that can be anywhere from just me to four or five architects, depending on the size of the project. And then we have interior design. HGA really is a full-service firm. We have architecture, interior design, mechanical, electrical, plumbing, structural, security, and AV. So, we can do it all, but we often will team up with other architecture firms around the country because we have an expertise that we can bring, which is in this case, museums and archives. So, we'll team up with locals and go after projects together, and that's what we did here in Pennsylvania.

00;06;26;02 - 00;06;30;14

DP

So, are you guys the architects of record or the design architects, or do you switch roles?

00;06;30;20 - 00;06;48;10

PN

Vitetta Architects is the executive architect, and we were the design architect. So, we had the upfront part of the project. We team together. We were always together working together, but we emphasized the front end of the project, and they were construction drawings and CA.

00;06;48;13 - 00;06;53;28

DP

All right, so let's jump into the building here. So, could you tell us a little bit about how your office got the project?

00;06;54;01 - 00;07;52;29

PN

You know, I wasn't there when we went after the project, but it's a typical story, I'm sure, which is there is a proposal out from an owner. They want a building, so they publish a proposal that anybody can submit to. And we looked for someone to team up with locally or they approached us, perhaps the local architect, Vitetta, and we've teamed up as a team and submitted a proposal. And then we were shortlisted, interviewed for it, and we were selected as the team to do it. We had experience doing museums and archives very recently before that, so that made a big impact on our selection.

I think it goes back to 2014 when we were selected for the project there initially was a different site. They went all the way through schematic on a site that was a green site on the edge of town. After schematic, they decided, no, we want to have a site that's closer to our capital complex in town. So, they found a different site and started design over, and that's when I joined the team.

00;07;53;01 - 00;07;59;04

DP

Wow. There's an original archive building, right? And that is done, I think in the brutalist style.

00;07;59;07 - 00;08;40;27

PN

Yeah, you could say that. It doesn't have many windows, so I could see how that would feel Brutalist. It's limestone, however, it's got a concrete structure, but the structure isn't expressed on the outside like you would typically see for brutalist architecture. It's at the Capitol grounds. It's 21 stories tall. And the problem with it is it's a low floor to floor, by today's standards. They considered upgrading it and expanding it, but they determined that the low floor to floor wouldn't allow them to create the updates they need for mechanical systems. Plus, there just wasn't enough space around it to move laterally. So, they decided the thing to do was to find a new site.

00;08;40;29 - 00;08;53;07

DP

So, I'm curious, when they came to you and this was their original building, did they talk at all about style? Clearly the floor heights were an issue. Did they say, “Hey, we don't want to do this again. We want something that's a little more contemporary”?

00;08;53;12 - 00;09;38;12

PN

Good question. Yes, they wanted a contemporary building. They wanted something that reflected today and the way we think about architecture today, which is great. The building that was built originally was a modern building, too. It was of its time. The History Museum is right next to it that will continue to be used. It was great that they wanted to look forward and be progressive about style, and I don't know if we ever talked style per se.

We just had already gone through schematic design. Like I said on this other site with another team. So, I think there was some sort of way of working that had already been established so that when I started on the new site as the lead designer, they had already had some confidence in us and were on board with the way we work.

00;09;38;15 - 00;09;43;13

DP

So, tell us a little bit about the programmatic requirements they came to you guys with.

00;09;43;15 - 00;11;52;13

PN

They wanted a full archive with plenty of space for growth into the future. So, of 146,000 square feet of this building, about 50,000 square feet is the archive storage spaces. The storage has different requirements depending on the kinds of documents it might be worth saying that the Pennsylvania State Archives collects, preserves, and makes available for study the permanently valuable public records of the Commonwealth, with particular attention given to the records of state government.

And as the Archives director, David Carmichael, once said, “they collect everything from parchment to pixels.” As a matter of fact, William Penn, who founded the Commonwealth in 1681, used a charter that gave him the right to establish the Commonwealth. And that charter is at the archives in Pennsylvania and as well as hundreds of millions of other documents that are important to the Commonwealth.

So, we needed to create spaces that allow them to continue to collect. So, it's important the whole process of how documents arrive at the site are brought in, brought into processing rooms, and then eventually put into storage. Quite often they're also photographed so that they can have a digital record of the document and a lot of the people who come in to do research, which is another big part of what they do, they collect and preserve, but they also provide these documents to the public for access, for research or just for curiosity and to learn.

So, there is this whole system of how documents are moving in and how they're being brought to the public to use and then put back into storage. The documents can be anything from large documents in flat files like maps. They can be eight and a half by eleven size. Some of the rooms need to be cool or even cold. So, there are different climates, let's say, in some of these rooms based on the type of media it is. For instance, film that they'll collect needs to be in a very cool environment. So, they have different climates in each space.

00;11;52;16 - 00;12;05;03

DP

Well, that's really interesting. So, let's go back a little bit. Tell us a little bit about the site. Are there any unique topographic features? Is it completely flat? Was it a pretty simple thing to put a building on it?

00;12;05;05 - 00;13;08;18

PN

Yeah, it's a three-acre site and there are two main streets on the west and east side. Sixth Street on the west is about one story above Seventh Street, which is on the East. And Seventh Street is a main feeder artery that comes into town, while sixth is more of a residential neighborhood or semi commercial residential. So, we put the public entry on Sixth Street, which is up a level which means of the four level building, there's a lower level that's a walk out, let's say on the east side.

And then the public enters on what we call first floor, which is one level up from the lower level. The site is also L-shaped, which sounds like it could be a problem, but it really isn't because it's a large enough site that it provides for the building and public space. So, we were able to create a nice plaza out front and lots of landscaping in front of the building to provide a public amenity, let's say, to the people who live in the community and anyone who's visiting.

00;13;08;21 - 00;13;11;23

DP

Did you guys have any challenging restrictions, in terms of zoning?

00;13;11;26 - 00;14;22;26

PN

There were challenges with infrastructure. We had some issues needing to connect the archive with the state capital complex with fiber optics. So, there was a fiber optic line that had to come underground all the way to our site and that was done on a different contract. But we also had a lot of flexibility. For instance, there were streetlights and so on around the site and in some cases, especially on the front where we met the public, we were able to move the streetlights across the street from us because we just didn't think it would be nice having all the lights and lines right out in front of the building.

So, there was some infrastructural work that was done more on a urban scale level to help accommodate this building. Also add that at the same time that we were doing this building, there was a federal courthouse being put in, which is just about completed now too, at the same time. So, these two large buildings that are within a couple of blocks from each other going in at the same time was interesting.

And we actually worked – we had one meeting with the local architect, the design architects of that building, so that we could coordinate a little bit on what some of the public lighting would look like.

00;14;22;28 - 00;14;44;05

DP

The building stylistically, you've got this large glass atrium space and you've got this metal framed armature that wraps that. And then I'm assuming going off in the other direction, you've got a very large block that is made out of masonry. Is that correct?

00;14;44;07 - 00;16;25;19

PN

That's right. We took that stated purpose, the mission statement of the archive, which is the archive collects, preserves, and makes available for study. We took those three ideas, and we turned them into form and gave each form its own material. So, for instance, “collects” is the storage of the archives. That became a form that you just described as masonry.

They preserve, and mechanical systems are an important part of preservation. We have the unique situation of all of the mechanical systems needing to be off to the side of the archive that couldn't be on top of the archive because we couldn't risk any sort of liquids leaking out of mechanical systems into the archives. So, all of the mechanical systems are in their own bay off to the side. That's the preservation part. And we use metal panels to describe that bay.

And then finally, “making available to the public,” there was a public element of it, and in this case, we made it a glass pavilion and we used an aluminum extruded solar shade custom made to protect people from direct sunlight but provide lots of daylight. So, it's very open, very visible. You drive by it on Sixth Street and great views in and out to the street and from the road in. But it's got its own expression from the other elements. And so those three elements look very different from each other. They each really have a different personality, but they're all neutral in color. They're grays from white to medium gray, nothing - it's a very tight range of neutral tones.

00;16;25;23 - 00;16;35;09

DP

Yeah, for a storage facility, it's pretty welcoming. The elevation with the glass and this metal armature is really quite lovely.

00;16;35;15 - 00;16;36;07

PN

Thank you.

00;16;36;10 - 00;16;51;15

DP

So, I saw some really interesting studies in your emails back and forth with Glen-Gery in regard to the colors that you ultimately chose for the facades. There's really a lot there. Could you tell us a little bit about that?

00;16;51;17 - 00;20;13;16

PN

That's a great part of the story. We knew that the archive wing would be enveloped by a long expanse of wall. Archives don't want to have windows, so there were not going to be many windows and this building was going to be up to four stories tall. So, we wanted to make sure that what we put on the building would be something that would be out of the ordinary. And we didn't have the budget for limestone. The Capitol complex is limestone. The original building was that way, but we wanted something durable and where we could allude in some way to what was going on at the Capitol. We thought brick is durable. It's a good candidate for an archive because of that, and we wanted to make some connection to the limestone.

We began looking for a light-colored brick, very neutral, something that could echo that limestone. But clay doesn't come in neutrals like we wanted it. You know, Clay typically is in the Browns, yellow reds. You can get it to be black or very close to black. But everything we found seemed to be a little bit too warm. The closest we could get was a very light-yellow brick, and even then, it just felt a little too warm. So, we started considering clay slip coatings that are available on the market for bricks that could be applied to the brick to get a lighter and more neutral look. And that's when we came across Glen-Gery. We found some buildings on the Internet that traced us back to Glen-Gery. I don't remember how, but we were able to find them. And then Glen-Gery could make custom colors in the matte, but they also could make glossy glazed finishes. So that's when we started to consider that. And from there we began a conversation with them about brick colors and finishes.

Eventually I took a trip to their plant up in northern Pennsylvania. One time I landed in Pittsburgh, rented a car, drove up to their plant, and then from there I went to a client meeting in Harrisburg. It was really a fun visit just to see that plant work and meet with the artist. They had like an artist lab or chem lab where they can mix custom colors. And we had really good conversations and that really convinced me that this had a lot of potential. It wasn't a shoe in, it wasn't sure yet that we could go this route, but I just felt like there was a path to get there.

And eventually we went the route of glazed brick over the matte finish. We found the shine and reflectance of the wall surface potentially very appealing, especially on a large building with so few windows. Second, there was a side benefit with the glazed brick, and we believe that it would help resist graffiti and make it easier to clean because we were in an area where graffiti could be an issue. So that was another selling point for going that direction. It certainly worked in terms of getting the state to back that idea of going with a glazed brick, because I think it just seemed very unusual that a building would be entirely covered with glazed brick, and it helped that we were using very subdued colors like grays. We have five colors. It's a range of grays. And when you stand back, they kind of blend together. It creates what I like to call a heathered look. You know, if this were a knit sweater, it would be using heathered gray yarn and it kind of all blends together.

00;20;13;16 - 00;20;22;16

DP

Well, when the bricks glaze, does it reflect images or light or is there anything special about the facade when you stand back and look at it, other than the color?

00;20;22;23 - 00;20;51;12

PN

In a surprising way, that was very pleasant, once it got put up – especially on that north side where it's a long wall of brick – we were really surprised and pleased to see that on a cloudy day as the clouds are going over, it reflects the sky and the clouds, enough really to - it's not like a mirror, but it gives you a nice feeling that this building is somehow relating to the sky. So we really like that part of it.

00;20;51;14 - 00;21;01;19

DP

It all sounds really cool. Before we wrap this part of the conversation up, tell me about the mockups you guys did for the colors of the brick. They're really cool. It was a great idea.

00;21;01;22 - 00;22;22;18

PN

Yeah. Thanks. We started just by getting Sherwin-Williams paint chips. They make eight by ten paint samples. We pulled out a whole bunch of neutral colors with little bits of warm and cool associated with them and had them sent to us. Then we took the ones that we found most appealing, and we created a brick shape with using chipboard, glued them down, and then we started to assemble different quantities and proportions of different colors and just started mixing things until we saw something that looked appealing.

So, we created this mockup model where we could try different proportions. We kept records of how many of this color, how many of that on each set up that we did. And we created a whole series of these that we could first show ourselves and figure out which ones we liked the best. And then we took them to the client and showed them to them and tried to find where the sweet spot was for this blend.

From there we started to work with Glen-Gery to actually come up with samples, glazed brick samples. They weren't full bricks right away. They were just pieces of clay, small, maybe four by three inches, for starters, until we could come up with something closer to the actual colors we'd want to consider.

00;22;22;21 - 00;22;45;28

DP

You know, what's so surprising to me is you take five colors, put them together on a board. You've got 30 or 40 bricks. Each one of these samples, you stand back, and you look at, I'm just blown away that you can do that on a facade, and it never looks busy. You stand back and it becomes like another color. It becomes the color in-between all the colors. How did you even know that was going to happen?

00;22;46;00 - 00;23;31;00

PN

That's a good question. You're digging into the way we had to think about this. You know, some of our mockups had more contrast. Some of them had less contrast. And I think you need to find that point where the contrast is enough to give some variety and not make it look homogenous. But you don't want it to be so contrasty that it starts to look speckled. We didn't want to speckled looking, building, so it was just a matter of setting things up, looking at them close and then walking away and looking at them from, you know, 100 feet away and just see how well they blend together. It's like pixels, right, on your computer. These were really just physical pixels. And the farther you get back, the more they blend.

00;23;31;03 - 00;23;47;29

DP

So, at the end of the day, when you guys were all done with the job, was there anything that you learned that was really interesting about the design or the construction process? Again, as an aside, being the designer architects, it's got to be interesting handing a job over and then coming back to it as it nears completion, right?

00;23;48;01 - 00;24;39;20

PN

Yeah. And fortunately, we had a great working relationship with Vitetta, Daniel Wasik, the architect who led the team at Vitetta, who did a wonderful job. We had a good relationship and all the way through construction drawings, we were actively reviewing the drawings with them and participating in meetings. They were leading that process at that point from there on out but we were still involved. And even during construction administration, I didn't get to go to the site until late in the game. However, we were getting pictures from them monthly, lots of pictures. They were really good about it. They would tell us if there were any issues, we'd work it through together. So, it really worked well. And I have to say, I've never worked with a local architect that well before. It was a wonderful relationship and I’d love to work with them again sometime.

00;24;39;23 - 00;24;43;03

DP

That's really cool. Did the GC have any trouble finding a good mason?

00;24;43;10 - 00;24;45;05

PN

I know that there were issues.

00;24;45;05 - 00;24;47;11

DP

It's always an issue.

00;24;47;14 - 00;25;23;03

PN

Yeah. I mean, when I look at the building, it was well done overall.

You know, we had some complicated pieces to it too. For instance, we had an overhang at the front entry with brick hanging ten feet out, cantilever out over the entryway, and we designed it so that the brick at the bottom was not supported by an angle. We hid the structure and hung those two courses at the bottom from a structure up inside the wall. So, we were able to glaze even the underside of the brick hanging out over that cantilever, which wasn't an easy thing to accomplish.

00;25;23;03 - 00;25;24;17

DP

Yeah, it sounds expensive.

00;25;24;23 - 00;25;44;28

PN

It was, but it's a state building and you want it to be done right, and further, I don't know if you've had this experience on your work, but I've gone back to visit buildings sometimes that are years old, ten years old maybe, and some of those angles that support brick can start to rust. So, we wanted to avoid having that happen on a building this important.

00;25;45;00 - 00;26;04;20

DP

Yeah. And you know, you're going to make a few statements in the architecture and that's one really big one right at the front of the building. Very cool. So, before you go, you've been at this for 30 years or so. If you could give yourself – your younger self some career advice, what would it be?

00;26;04;22 - 00;26;49;17

PN

Oh, boy. Well, I do meet with mentees – we have a mentorship program here at HGA, which is highly valued by the people who are just starting out in their careers. And sometimes what I'll tell them is try to pay attention to everything you do, even the details. And not just focus on the big picture because the more you can know about the way buildings are specifically put together, the more you can understand about the structure and the other disciplines, the better you can be at making those decisions and choices at the beginning of your project. And so, I always encourage architects, especially people who are interested in being designers, to learn every aspect of the project down to the details.

00;26;49;20 - 00;26;56;24

DP

Yeah, if you're not interested in being a lifelong learner, architecture may not be the right profession for you.

00;26;56;26 - 00;26;57;16

PN

That's true.

00;26;57;16 - 00;26;59;28

DP

Right? You're always learning something.

00;27;00;06 - 00;27;01;08

PN

I'm still learning.

00;27;01;12 - 00;27;08;25

DP

Oh, yeah, I am too. Every day. So, Paul, it's been great to have you here. Thanks for your time. Where can people go to learn more about HGA architects?

00;27;08;25 - 00;27;18;15

PN

They would go to hga.com, and we've got our projects there that you can look at, and our teams, our people. It's a fun place to go.

TRANSCRIPT

00;27;18;18 - 00;27;21;25

DP

That's great. It sounds like a really interesting place to work.

00;27;22;00 - 00;27;34;05

PN

It is. I really enjoy it. There's a lot of smart people here and I'm so glad that I get to play the role I play. But I also admire those people who play all the other roles that we have at this firm.

00;27;34;08 - 00;27;34;28

DP

That's great, Paul. Thank you.

00;27;35;01 - 00;27;39;18

PN

Thank you. It was a pleasure.

TRANSCRIPT

00;00;00;00 - 00;00;05;09

Doug Patt (DP)

Let's go inside the vault. The design vault.

00;00;05;11 - 00;00;35;04

David Kubik (DK)

From avenue to Avenue across all of these 11 buildings. That was generally programmatically, what was sought after by the client was good commercial space, whether it was retail or office. So then really the next question was, okay, let's look at these buildings, understand which ones were perhaps more intact, more attractive the way they were, which ones could receive some additions, and were there any buildings that just didn't have really kind of great architectural character and warranted demolition and starting over and so we had a little bit of all those.

00;00;35;07 - 00;02;59;25

DP

This is my guest, David Kubik, AIA. I'll share more about him shortly. In this episode from the Design Vault, we’ll highlight David's project called Gansevoort Row. BKSK Architects made its imprint on the Gansevoort Market Historic District in New York City with a collection of landmark approvals. The redevelopment of a full block of tattered, low rise commercial buildings near the High Line.

Through careful analysis, BKSK made a strong rationale for taller building heights and some new construction along portions of the block. The new development project has a roster of luxury retailers, commercial and office space. The row buildings include existing facades, along with a creative variety of contemporary versions. Interestingly, each new building of various sizes features a unique blend of colors and patterns of brick.

The street facades maintain a turn of the century aesthetic with traditional elements and details, while employing modern windows and expansive metal awnings.

Hi, I'm Doug Pat and this is Design Vault.

Today we're talking to David Kubik, AIA. David Kubik holds a Bachelor of Science and Master of Architecture degree from the University of Maryland. He joined BKSK in 2003 and was named partner in 2018.

He works on the design of both institutional and development projects and is experienced at coordinating large consultant teams with expansive layers of complexity. He is currently the partner in charge of two new high end multi residential buildings for BKSK, the Keller and 111 Charles Street, both in the West Village and the recently completed 601 Washington Street. He also led the design of two commercial development projects in the Gansevoort Market Historic District, one of which we will discuss today, the Gansevoort Row redevelopment.

David has received an award for Excellence in Design and fellowships at both the graduate and Baccalaureate levels, as well as a thesis citation. David taught Design Studio as an adjunct lecturer in the Architectural Technology program at the City University of New York. So welcome, David. Nice to have you with us today. So, tell us a little bit about BKSK in New York City.

So where are you guys located? What's the size of the firm and what type of work do you do?

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DK

Well, thanks for having me. A little bit more about BKSK Architects. The firm was founded in 1985. We've always, right from the beginning, been a firm focused on ambitious design, really over a broad range of typologies, whether commercial or residential institutional. And as we're going to talk about today, we have many, many projects that have obtained approval from the Landmarks Preservation Commission. That's a particularly special part of our practice. The firm is located here in New York City. We're on West 38th Street. It's currently led by six partners and we're about 50 people.

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DP

So how long have you guys been in New York City?

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DK

We've been here practicing since 1985, and we were down on 25th Street for a number of years. We recently moved up to West 38th Street in 2020, which was an exciting time to move an office.

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DP

How was that? Was that fraught with challenges?

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DK

It was fraught with challenges. We literally moved the weekend of the shutdown. So, we moved out of our old office on the Friday and moved into our new office on that Saturday. And if everyone recalls, Sunday was the day that New York City really, effectively, shut down. So, we plugged in our new server, plugged in all of our new computers, and crossed their fingers that everyone could log in remotely on Monday morning. And miraculously, it all worked.

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DP

That is unbelievable. So, you guys weren't fully remote.

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DK

Fully remote as many did for a number of months. But yes, all of that came down to literally a day.

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DP

As an aside, did that last for employees or is everybody back in the office now?

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DK

We're all back in the office now. We kind of have some flexibility in terms of working remotely like many do. You know, you can have kind of a hybrid week somewhat, but like many companies, for a number of months, we were fully remote, which is tricky for an architecture firm.

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DP

Absolutely. So, tell us a little bit about yourself. So how did you end up at BKSK?

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DK

Sure. So, as you noted in the introduction, I was attending University of Maryland. I grew up in New Jersey, so always had kind of a fondness for the New York City area, was really excited by the architecture that was happening there. So, while I was still a student at the University of Maryland, I did have a summer internship with Clement and Holl Span architects, who are really also well-known mid-sized firm here in New York.

After graduating, I worked for about a year and a half at Michael Graves Architect. Most people don't know this, but they did at the time have a New York City branch office. They were not just in Princeton, New Jersey. So, I worked for them for a little bit. And then in 2003, I joined BKSK Architects. And at the time I was really looking for work where I could have a heavy involvement in the creation of the construction documents and during Construction administration.

I loved the work that BKSK had. There was a real high level of design ambition and you could tell there was a real study and appreciation for the craft of what they were making. And I loved the idea that I could be both involved in the design and documentation as well as have the opportunity to be on site while it was being built, which on some of the larger firms, sometimes that's not always in the cards.

So, it was a little bit of a shift for me to go to an office that was a little bit smaller, a little bit more locally focused. But there was something that I recognized I was really interested in and BKSK was able to provide that. So, it was a really rewarding shift and I really enjoyed that practice.

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DP

So now you're a partner. Has that changed at all your role in the office? Or tell us a little bit about what you do now.

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DK

Sure. So obviously some things change, and I'm happy to say that many things haven't. Sure, my role has changed. I'm involved in more projects; I'm overseeing those projects in the kind of sort of senior leadership role you'd expect when you hear the term partner. But – and our office is a little bit bigger now than it was when I joined in 2003 – but,  I would say that the ethos has not changed and we still, as architects, as kind of a tight knit group there in the office, were still very much focused on what I was describing earlier, which is high level of ambition in the design work that we do. And we really like to understand how things get built and the craft in which it takes to build them.

So, we enjoy working with contractors. That's not an adversarial relationship. We like to be on site, you know, and communicate directly with the subcontractors and the general contractors. And that's a process that we see can have a lot of opportunity for collaboration. And again, doesn't have to be this sort of adversarial standoff, which sometimes it can unfortunately sort of devolve into. But we try to make sure it doesn't go there and that everyone's working together in the sandbox to create something beautiful.

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DP

Let's dig in here and talk about our building. Tell us a little bit about the Gansevoort Row project. So how did your office get the project?

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DK

One of our existing clients, a client that we had already completed a number of projects with us, approached us about this project over our capital. I definitely can go on and on about that. Relationships. We're really happy with that relationship. They're a terrific client. They understand what it means to do a project of quality.

And so, we were honored when they came to us about this opportunity and this site. It's on the south side of Gansevoort Street, stretching from Avenue to Avenue, from Greenwich Street to Washington Street. It's really three pieces of property. But when you look across those parcels, it's really 11 individual historic structures that occupy these three properties. So, it was really quite a collection of buildings and structures that we had to grapple with and understand. They were all a little different. Some were more carefully preserved and intact than others, but the entire site had to be presented into the Landmarks Preservation Commission and whatever we designed, they had to approve.

So, what's interesting about that process, I think right out of the gate is that, if you're working on a site that is not subject to LPC approval, the very first thing you do is understand what the local zoning regulations allow you to build. How tall can I go? How big can I go and plan? What is the bulk that's permitted? How many square feet of floor area can I build? When you're in a landmarks district, you do not have rights to that floor area. You have to present a design that is compelling and as they deem, quote unquote, appropriate. It's often the case that you do not get to realize all of the square feet or all of the bulk that zoning might describe for that particular district. And that happened here, too. We didn't reach the full floor area allowed. We realized a lot of floor area for the developer, which is of course good for them. But we did have to present something that was appropriate for the neighborhood, appropriate for the scale on the street and the specific site context that we were dealing with.

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DP

So, tell us a little bit about that. So LPC is Landmark Property.

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DK

Landmarks Preservation Commission, so LPC for short.

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DP

And you said they had to approve what you guys designed. How does that work?

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DK

Because they were in a historic district. It's the Gansevoort market district. Anything that gets proposed has to first go in front of the LPC group and they have to review it and approve it before you can get your building permit, before you can get your approval at the local building department. So, it's not a, quote unquote, as of right district where you just follow the local code, follow the local zoning and you're off and running. We have this extra step of scrutiny. Whatever we present, they ultimately have to approve.

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DP

I saw a great photograph; I think it was on the website from 1938. So, tell us a little bit about the history of the site. Is it interesting and why hasn't it been developed to this point? And what has happened along the way?

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DK

It is very interesting. It has many chapters which we could spend hours talking about, but I'll summarize it a little bit in the sense that there was different types of buildings that were built here, whether it was a store and loft building or more of a warehouse building or purpose built garage buildings. In this district, you would see many different types of buildings. It wasn't sort of so perfectly monolithic like in some other historic districts. And in, generally speaking, many of these buildings were built to a certain height, often around five stories, six stories. And then when the city kind of really fell into tough economic times, a lot of these buildings were cut down to two stories because it was a strategy for building owners to pay less in taxes.

Unfortunately, a lot of these quite nice historic buildings would get cut down arbitrarily to two stories because that's just what made sense if you had a store and maybe one level of offices or storage above but, they didn't really need more than that. And this area of Manhattan on the far, far west Side, you know, became this sort of meatpacking district. And it just wasn't very desirable real estate in New York City for many, many decades. And then as economic growth has kind of pushed the city in recent years and decades, you know, finally this neighborhood has become a place where it's seen as advantageous to develop. High line, obviously, changed a lot of that. The new Whitney Museum, being literally on the opposite corner from this site, changed a lot of that. And our developer, Aurora Capital, are really responsible for a lot of the development in this neighborhood.

So, they've really boosted the appeal and the economic viability of this neighborhood. So, it was interesting to really understand the history of those buildings and it was sort of time for the next chapter of what could happen with these buildings. And so, your original reference, the 1938 photo, we looked at a lot of that carefully because it was obviously history and context that matters when you're dealing with these buildings. And in some cases there were narratives about bringing some of these buildings back up to their original five story height and in other cases not, which we can get into a little bit more specifically. But yeah, it was a bit of a mixed bag.

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DP

So, I understand the scope of the project was to create successful retail, commercial and office space. Tell us a little bit about the scope and then the programmatic requirements.

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DK

Sure. So, from avenue to avenue, across all of these 11 buildings, that was generally programmatically what was sought after by the client was good commercial space, whether it was retail or office. So then really the next question was, okay, let's look at these buildings, understand which ones were perhaps more intact, more attractive the way they were, which ones could receive some additions. And were there any buildings that just didn't have really kind of great architectural character and warranted demolition and starting over? And so, we had a little bit of all of those. So, you know, if you start generally looking at the block on the eastern end, there were more buildings that were pretty intact, had good architectural character. And we got from a sense in the community that they were cherished a bit more than some of the others.

So, you'll see on the eastern end the scale kind of stayed down at two stories. On the western end, there were two sort of blocks of buildings, one which comprised of five store and loft buildings, almost tenement style rowhouse looking type buildings, but more commercial oriented. Those buildings were all cut down from five stories to two. So, we proposed to put a three-story addition on that two story structure and raise that to a five story building.

And then lastly, on the western end of the property, and that piece of property being directly across from the Whitney, was just a one-story garage building kind of purpose-built garage building. It was not an original building in the district and really had no kind of architectural merit or character to speak of in the historic designation report for the neighborhood, it was described as non-contributing, which is also a term they use for buildings that might be in a historic district but were really never part of the original fabric and don't have any real value or they're not adding value to the district. So that was a corner property that was deemed acceptable to kind of demolish, remove that one story structure, and build something brand new. So, on that far western end, we proposed a new six story kind of warehouse loft looking building. And this goes back to the strategy of where is it viable to add bulk and square footage for the developer to kind of realize their investment? And where does it make sense to not do that?

And so, it was in a sort of perfect, even monolithic approach. Let's just add two or three stories across the whole block from avenue and avenue. We didn't do that. We said, you know what, on the western end, it makes more architectural sense to grow the properties and go higher. And on the eastern end, it makes more sense to keep them a little lower.

What was also interesting about this project was, you could imagine the owner could have very easily said, okay, we have three pieces of property here. Let's go to three different architects and just treat them like three individual projects and go to landmarks three individual times. But we didn't do that, and I think that was really smart on behalf of the owner, regardless of who they hired, to treat this as one job because you could treat it almost like an urban design exercise, a master planning exercise, you could look at the whole block and sort of horse trade square footage and decide where was it more appropriate and palatable to pump up the square footage and where was it not. And so, I think that we recognized it as a unique opportunity. We wanted to get our heads around, immediately about, where does the architecture support this intervention and where maybe does it not.

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DP

So, at the end of the day, were there any project restrictions in terms of the heights of the buildings?

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DK

Definitely. There was a lot of scrutiny about height, but it wasn't coming through either a code or zoning regulation. It was coming through an in-depth conversation with the Landmarks Preservation Committee and the Community board. So, when the Landmarks Preservation Commission approves your project, their permit has a title, and at the top it's Certificate of Appropriateness. Their measure of, you know, whether or not something should be approved really centers around that term appropriateness. So, it's very subjective.

So, they're looking at the context. How tall are the buildings around you? What are the styles of those buildings? What are the colors of those buildings? Do they have a lot of glass? Do they have a little bit of glass? You know, is all of the architectural language context bulk history. So, it's about storytelling is one way we like to think about it. What is the narrative that justifies your project? Like, what is the big idea of your project? And it has to be rooted in the history of the site, the context of site, and an appropriateness. So, there was a lot of analyzation of what were these buildings.

You mentioned the 1938 photo. That was one photo that was really important. There were many others. And so, you're really crafting a story. You're telling a story. So, what we proposed, we hope, extends the sort of natural evolution of this block like I was referring to earlier. This block has many chapters, and this is just the next chapter. Buildings go up, they come down, they go up again. And this will kind of be an evolution that the neighborhood will probably continue to see.

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DP

Since the process with the planning commission was so subjective, how many people are on the planning commission? Was that really challenging? Because everybody's got to agree, right?

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DK

Sure. I can't recall the exact number right now. I think it's around ten commissioners. And so, you know, you have to have a majority of the commissioners to obtain approval. You don't have to have unanimous approval. We went to the Landmarks Commission two times in order to obtain that approval. But we involved ourselves with a lot of kind of community engagement and – and meetings ahead of time because we wanted to make sure that what we were bringing was something that was viable and supportable in any way that we could.

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DP

So, tell us about the building plans. I would imagine as you run across the facade, some are rectangular, summer more square, but they all fill the entire block?

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DK

Well, it's actually a little bit different. So, the buildings that are on corners have different requirements than buildings that are mid-block. On both the eastern and western end – on the eastern end is an existing building. That building is built full on its lot because a corner building can be built full, it doesn't have a required rear yard. So, the eastern building was a purpose-built garage building, really kind of special, unique yellow brick house has a really bright image to it and we retain that building because it has some really nice character to it. Hermes is in there right now, as a high-end retailer. That's a special condition.

In the mid-block portion of the project, there is a rear yard, and the ground floor is built full. But once you're above the ground floor, starting at the second floor and up, these buildings do have rear yards. And then our new building that we proposed on the western corner that I was talking about earlier, same situation that it's very common.

The zoning allows it. Most buildings in New York City, when you're on the corner, won't necessarily have a rear yard or a side yard or anything like that. And this building doesn't either.

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DP

So, tell us a little bit about the style choices, right. I mean, it looked to me like there were at least three buildings that remained.

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DK

More than that. I would say on the eastern end there are two. And then in the mid-block portion, it's one building. But historically it's really three structures. Then there's this group of five, and then there's our new warehouse building on the western end. So that's why I was saying it's kind of like 11 structures stretching across three pieces of property when you really get into it, in terms of their history. They are different styles. They're all a little different.

The one on the eastern end was kind of a garage building. The ones mid-block are more kind of a store and loft, so they have kind of commercial storefronts at the ground floor and then kind of punched opening double hung window language above that. And then on the western end, our new building was not so much a store and loft had more of a kind of a warehouse look, so much heavier masonry language with much bigger areas of glass kind of departing from the individual punch window language.

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DP

So stylistically, the newer buildings are slightly more contemporary than the existing buildings. Did you have different architects working on different buildings and coming up with themes?

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DK

We definitely had a pretty substantial team in this project, and we are very collaborative in the office. So regardless of what level you might be practicing at our office, we're all at the table together. Everyone's contributing ideas, which we think is a great way to work and really fun. Obviously, as you kind of break down the teams, there were certain people dedicated to certain areas of the project. I also worked really closely with my partner Todd on this project. He had a deep involvement in this as well. So, it was really kind of the two of us on this.

What I think is fun, and as a general observation across the whole block, is that once we had a clear understanding of the kind of existing language of the architecture, whether it was garage or store in loft or warehouse, when we had our interventions, we did it in such a way that was quite respectful and kind of playing off the traditional languages of those buildings, but clearly contemporary at the same time.

So, the brick detailing is done in a traditional way, but with modern techniques and modern, you know, sort of expressions that are a little bit different. So, in the mid-block building, the one that has a three-story addition on a two-story base, there we used brick that was very similar in tone to the second floor that existed, but then also came up with a very special window language that involved some terracotta tiles on the transom that allowed for bigger glass windows but a smaller masonry opening. So, it felt appropriate for the scale of that facade. And then on the corner building, we really wanted to bring the sort of large heft and substantialness of the masonry detailing that you would see on a lot of the older warehouse buildings, even some of the buildings directly across the street from us. And so, we used a technique called a concealed lintel system to allow all of our brick returns, whether they were eight inches and in some cases 12-inch brick returns. You had these really beautiful brick returns both in plan and in sections. So, above the window, the window heads, you can really see 12 inches of brick wrapping and returning to the window, which you don't always see in newer buildings now, but we thought was really important for a building like this to be well detailed like that and show that depth of masonry, which is so characteristic for a lot of the historic buildings in that neighborhood.

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DP

Now, I saw some patterning running vertically along one of the taller buildings. Tell me a little bit about that because that motif appears as a lintel above the windows. What is that?

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DK

Yeah, so that mid-block building that was five store and loft buildings all kind of put together on its eastern facade because the building next to it was cut down like we talked about down to two stories. It's sort of exposed on that brick facade, the sort of scar of where the chimney would have been. So, there was a very sort of roughly demolished zone on the side of that facade where you could tell by looking at it, ‘you know what? I bet you there was a masonry chimney there and it all just sort of got roughly demolished.’ But it was kind of a signature moment on the side of that building that you would really see in the historic photos, and you would see in that 1938 photo.

So, we kind of wanted to bring back that chimney scar, but we did it with these terracotta tiles and behind those tiles behind that pattern is floor to ceiling glass. So, you're getting this masonry expression on the eastern facade that brings back that very particular circumstance that that building had. But you're doing it in a way that also allows some natural light to come in the building, because this is now a commercial office building. It's not a store in loft. Those upper floors are not used for storage anymore. People are occupying those floors. So, we were looking for ways to bring in a lot of natural light into this new work environment. But we wanted to do it in such a way that again, go back to that word that was appropriate for the sort of architectural expression of the building. So yeah, it was a unique moment. And the transoms, the lintel is basically doing the same thing.

Behind that is a really tall window, but from the street it looks like a smaller window, and it looks like a size window that is appropriate for that scale of building. So, it was sort of how you can have your cake and eat it too.

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DP

Yeah, it's a really interesting detail. So how long did the design process take, city review, construction, start to finish?

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DK

Good question. I don't know. I don’t have all of those dates at my fingertips, but I would say that while typically a project like this in our office would take about a year to document from schematic design to 100% construction documents, I think on this project it was substantially longer. Maybe a year and a half, a year and three quarters because of the extra time it took to first seek and get that LPC approval.

Once the approval is in hand, then we can really march forward and finish those construction documents. And then the construction itself, I believe, took about two years.

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DP

How many sheets were in the set?

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DK

It's definitely over 200. It's probably approaching 250 sheets or something like that. Yeah, it's a big undertaking.

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DP

Did you guys model this in 3D?

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DK

This entire city block is in Revit. It's all one Revit file that can be broken apart because we had to issue it as three sets of construction documents. Going back to the fact that this is three properties, it had to get filed at the Department of Buildings in three pieces to match up to those pieces of property, even though it was conceived as one big thing. So, yes, three sets of drawings.

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DP

Now, a job this big, do have more than one PM? Project manager.

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DK

Yes. Yeah, on this project we had two, Will Russell and Evan Singer, who did a phenomenal job really combing through every detail, understanding every nook and cranny. It was a real labor of love for them. I think they enjoyed it very much and they did a great job.

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DP

So, this question comes up a lot. Did sustainability ever come up in choosing the materials for the project? And clearly brick was already out there. Did you guys just say, “okay, this is what we're going to do; we never even thought about another material”?

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DK

Yeah. So, this project didn't seek any particular certification, but there were many sustainable elements that we tried to incorporate whenever we could in terms of material selection. I think that was also interesting is this is a conversation about adaptive reuse. One of the most sustainable things you can do when you look at a building project is reuse existing material. If you want to reduce your carbon footprint, reuse what's there, don't bring new material on site.

Many of these facades, you know, we really carefully tried to keep as much as the brick structure, whether it's party walls, you know, load bearing walls, facade walls. We tried to keep as much of that intact as possible. There were cases where, even a little scary times, you go onto the roof and you look at these old brick parapets and, you know, they haven't been maintained or cared for in way too long. And the mortar is at this point dust. And you can literally just take your hand and take the bricks off, which it was time. We are also very grateful that this project happened when it did because, you know, I think it saved these buildings, too. They really needed this intervention. They needed this next chapter in their life.

So, we, in some cases, had to demolish brick walls and keep all the brick and catalog it, put it down on the floor, label it so that the masons could take it and then put it back up and reinstall it. So, we did a lot of that careful work in the restoration and then much of the new either additions or buildings that we designed use brick. And it was a direct sort of reaction to this historic neighborhood. There was just an abundance of it, frankly, used in many different ways, many different colors. And it was really sort of a core ingredient, if you will, to any of the architecture that you might propose here.

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DP

So, I haven't seen any of the interior photos. But do we end up seeing brick on the interior of any of these buildings?

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DK

On some of them, again, particularly in the places where they are existing. So, in the existing two-story portion of that store in loft building, every 25 feet was a load bearing brick wall. Many of those are still there and the retailers who took those spaces did not cover them up, which is great. We love seeing that. So, you can really see a lot of that character and some of the buildings on the eastern end. You have moments to see some of that brick, too.

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DP

It looked to me like there were at least two different brick colors that were really unique to this job. Could you tell us a little bit about that?

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DK

So, the two brick colors on the project that we're talking about right now is a kind of a standard red brick that went on our three-story addition over the two-story existing structure. And that was kind of a nice interplay between a nice, textured, more modern looking red brick, but clearly still relating to the historic red brick that was right below it. So, you can distinguish the difference, but it's subtle.

On the corner building, there is a more sort of neutral what you might think is a more modern brick color. It's a Glen-Gery glacier gray brick. It has a lot of kind of nice texture and variation to it, which we were really attracted by. And it is perhaps a little bit more neutral, a little bit more contemporary of a tone.

That said, there are many large six story warehouse buildings directly across the street from us on Washington Street on that block facing the river. And many of those buildings had some pretty neutral tones in their brick selection as well. Maybe perhaps a little bit creamier, a little bit warmer, but not that different from what we were proposing there. So, we thought it was kind of a nice sort of interplay between those tones and still felt quite appropriate in the color.

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DP

And how did you guys ultimately find the right colors for the bricks? Did you guys simply have samples in the office, or did you go out and take a look at them?

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DK

Yeah, both. So, we really want to gain all those samples in the office and kind of build a library that we can consider. We looked at mockups on site to make sure that we were really happy with it and just walking around the neighborhood looking at these tones and seeing really how they relate. So again, it's nice to feel like the selection is growing right out of the context, but with a little bit of a modern twist, we think is actually quite nice.

And that brick in particular, we really loved the variation in the shading. You get kind of different colors within it. There is a little bit of texture and stippling to the brick finish as well, and we kind of joke around that sometimes if you look at a material sample up close, you think it looks messy, but it's that messiness. When you put it at a building scale or an urban scale that really makes that brick look good and crafted. So having that texture we think is kind of important.

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DP

That's a really good point. So, did your team learn anything interesting through the design and construction process? Anything come to light that was like, this is kind of cool?

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DK

I think what's just fun about designing in brick is it's a particular knowledge set. It's kind of its own craft or game if you want to call it that. You really have to think about the module of brick and how it wants to be used. We know a typical module for brick is either eight inches or twelve inches, quite commonly, and when you start designing your building, you have to be thinking about that brick module from day one, how it courses out vertically, how it courses out horizontally.

There were moments we learned a little bit of the hard way where we thought we had it exactly right and we didn't have it exactly right. And we had to make changes on the fly. Work carefully with the subcontractor, but you can't ignore the module of brick. You have to kind of work with it, don't work against it, and your details should sort of celebrate the natural dimensions of that brick. And I think we learned a lot about that. We had done already a number of brick buildings in our history of the firm, but this one really had a little bit of everything in it, which was really quite fun.

00;30;55;03 - 00;31;08;02

DP

Isn’t it interesting that we deal with buildings, but we're really dealing with math, right? Everything has to kind of fit into those modules.

So, did you guys have any trouble finding a great mason to work with on the process?

00;31;08;09 - 00;31;56;12

DK

So, we rely very much on our contractors to find those subcontractors. So, we worked with a great general contractor here who did find their way to a mason who you could tell right from the beginning was enjoying their craft. They would constantly ask us questions because they just wanted to make sure that they were getting it right per the design intent. And we thought that was really great.

Again, going back to something I said earlier, it was a good collaborative, positive relationship between everyone because we just wanted to make these buildings, you know, as best we could. And so, I think that mason did an excellent job in this project, and it really shows if you walk the block. And whether you're looking at very careful noodling and restoration on the buildings to the east, or the obviously more expansive, impressive new construction on the west, all the detailing, all the construction is very tight. It looks great.

00;31;56;18 - 00;32;03;21

DP

It's good to hear. So, this is the last tough question I've got for you. You've been an architect for some time, I would imagine. 20, 25 years.

00;32;03;26 - 00;32;07;14

DK

23. Yeah, depending on when you want to start the clock. But yeah, somewhere in there.

00;32;07;14 - 00;32;14;24

DP

Right. Exactly. So, if you could give your younger self some career advice, based on who you are now, what would it be?

00;32;14;26 - 00;33;36;07

DK

I guess I would say, and it's something that's been important to me, and I guess it was a bit of a leap of faith, I kind of found my way to BKSK architects for a reason. I feel lucky that I ended up there, frankly. It reinforced an interest I had, which is really to understand what you're making.

I enjoy design very much. You know, we want to blue sky and think very ambitiously about what a project could be. You want to push the envelope. But I always like to couple that with the reality of how something gets built. And I think that constant tension, if you will, about being ambitious, trying something new, being innovative, I always want to couple that with understanding how you build because a lot of times the innovation will grow out of something quite conventional, or an observation about how things get built. ‘Well, this is how we normally do it.’ Well, what if you just did it the normal way, but turned it 90 degrees and now you have a new detail and you can express things differently. So, those two things don't have to fight each other, and they could actually reinforce each other. And I think that's something that I've tried to instill in people who have worked for me or when I've taught at City Tech. I think that is something that I've found to be a kind of rewarding aspect of the practice. I also think that goes back to where I went to school at University of Maryland. That was something that was kind of a core part of their ethos and their pedagogy about what they taught. And I think it's important and I recognize the sort of value of it as a practicing architect.

00;33;36;09 - 00;33;55;16

DP

Back when I was in Maryland, working in Baltimore, I was out on set with a contractor and he said, “Doug, do us a favor. Do yourself a favor. Always draw something that can be built.” So, learn construction, right? You may be an architect and you may want to be a designer, but you've got to learn how everything goes together first. That’s great advice.

00;33;55;18 - 00;34;20;00

DK

Yeah. And we try to practice this in our office now. Myself and my partners, we all kind of grew up together here at the firm. Once you get through one really big project of consequence, it makes you a better designer for the next project. It's like learning a language. It's like learning a grammar. Once you understand it and can speak the language and know how to form sentences and the structure of it all, it just makes you a better designer for the next one.

00;34;20;04 - 00;34;26;16

DP

Absolutely. David, it's been great to have you here. Thanks for your time. Where can people go to learn more about BKSK architects?

00;34;26;23 - 00;34;35;25

DK

bksk.com Please go ahead and visit. We're also on all of the major social media platforms. Welcome anyone's input, or anyone wants to reach out.

00;34;36;01 - 00;34;38;19

DP

Awesome. Thank you very much. It’s been great to have you as a guest.

00;34;38;21 - 00;34;42;15

DK

Thanks for having me. This was really fun.

TRANSCRIPT

00;00;00;00 - 00;00;05;13

Doug Patt (DP)

Let's go inside the vault. The design vault.

00;00;05;15 - 00;00;30;15

Peter Vanderpoel (PV)

Even though it wasn't important at the moment, but with COVID, the idea of having a prominent place or office in the house also came to the fore during the design process, three car garage, the expectation of a pool, some sort of flattened area for a deck around that pool, and then we've got the very steep hill in the back that turned into this terrace for someone could lay out there and get sun. It's fairly private there in the center of that spot.

00;00;30;17 - 00;02;15;21

DP

This is my guest, Peter Vanderpoel. I'll share more about him shortly. In this episode from The Design Vault, we’ll highlight Peter's project, Guilford Court. Guilford Court is a luxury home in a suburban area of McLean, Virginia. The lot is angular and located on a cul-de-sac with narrow street frontage. It's also quite steep, rising 20 feet as it extends back from the street.

Peter uses three separate virtual axes to inform the floor plan and programmatic organization of the house. The garage, located on the south side of the property, is clad in wood, while the private portion of the house, which resembles a kind of modern Tudor facade, is enclosed in fiber cement siding. The middle semipublic spaces are enclosed in a dark brick veneer.

The landscape also reflects the same three axis grid with sculpted geometry that level out the site.

Hi, I'm Doug Pat and this is Design Vault.

Today we're talking to Peter Vanderpoel, registered architect of Vanderpoel Architecture. Peter is a practicing architect, licensed in Maryland, Washington, D.C., and Virginia. His practice focuses on residential and small commercial projects in and around Washington, D.C. He received a Bachelor of Architecture from the University of Kansas and a Master of Architecture from Virginia Tech.

He's a certified Passive House consultant and has taught architecture at the university level for over ten years. He's currently an adjunct professor at Virginia Tech's Washington Alexandria Architecture Center, located in Alexandria, Virginia. So, let's get into the details. Welcome, Peter.

00;02;15;26 - 00;02;16;14

PV

Thank you.

00;02;16;16 - 00;02;27;21

DP

Thank you very much for being here. So first, tell us a little bit about Peter Vanderpoel architecture. Where you guys located? What type of projects do you take? And what have you been working on lately?

00;02;27;23 - 00;02;55;18

PV

The practice is located in Arlington, Virginia. If you're from the area, it's not far from the courthouse metro. Arlington used to be part of DC before receded back to Virginia a few hundred years ago. So we're right near downtown D.C. The practice is mostly residential and some small commercial projects. I'm trying to expand some of the commercial portfolio just to have a better balance in the marketplace. But I've been practicing - I've been on my own now for about 20 years now.

00;02;55;20 - 00;03;02;01

DP

Wow. So, tell me a little bit about the office. So how many people do you have working with you? Is that pretty consistent?

00;03;02;08 - 00;03;27;04

PV

So, the studio is in the backyard of my house, but it is off grid, so I have solar panels to run it and huge battery and a room in the back. It's not a passive house quality in terms of the exterior envelope, but it sort of leans those ways in response to the site. But it's very small. It's not much bigger than a garage. And I have two employees there, one full time, one part time. We can spend most of our day in there in a pretty comfortable fashion.

00;03;27;06 - 00;03;34;18

DP

That's pretty cool. Let's dig into that a little bit. So when did you decide to have an office or a building on your property that was off grid?

00;03;34;20 - 00;04;16;26

PV

Well, we used to have a garage. It was doing self-demolition over time. It used to be – it was not a Sears and Roebuck house, but it was a kit house from the 1980s. Yeah. And I forget the name of the company that made it. And it was one story. So, when my wife originally bought the house and then when our first child came, we decided to add the second floor.

And then I was working in the basement for a long time. But as the practice progressed, decided that I needed extra space. So, we finished off the demolition where the garage was essentially put it in the same location. But it's a story and a half. There's one floor and then there's a mezzanine above. Both my wife and I paint and so we have a couple easels up there on that second level. But the lower floor is all architecture.

00;04;17;03 - 00;04;19;19

DP

That's so cool. How long has your office been there then?

00;04;19;21 - 00;04;28;19

PV

Physically, for about five years. I started doing my own residential work in about 2001 when I was in graduate school, evenings and weekends.

00;04;28;22 - 00;04;31;16

DP

So, your first client, was that somebody you knew?

00;04;31;18 - 00;04;52;05

PV

No. It's a woman and I – she had a house not too far away, and she wanted to make it more energy efficient. So, we worked on that together. It went very well. And she decided that she wanted to do a more robust project. She bought the house across the street from her. Kind of a long, interesting story that goes with that. But then we built a new house for her and that was sort of my first big project.

00;04;52;12 - 00;04;57;02

DP

So, have you always been interested in energy efficiency in architecture and building?

00;04;57;08 - 00;05;29;16

PV

No, to be honest, it doesn't come up as often as you'd think and conversations with clients. But it's something that I'm trying to push now. As a passive house consultant, I can see the value of it, and it's not that difficult to get to. That's kind of fussy when it comes to construction, but in terms of the cost, it's making a much better envelope.

The tail on idea is that the mechanical systems, they don't need to be that special because you're not using them that much. The idea is not to be clever about producing energy, it’s to avoid using it in the first place. So, keep what you have.

00;05;29;18 - 00;05;34;26

DP

So, is it gotten less expensive over the last five or ten years to do energy efficient homes?

00;05;35;02 - 00;05;38;16

PV

I don't think so, because all of the construction costs have gone up after COVID.

00;05;38;22 - 00;05;39;10

DP

Oh wow, interesting.

00;05;39;10 - 00;05;54;11

PV

Everything associated with construction is – most of its up. Some things are starting to come down now. There are some materials that sort of lend towards that or lean towards the passive house and they're expensive like everything else. So, I don't think so.

00;05;54;18 - 00;06;02;28

DP

Interesting. Well, I’d love to talk more about that, but we're here to talk about Guilford Court. So, let's dig in here. How did you guys get the project? How did you get Guilford Court?

00;06;03;05 - 00;06;25;10

PV

I used to belong to a business networking group, and it was there that a friend of mine who was an insurance agent had met somebody who did construction. He wanted to do some projects and I went and had coffee with him one time, and then he had some backers who wanted to do a luxury home, and they found a lot in McLean. So he gave me the call and then we got started on the project from there. So, it was through business networking.

00;06;25;13 - 00;06;40;08

DP

Okay, so you didn't know the clients initially. Interesting. So, let's talk a little bit about the site. Tell me a little bit about the architecture around the site and I guess I should ask, was there a house on the site before you guys got there?

00;06;40;14 - 00;07;13;14

PV

Yes, there was. So, most of the houses there on that cul-de-sac were built, I would think in the seventies, the split-level brick. And over time – so when I first saw the site, all the houses on the cul-de-sac were like that. And during the design and construction process, I think at least two of them now have been torn down and rebuilt. There are a lot of tear downs in Washington D.C. because a lot of people come into the neighborhood – Amazon and whatnot – so it's not too hard to sell a house in that area at this moment. The houses that were on the lots were McMansion. I mean, I want to say-

00;07;13;17 - 00;07;17;05

DP

Sure. So stylistically, colonial stuff?

00;07;17;07 - 00;07;37;24

PV

Yes, colonial, stucco, no modern leanings at that time. That was sort of just before things were starting to get modern in the general building industry in D.C. So, it was typical suburban, large suburban houses. McLean's a wealthy community, so they're large and very nice but kind of standard stuff.

00;07;38;00 - 00;07;44;19

DP

Sure. So, it was kind of goofy when your client was like, hey, I want to do something modern. You're thinking, oh boy-

00;07;44;21 - 00;07;47;09

PV

Oh no. That's what I want to hear! I mean, the nice thing is I-

00;07;47;09 - 00;07;58;01

DP

No, I meant for all the neighbors – potentially for the neighbors. Sure. Right in the back of their mind. Did they ever talk about that? Hey, do you think, you know, we're going to put something modern here? We're excited about that. We don't really care.

00;07;58;05 - 00;08;09;10

PV

I think there's enough new things in that market, and new neighbors and so on that it's not as tight as it might be in terms of styles. And I think that's okay.

00;08;09;13 - 00;08;11;00

DP

How long has the house been finished now?

00;08;11;06 - 00;08;12;18

PV

It's been a couple – three years.

00;08;12;19 - 00;08;15;08

DP

Okay. So, you would have heard by now through the clients?

00;08;15;15 - 00;08;17;20

PV

Yes.

00;08;17;22 - 00;08;26;01

DP

So, let's see, programmatic requirements. So, you guys had your first meeting and they said, this is what we want. What was that?

00;08;26;03 - 00;09;25;17

PV

Well, the program was fairly standard, in that, the expectation to be a family, a number of bedrooms, a studio – if there was an artist, that would be sort of back on the site, but even though it wasn't important at the moment, but with COVID, the idea of having a prominent place or an office in the house also came to the fore during the design process – three car garage, the expectation of a pool, some sort of flattened area for a deck around that pool, and then we've got this very steep hill in the back that turned into this terrace for someone could lay out there and get sun. It's fairly private there in the center of that spot. So, in terms of the programmatic elements, they were more luxurious than some, but nothing out of the ordinary.

And then it was mostly dealing with the site that I think the interest started to come into the project because the first time I saw it, there was a house on there. We went out the back door and I went, ‘Oh my.’ In school you always go, ‘Oh, this will be challenging,’ but then in real life it's like, ‘oh, how are we going to do this?’

00;09;25;19 - 00;09;36;00

DP

So, did they talk about square footage in the beginning too? We want a house that's going to be 5,400 square feet, 3,000 square feet, 8,000. They have an idea because of square foot costs. Did they think about the house-

00;09;36;00 - 00;09;45;23

PV

No. As it was built – so, the contractor made some changes as the project was built. So, there was square footage added between permit and occupancy.

00;09;46;01 - 00;09;47;28

DP

You can do that? Don't you have to re permit?

00;09;48;03 - 00;09;56;08

PV

Different jurisdictions. Like they don't have an FAR in McLean. That's Fairfax County. Alexandria does and it's a-

00;09;56;09 - 00;09;59;09

DP

Yeah, I know. I deal with FAR like, it never ends.

00;09;59;09 - 00;09;59;19

PV

Yeah.

00;09;59;23 - 00;10;05;28

DP

And then you start thinking about renovating the basement and then FAR comes back in and you're working on the house and it's crazy.

00;10;06;01 - 00;10;08;29

PV

Yeah, it's just lot coverage there, and that's never a problem.

00;10;08;29 - 00;10;10;27

DP

Okay. What size is the house?

00;10;11;01 - 00;10;13;03

PV

I think it's 7,000.

00;10;13;03 - 00;10;29;18

DP

Okay, so let's talk a little bit about the building design. So, we already discussed the fact that you've got a site with some challenging topography. Talk a little bit about the unique geometry or the geometries that were generated based on what's physically out there.

00;10;29;18 - 00;12;18;03

PV

So, the lot as it looks in plan, in the site plan, it kind of looks like the state of Georgia and the Atlantic coast of Georgia, which just a little bit to the northeast of Florida is what's on the cul-de-sac. So, there's a very small entrance circle for the cul-de-sac, very small entrance onto the site, and then very steep as it goes up in the back.

And then these two angles that almost describe 60 degrees from the two property lines that go away from the cul-de-sac. And so, my first inclination was, well, that's almost 60 degrees. And so, a hexagonal plan would work on a plot like that. So, then I started looking at precedents for that. I know Frank Lloyd Wright had done the Hanna house in California that was based on the hexagon. He had done a whole series of projects based on geometry. So, I had looked at those, but it was through that less hexagonal forms and more towards three axes rather than we normally think of two axes that X and Y. But this now has these 120-degree rotation that with a hexagon you have three axes that are involved in describing that geometry and that was essentially the same geometry we had on that site. So that became the basis for the design.

And there were three geometries. We've got three programmatic elements of getting the cars on and off the semipublic and then the private. And then we also have this dramatic rise in height. So, we could also do the same thing vertically. We had the garage at the lowest level so the cars can get on easily. The semipublic now faces the street on this very narrow frontage and then the private is up highest and essentially resting on top of the semipublic block and runs back. But because the site is so steep, it touches ground. It's a grade at the back of the property, even though it's sitting on top of the lower level at the front.

00;12;18;06 - 00;12;35;05

DP

So, you did a lot of thinking about this project. The clients must really love that. I mean, you sit down with them, and you start talking about these three axes and three levels, three buildings, three heights, you know, the whole thing up there must have been like, “wow, man, this is really cool. This guy knows what he's doing.”

00;12;35;07 - 00;13;15;20

PV

You had mentioned that I teach, and one of the things that I find the easiest way to engage with clients is to talk about ideas rather than just areas and square footage costs, because everybody wants to be on board with that because thinking is the fun part of the design. The best compliment I get is somebody says, I never thought of that. I feel like, well, so I'm bringing value to this.

I have proposed several different designs. I think I had three different options. I had pinned them all up in the office and had wine and cheese for some people come in and just talk about it, and the design that is there right now was not my first choice. But then someone had said, “well, you know, this has all these things going on with these three axes.” And then it was like, ‘yeah, I think that is the best one.’

00;13;15;26 - 00;13;18;12

DP

When you're talking about people, is that the clients or other people?

00;13;18;12 - 00;13;20;18

PV

No, no. Other people in the office.

00;13;20;21 - 00;13;27;19

DP

Oh, that’s so great. So, you had a kind of design charrette in the office. Everybody's looking at it. You stand back and you kind of go through all the design options.

00;13;27;26 - 00;13;36;09

PV

And then the same thing will happen with the client. This was a speculative house, so it wasn't dealing with the final client, with the person who's going to move into the house.

00;13;36;11 - 00;13;42;15

DP

Oh, it was a spec house. Interesting.

So, local zoning codes and issues there.

00;13;42;18 - 00;14;08;29

PV

Fairfax County isn't that onerous. The usual, there's lot coverage. There's no aesthetic review. They do have those in Georgetown, in D.C., and in Old Town, in Alexandria, Virginia. But most of the other jurisdictions don't have an aesthetic review. And so, we didn't have to worry about that. The FAR, which happens in Alexandria, but not in Fairfax, we didn't have that. It's just lot coverage. It's rarely a problem.

00;14;09;02 - 00;14;10;25

DP

There wasn't anything too challenging.

00;14;10;28 - 00;14;11;17

PV

No.

00;14;11;19 - 00;14;12;15

DP

And building codes, IRC?

00;14;13;11 - 00;14;19;18

PV

Yeah, well, it's - Virginia has a uniform state building code, which is based on the IRC, and they have a couple of tweaks in there. But yeah.

00;14;19;24 - 00;14;26;27

DP

Right. Of course, they do. So, describe the building plan for us. What did you end up with?

00;14;27;00 - 00;16;50;09

PV

Well, one is getting the cars on and off the lot. They can't – just the nature of cars – they can't be going up and down hill. So, we need to get them on the shortest route and the lowest route so that if you think about the site as a state of Georgia, the Florida borderline was where the cars came in. The semipublic faced the cul-de-sac. It addressed through there and then we had stairs going up this series of stones, because one of the concerns was that's a long way up to get to that first floor just because it's so steep. So, we have these stones on the site that are shifted. So, you're sort of walking across these lily pads and then a diagonal that goes up and then a set of stairs. So, there's a variety of experiences moving towards the front of the house.

We also had the office portion and that was right inside the front door. So, if someone in the house decides to set up office there, they have a client come by. They don't have to go into the main house just in and out the front door, take care of business.

And then from there, a few more steps go into the main house. So that opens up in a very large open space. There's the fireplace, dining, living, kitchen are all in that area. And then behind the kitchen is sort of the pool deck area for showers and changing and so on. And then there's a large circular stair that's the pin.

So, if you think about the semipublic and the private, they splay out at 120 degrees and the stairway is the pin that holds us together to do that rotation. So, there's a very large grand sculptural stair up to the second level, and it comes up between the master bedroom and the additional bedrooms so that when you move towards the cul-de-sac, you're now in the master bedroom suite that is like this big diving board looking over. It's a tremendous site of this that was very challenging. But being in that master bedroom and looking out over the trees, away from the site, it's a dramatic view. Going the other direction, there are the other bedrooms, as I said, eventually gets back to grade because it gets so steep in the back. And then there's also the stair continues down.

So, there's a family room in the basement, a large television there as well. And then on the other end, we have that same rotation with the garage, and that's a much more modest stair coming from the garage into that living space. But it's based on those three axes and those two hinges to turn it on to the site, both in plan and in section.

00;16;50;15 - 00;17;00;28

DP

Yeah, that's really cool. So, tell us a little bit about the building materials. We’ve already discussed the house is modern and you use a series of different materials for the house.

00;17;01;01 - 00;17;31;29

PV

Right. There's fiber cement boards for the bedroom space and then the semipublic was a brick, and then the garage was - I think there's a wood on there. So, we have a couple of different faces. There's a brick facade for the semipublic. I think there's some brick as well on the garage. And we also brought some of the brick inside in the living spaces. We wanted to have a variety of materials to represent because everything's now being divided into threes with the garage, semipublic, private spaces.

00;17;32;01 - 00;17;38;19

DP

So, tell me a little bit about why you guys chose to use brick and in particular the dark brick.

00;17;38;22 - 00;17;55;25

PV

The dark brick. That was not my selection. I did not select the colors on that element, but it would also be contrasting. You could see the dramatic change in color because as I said, it's about these three elements and so they read differently everywhere you cut it.

00;17;56;00 - 00;18;02;21

DP

And it would seem to me that you chose to use brick as a differentiated design element, right?

00;18;02;23 - 00;18;13;08

PV

Right. It's also very common in this part of the country. In Old Town, Virginia, and just all up and down the East Coast, brick was the way to do durable construction and still is.

00;18;13;10 - 00;18;17;13

DP

Are there any houses around this one – are masonry as well?

00;18;17;17 - 00;18;36;11

PV

Yes. So, the houses that were there in the neighboring lots, most of them were split level with a lower with brick on the first floor and siding on the second floor. The houses that have come in their place, the two I can think of are stucco, but there's a lot of brick in the neighborhood.

00;18;36;14 - 00;18;53;12

DP

So, this is, as we discussed, it's contemporary. I wanted to talk a little bit about the unique construction details. I'm looking at these two facades that come together at the corner, and we've got two completely different building materials. That must have been a challenging detail. And you got a window, you got a corner window there. So how did you guys do that?

00;18;53;20 - 00;19;59;16

PV

There's steel in there to handle that opening on the corner. The reason why that angle is the way it is – something else that we hadn't discussed is that I used to play the drums, and still do. And for a long time, I used to play actually, in a bagpipe band. More sophisticated than you think – but, so, rhythms is something that I've been dealing with since I was ten years old.

And one thing that came up is what called polyrhythms, where you have overlaying rhythms. You take two rhythms that may not be so interesting on their own, but when they're overlaid with each other, then it creates something more interesting than either of them were to begin with. And that's how I view this project that this overlay, the reason why that window angle is there on the corner is because the geometry of the private portion has been thrust through the semipublic and so there's an angle that goes through. The chimney was rotated along that as well, and the contractor turned that back. But it was that slot that pushed through that mirrors the same access that the private portion is on.

00;19;59;19 - 00;20;05;03

DP

Is the chimney also masonry? And that's supported by steel. Doesn't run straight through the building.

00;20;05;06 - 00;20;07;19

PV

Right. There are portions of it that are supported with steel.

00;20;07;19 - 00;20;11;06

DP

Did you guys end up using any brick on the interior?

00;20;11;08 - 00;20;29;24

PV

Well, there is you can see it on the lower portion there. There's brick for the fireplace surround, which is in the lower left photograph there.

And there were also two trees on the site where we ended up pulling those up, but the contractor had those milled and use them for the trim. The wood that's above the fireplace there is from those trees.

00;20;30;00 - 00;20;31;13

DP

Do you remember the species?

00;20;31;15 - 00;20;34;16

PV

My recollection will be black locus, but I'm not sure.

00;20;34;18 - 00;20;47;06

DP

I was going to ask you what some of the historical precedents were for the for the architecture, but clearly were into much more modern architecture here. However, as you said, we see brick in the area.

00;20;47;08 - 00;20;52;08

PV

Yeah, there's brick. The material is common in Northern Virginia. The building forms.

00;20;52;15 - 00;20;54;02

DP

Yeah. I was going to say we've got gables here.

00;20;54;02 - 00;21;01;21

PV

Yeah, that's pretty common as well. So, the basis of it is traditional, but the implementation has become modern.

00;21;01;24 - 00;21;12;26

DP

And tell me a little bit, what I call this modern Tudor aesthetic. Where did that come from? And I know it's not modern Tudor but describe that for our listeners.

00;21;12;28 - 00;21;22;15

PV

So, from this view, the division of the fiber cement is accomplished with these vertical elements that come proud of the exterior finish.

00;21;22;18 - 00;21;28;16

DP

Okay, so they're not set back into the fiber cement. They're actually proud. So, it's applied.

00;21;28;18 - 00;21;44;00

PV

Yeah. And so that could be considered a reference. It was not the intention, but the half timbers that was common with timber houses would use expressed wood materials and then with stucco in between those and then the angles for the roofs are fairly standard.

00;21;44;05 - 00;21;44;24

DP

Are those 12:12’s?

00;21;45;07 - 00;21;51;25

PV

Tudor style, yes, they are. The contractor ended up putting living space up there as well. So, you made good use of that space.

00;21;51;25 - 00;21;59;28

DP

Oh, of course, that's great. And you had no issues with having a third or fourth story there, right? So, were there any height restrictions on the site?

00;22;00;04 - 00;22;06;12

PV

There are, but Fairfax County, you add up, it's an average the way it was in the back. We were okay on the front.

00;22;06;13 - 00;22;10;19

DP

Right. You said the third story, which was the basement was set down into the site.

00;22;10;22 - 00;22;18;04

PV

Yeah. You can see it on the left, the lower right image there you can see the window for the basement below that large corner window.

00;22;18;08 - 00;22;23;25

DP

So, did you learn anything new about brick dealing with these details, even with this cantilever?

00;22;23;27 - 00;22;37;29

PV

Well, no, it's just with steel implemented in there, it's fairly common. If you go through D.C., the urban renewal period of Georgetown in the seventies and eighties, there’s brick everywhere. And so, everybody knows how to work with brick in D.C.

00;22;38;03 - 00;22;55;19

DP

Well, it's clear it solved a design issue for you guys because you were looking for a series of materials that all went together, and I love the color. It goes so well with everything else. It really just works. I think it looks great. Now, who did the drawings for the job and did you do them in 2D and 3D, 3D, BIM?

00;22;56;11 - 00;23;14;28

PV

No. Well, we did a sketch up model. I was renting some space with the firm down, and Alexander at the time had a woman helping me out to do most of the construction documents in AutoCAD. And then we had the sketch up models for presentation just to talk about the design. There was originally, that's when I used to draw with my hands. I used to do it on sketch paper.

00;23;15;04 - 00;23;33;05

DP

You and me both. It's so great. I got so lucky, I worked in an office in Baltimore, and they got so slow that they trained me on CAD. This was 97, 98. Thank God. I would have been completely unemployable for the rest of my life had I not learned how to draw and, you know, how to use sketch up, which is great.

00;23;33;05 - 00;23;39;09

PV

Well, yes, I do. When I started though, we had a product called GDS, and it was McDonnell Douglas.

00;23;39;11 - 00;23;42;03

DP

Okay, So airplane software. You’ve gotta be kidding me. That’s great.

00;23;42;03 - 00;23;49;24

PV

It was their software. And there was a manual that was about two inches thick. And yeah, once you read it, you were fine, but it wasn't that friendly.

00;23;50;01 - 00;23;54;10

DP

Oh my gosh. So, sustainability and this house.

00;23;54;12 - 00;23;55;07

PV

Not a concern.

00;23;55;12 - 00;24;01;03

DP

Not an issue with the GC? Just wasn't something that you were going to push as part of the design build aspect of the house.

00;24;01;16 - 00;24;03;15

PV

No, that wasn't a concern for this project.

00;24;03;16 - 00;24;08;03

DP