Housing and Community Development

I think that it is important to remember that the projects that win these AIA awards are not intended to be useful as prototypes for the rest of us to emulate in some formulaic way.  They bear the same relationship to builder-housing and even custom residential design that Paris runway fashion does to pret-a-porter.   They win awards precisely because a client has granted an architect a lavish budget, an incredible site, and a high degree of control over the program -- most likely all three -- and the architect has in turn responded with something visionary or even poetic.

Are the juries always right?  Of course not.  One rather imagines that every juror would take back some decision made ten or fifteen years back which in hindsight looks foolish.  But sometimes a piece of architecture stands the test of time and tells us (and perhaps future generations) something important about our times and our ideals, and even our selves.  Grousing that they're expensive, elitist, poorly insulated or that the roof looks like it might leak is to belabor the obvious and miss the point of their creation altogether. 

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Frederick Taylor AIA
Frederick Taylor, Architect
Washington DC
-------------------------------------------

While I absolutely agree and sympathize with many of the concerns that have been put forward on this forum, I also found it refreshing to finally have one architect respond in defense of the awarded houses. The point Frederick makes I think is a really valid one.  

I have volunteered as a docent for Mies' Farnsworth House in the past, and I thought that using this analogy may be helpful when trying to make the Farnsworth House accessible to non-architects who come to see it and say "I could never live in a place like this!  What was Mies doing to poor Edith Farnsworth!", because they prefer something more traditional.  One could respond that it is like a Paris runway fashion show-- regular people aren't going to wear those clothes everyday, just like regular people aren't going to live in little glass box houses everyday.  Rather, the whole purpose is to be something visionary or poetic, which is exactly what houses like the Farnsworth House, Philip Johnson's Glass House, Le Corbusier's Villa Savoye, and Frank Lloyd Wright's Fallingwater and Robie House are.  Just because ordinary people need ordinary houses to live in, doesn't mean we should stop making and celebrating visionary and important houses too.  It would have been a shame if these (and other) houses had never been built, if none of these architects had taken the opportunity of having a wealthy client to create something extraordinary and timeless, and if other architects had not recognized and celebrated these wonderful (if also sometimes outrageously impractical, expensive, energy inefficient, cracking, leaking, sagging, flooding, etc.) houses.  There is a place for good, high quality houses that ordinary people will want to live in, and truthfully, this is the kind of architecture that I personally am interested in creating.  I don't have any notions that I am some kind of genius who will be the next Mies or Wright, but I am glad that there are architects who do have this level of inspiration and creativity.  So in my mind, there is also a place for the extraordinary, visionary, poetic houses, too.  Both kinds of houses should be recognized and celebrated and I don't think it should be an either/or proposition.

I know that there are many different architecture awards given out by different organizations, but perhaps it would be helpful when announcing and describing these awards to the public in a forum such as Huffington Post to be clear what kind of award this is.  Is this particular award recognizing a house for its quality, functionality, energy efficiency, warmth, approachability, cost effectiveness, practicality, etc.?  Or is this house awarded for being striking, visionary, inspiring, thought-provoking, etc.?

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Kelby J. Phillips, Assoc. AIA
Intern
Garapolo/Maynard Architects
Oak Park IL
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Original Message:
Sent: 06-19-2012 13:45
From: Frederick Taylor
Subject: Housing awards

I think that it is important to remember that the projects that win these AIA awards are not intended to be useful as prototypes for the rest of us to emulate in some formulaic way.  They bear the same relationship to builder-housing and even custom residential design that Paris runway fashion does to pret-a-porter.   They win awards precisely because a client has granted an architect a lavish budget, an incredible site, and a high degree of control over the program -- most likely all three -- and the architect has in turn responded with something visionary or even poetic.

Are the juries always right?  Of course not.  One rather imagines that every juror would take back some decision made ten or fifteen years back which in hindsight looks foolish.  But sometimes a piece of architecture stands the test of time and tells us (and perhaps future generations) something important about our times and our ideals, and even our selves.  Grousing that they're expensive, elitist, poorly insulated or that the roof looks like it might leak is to belabor the obvious and miss the point of their creation altogether. 

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Frederick Taylor AIA
Frederick Taylor, Architect
Washington DC
-------------------------------------------

The skill and craft emblematic of the award winning appear unsound when one stops short to evaluate the livability, green realities, and cost. In every era a community of architects at least identifies with something and loves it and pretty much establishes the new norm.

This is a consensus of thought about complexity, and, a statement of the economy that fosters it. There is still an abundance of rich building form being produced while there reamains an overabundance of under employment, unemployment, and other economic quandaries. The failures are not the subjects of awards. Exceptionalism thrives in every economy, to some extent. 

What is it that prods about this year's awards? Nostalgia for an 80 year old vision of modernism? Or reminiscent about a 100 year old vision of shingle styles, it's a choice. All are revisted with nostalgia and bettered with creativity. 

And the comfort level with modernism has never been higher with the public - probably better than the 5% that affords it, probaly another 5% would wanna be, and another 10% appreciate it. Among architects, the numbers are radically skewed toward modernistic styles. I was reminded while driving north on Tuesday that the McDonald's prototype in Harrisburg, PA, now being reproduced globally, with its casual roof curve, is an epitome of modern language, down to the glass and white walls - with no fancy mansard applique and a flat roof. Burger bauhaus! 

I am reluctant, however, to attest that "vision" guides the design. The consensus of thinking has become so strong that it blinds vision at times. But modernism's commercial success is palpable, and has been for some time, a curve that some of the most successful talent rides. If the the most talented and skillful of the profession have deftly mastered the language, where are the visionaries fullfilling a truer form? Do we need to articulate another form that goes beyond form? Again?

Longing for vision can become nostalgic, too.

These buildings speak to us, and for those who read and write the language, don't be disappointed. The language is not the message, the consensus is not the vision. There are real visionaries out there, not all, but some grouped wrongly amongst the rest maybe. We have to find them, thin as they are, and tell why they are there. We have to take the next step and tell why the norms are passe too. 
  


. -------------------------------------------
Allen Neyman AIA
Principal
StovallSmithNeyman and Associates Architects
Germantown MD
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Original Message:
Sent: 06-20-2012 15:39
From: Kelby Phillips
Subject: Housing awards

While I absolutely agree and sympathize with many of the concerns that have been put forward on this forum, I also found it refreshing to finally have one architect respond in defense of the awarded houses. The point Frederick makes I think is a really valid one.  

I have volunteered as a docent for Mies' Farnsworth House in the past, and I thought that using this analogy may be helpful when trying to make the Farnsworth House accessible to non-architects who come to see it and say "I could never live in a place like this!  What was Mies doing to poor Edith Farnsworth!", because they prefer something more traditional.  One could respond that it is like a Paris runway fashion show-- regular people aren't going to wear those clothes everyday, just like regular people aren't going to live in little glass box houses everyday.  Rather, the whole purpose is to be something visionary or poetic, which is exactly what houses like the Farnsworth House, Philip Johnson's Glass House, Le Corbusier's Villa Savoye, and Frank Lloyd Wright's Fallingwater and Robie House are.  Just because ordinary people need ordinary houses to live in, doesn't mean we should stop making and celebrating visionary and important houses too.  It would have been a shame if these (and other) houses had never been built, if none of these architects had taken the opportunity of having a wealthy client to create something extraordinary and timeless, and if other architects had not recognized and celebrated these wonderful (if also sometimes outrageously impractical, expensive, energy inefficient, cracking, leaking, sagging, flooding, etc.) houses.  There is a place for good, high quality houses that ordinary people will want to live in, and truthfully, this is the kind of architecture that I personally am interested in creating.  I don't have any notions that I am some kind of genius who will be the next Mies or Wright, but I am glad that there are architects who do have this level of inspiration and creativity.  So in my mind, there is also a place for the extraordinary, visionary, poetic houses, too.  Both kinds of houses should be recognized and celebrated and I don't think it should be an either/or proposition.

I know that there are many different architecture awards given out by different organizations, but perhaps it would be helpful when announcing and describing these awards to the public in a forum such as Huffington Post to be clear what kind of award this is.  Is this particular award recognizing a house for its quality, functionality, energy efficiency, warmth, approachability, cost effectiveness, practicality, etc.?  Or is this house awarded for being striking, visionary, inspiring, thought-provoking, etc.?

-------------------------------------------
Kelby J. Phillips, Assoc. AIA
Intern
Garapolo/Maynard Architects
Oak Park IL
-------------------------------------------






Original Message:
Sent: 06-19-2012 13:45
From: Frederick Taylor
Subject: Housing awards

I think that it is important to remember that the projects that win these AIA awards are not intended to be useful as prototypes for the rest of us to emulate in some formulaic way.  They bear the same relationship to builder-housing and even custom residential design that Paris runway fashion does to pret-a-porter.   They win awards precisely because a client has granted an architect a lavish budget, an incredible site, and a high degree of control over the program -- most likely all three -- and the architect has in turn responded with something visionary or even poetic.

Are the juries always right?  Of course not.  One rather imagines that every juror would take back some decision made ten or fifteen years back which in hindsight looks foolish.  But sometimes a piece of architecture stands the test of time and tells us (and perhaps future generations) something important about our times and our ideals, and even our selves.  Grousing that they're expensive, elitist, poorly insulated or that the roof looks like it might leak is to belabor the obvious and miss the point of their creation altogether. 

-------------------------------------------
Frederick Taylor AIA
Frederick Taylor, Architect
Washington DC
-------------------------------------------

While fashion is an interesting analog to architecture, I find it falls short in several ways: fashion seldom threatens the health, safety, welfare or access of its owners, occupants or the general public; fashion lasts a season at best while architecture lasts a lifetime (centuries when done well); fashion has a large following that enjoys some public respect while avante garde architecture's following is a small fraction of that size and not as well-respected. Drawings, models and pure fine art can be visionary and poetic; what interests me is the environment as built, not only as envisioned to inspire. Does a building suit all of its purposes, including the mundane ones of function, shelter and life safety? If not, I don't consider it good architecture. Those characteristics are what separate architecture from sculpture.

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Sean Catherall, AIA
Herriman UT
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Original Message:
Sent: 06-20-2012 15:39
From: Kelby Phillips
Subject: Housing awards

While I absolutely agree and sympathize with many of the concerns that have been put forward on this forum, I also found it refreshing to finally have one architect respond in defense of the awarded houses. The point Frederick makes I think is a really valid one.  

I have volunteered as a docent for Mies' Farnsworth House in the past, and I thought that using this analogy may be helpful when trying to make the Farnsworth House accessible to non-architects who come to see it and say "I could never live in a place like this!  What was Mies doing to poor Edith Farnsworth!", because they prefer something more traditional.  One could respond that it is like a Paris runway fashion show-- regular people aren't going to wear those clothes everyday, just like regular people aren't going to live in little glass box houses everyday.  Rather, the whole purpose is to be something visionary or poetic, which is exactly what houses like the Farnsworth House, Philip Johnson's Glass House, Le Corbusier's Villa Savoye, and Frank Lloyd Wright's Fallingwater and Robie House are.  Just because ordinary people need ordinary houses to live in, doesn't mean we should stop making and celebrating visionary and important houses too.  It would have been a shame if these (and other) houses had never been built, if none of these architects had taken the opportunity of having a wealthy client to create something extraordinary and timeless, and if other architects had not recognized and celebrated these wonderful (if also sometimes outrageously impractical, expensive, energy inefficient, cracking, leaking, sagging, flooding, etc.) houses.  There is a place for good, high quality houses that ordinary people will want to live in, and truthfully, this is the kind of architecture that I personally am interested in creating.  I don't have any notions that I am some kind of genius who will be the next Mies or Wright, but I am glad that there are architects who do have this level of inspiration and creativity.  So in my mind, there is also a place for the extraordinary, visionary, poetic houses, too.  Both kinds of houses should be recognized and celebrated and I don't think it should be an either/or proposition.

I know that there are many different architecture awards given out by different organizations, but perhaps it would be helpful when announcing and describing these awards to the public in a forum such as Huffington Post to be clear what kind of award this is.  Is this particular award recognizing a house for its quality, functionality, energy efficiency, warmth, approachability, cost effectiveness, practicality, etc.?  Or is this house awarded for being striking, visionary, inspiring, thought-provoking, etc.?

-------------------------------------------
Kelby J. Phillips, Assoc. AIA
Intern
Garapolo/Maynard Architects
Oak Park IL
-------------------------------------------

Kelby,
You hit the nail right on the head. The answer to your question is the latter. When I chaired the housing Committee 14 years ago, we felt that the AIA did not have a recognition program for "merchant built" housing. Architectural Record Magazine celebrated the one of a kind art work houses each year in an issue directed for that purpose. We as a committee wanted to include the architects that were working on developer housing in a program to recognize exceptional examples of that market segment. The first few years as members of the original effort were involved that was maintained as a goal. Later when HUD was included lower priced range housing was also recognized. As the program evolved it migrated back to look like all the other award programs at the AIA, which were jurried by non residential architects and we are where we are. The sentiment that I am sensing by the dialogue in this thread is that there is a desire by the residential architects to celebrate what they do and what the home buying community through the developers are demanding. We as an organization need to demonstrate to them what great design can be achieved using standard materials and budget constraints, not one of a kind art works that they can not relate to. I buy the argument that runway designs generate better department store selections. But I do not think that most developers and homeowners can look at the contemporary modern boxes and translate them into what they may get in their subdivision. When we convinced Robert Ivy at Architectural Record and the AIA that we needed this award program 14 years ago, that was the argument I used. I was at the awards presentation at the AIA convention in Washington and could not help feeling saddened that the original mission was forgotten.
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Mike Rosen LEED AP ND AIA
The Martin Architectural Group, PC
Philadelphia PA
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In order for the Architectural Community to have a significant role in the most profitable portion of the building industry that has the most direct effect on regular Joe/ Jane's lives, we need to promote obtainable residential design. I also believe we must continue celebrating excellence at the highest level as that's what we have always done. Because of how buildings are erroneously valued by the banks and their appraisers, there is no incentive to design anything. When a wonderful Architectural House is compared equally to a lousy mass produced, cheap box, then how can we survive? A wonderfully designed house isn't the same status symbol as the Gucci purse, the BMW, the Vera Wang dress. There is no way to create a brand with inherent value when the bank equally compares your work to that of your mass production competitors, even when your work out sells theirs every time. Even when your houses are always the top comp on everyone's appraisal in your area. They refuse to recognize that the most likely result of the next sale will be close to that of YOUR last sale, not the average of your competitors. The banks and appraisers see nothing in a house as being unique, they are only obsessed on the value of the "Location". I've never seen a homebuyer walk up to a house, scoop up a handful of dirt and say, "I'll take it!" In order for the banks and appraisers to understand there is a difference is to flood the marketplace with better houses and make them take notice there's a difference! Our only contribution is design and it just doesn't matter when it comes to housing because everyone has to use a bank to buy the house.

We should have awards in categories across the income spectrum and quit focusing on one version of modernism. It's not just the AIA, juries, etc. Look at the magazines geared toward the Architects, which seem to differ from those geared toward the average homeowner. Architectural Digest and Architectural Record seem to be quite different and how many regular people are buying Record? I see Digest in the Drs office, but the only time I see Architecture magazine or Residential Architect is when I leave behind my old copies. The problem isn't just awards that tend to drive the next round of submissions, it's US! I'll be one of many to admit that I haven't found this magic new direction yet, but I think it's about time we really start trying to break the mould and produce something that resonates with everyone. You know the one house that still seems to amaze the average person and the professional Architect is of course, Falling Water. It was a career resurrector for a 60+ year old, washed up Wright. He was schooled by the International Style Architects for many years and then he played their game better by bringing the warmth of nature and organic Architecture to the aesthetic of the urban machine for living. I don't think anyone has nailed it like that since.

We are at a point in time much like when the Chicago Architects who walked away from the the World's Fair of 1893 in disgust. All they saw was Greek Revival Architecture and machines replacing humans. They realized Architecture had been stuck in a 3000 year old rut and the industrial revolution was threatening the quality of made items with promises of cheap quantity. Here we are today in a modernist rut and a Wal-merica of cheap mass produced Chinese made junk. We're making glass boxes being hailed as the beacon of energy efficiency excellence. The builders are forcing green gadgets into a worn out hodge podge of traditionalist, Mr. Potato Head aesthetics, where you don't even have to change the plan, you just sick a tapered column on the front and it's Craftsman or a little gingerbread and now it's Victorian. We've let the amateurs run the housing industry and let people fall in love with a confused aesthetic of historic-i-ness. We have concerned neighbors crying historic district because the average delivery method of housing has resulted in giant out of scale flat boxes. People resort back to what's familiar when we don't offer a better alternative for the future. It's our job to create the future!

-------------------------------------------
Eric Rawlings AIA
Owner
Rawlings Design, Inc.
Decatur GA
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Original Message:
Sent: 06-21-2012 11:58
From: Mike Rosen
Subject: Housing awards


Kelby,
You hit the nail right on the head. The answer to your question is the latter. When I chaired the housing Committee 14 years ago, we felt that the AIA did not have a recognition program for "merchant built" housing. Architectural Record Magazine celebrated the one of a kind art work houses each year in an issue directed for that purpose. We as a committee wanted to include the architects that were working on developer housing in a program to recognize exceptional examples of that market segment. The first few years as members of the original effort were involved that was maintained as a goal. Later when HUD was included lower priced range housing was also recognized. As the program evolved it migrated back to look like all the other award programs at the AIA, which were jurried by non residential architects and we are where we are. The sentiment that I am sensing by the dialogue in this thread is that there is a desire by the residential architects to celebrate what they do and what the home buying community through the developers are demanding. We as an organization need to demonstrate to them what great design can be achieved using standard materials and budget constraints, not one of a kind art works that they can not relate to. I buy the argument that runway designs generate better department store selections. But I do not think that most developers and homeowners can look at the contemporary modern boxes and translate them into what they may get in their subdivision. When we convinced Robert Ivy at Architectural Record and the AIA that we needed this award program 14 years ago, that was the argument I used. I was at the awards presentation at the AIA convention in Washington and could not help feeling saddened that the original mission was forgotten.
-------------------------------------------
Mike Rosen LEED AP ND AIA
The Martin Architectural Group, PC
Philadelphia PA
-------------------------------------------

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Perry Cofield AIA
Design Ways & Means Architects
Arlington VA
-------------------------------------------
I hope Mr. Rosen can get back to Mr. Ivy and discuss the situation once again. Having worked for a midcentury "Master" back in the day, here is the difference between then and now:  Whereas the public has accepted the futuristic designs of the auto manufacturers readily, this is hardly so for the single family house.  Whether driven by love of cottage, builder mentality, etc the public has not, in 50 years, grabbed the Machine for Living aesthetic.  So the award winners come off as Jetson-like (now in perpituity). There are a few winners locally for trad work- and there should be more at the National level, to show the public we are human!  Not only that, California awards needs to be considered more carefully, since there are no real energy issues in that state, compared to say, Massachussetts.





Original Message:
Sent: 06-21-2012 11:58
From: Mike Rosen
Subject: Housing awards


Kelby,
You hit the nail right on the head. The answer to your question is the latter. When I chaired the housing Committee 14 years ago, we felt that the AIA did not have a recognition program for "merchant built" housing. Architectural Record Magazine celebrated the one of a kind art work houses each year in an issue directed for that purpose. We as a committee wanted to include the architects that were working on developer housing in a program to recognize exceptional examples of that market segment. The first few years as members of the original effort were involved that was maintained as a goal. Later when HUD was included lower priced range housing was also recognized. As the program evolved it migrated back to look like all the other award programs at the AIA, which were jurried by non residential architects and we are where we are. The sentiment that I am sensing by the dialogue in this thread is that there is a desire by the residential architects to celebrate what they do and what the home buying community through the developers are demanding. We as an organization need to demonstrate to them what great design can be achieved using standard materials and budget constraints, not one of a kind art works that they can not relate to. I buy the argument that runway designs generate better department store selections. But I do not think that most developers and homeowners can look at the contemporary modern boxes and translate them into what they may get in their subdivision. When we convinced Robert Ivy at Architectural Record and the AIA that we needed this award program 14 years ago, that was the argument I used. I was at the awards presentation at the AIA convention in Washington and could not help feeling saddened that the original mission was forgotten.
-------------------------------------------
Mike Rosen LEED AP ND AIA
The Martin Architectural Group, PC
Philadelphia PA
-------------------------------------------