Vistas at Modern Atlanta 2012

We only had time for 4 houses at the Modern Atlanta home tour this year but I was overwhelmed.

It's hard enough to keep the familiar in my head and these modern homes are anything but familiar.

I mostly put away my objectivity and my camera and went along for the ride.

I found myself looking out as much as looking in..


I found myself enjoying scenes like this. Did the architect - Scott West - intend this vista? Did he design it just for me?


Did Matt Walsh design this for just me? I spent the afternoon as docent at Matt and Fran's house admiring the view. I'm sure he intended this "window overlooking life." See Pattern 192 of  A Pattern Language.


It takes a big painting to balance this smallish window thanks to the architects Cara Cummins and Jose Tavel from TaC Studios

 
This is Bill Carpenter from Lightroom STUDIO (fingers on chin). In this house I felt sheltered from the elements but I didn't feel "inside."

Wait 'til next year.

This Modern Teardown is Done

I'm participating in Metamorphosis Monday at Between Naps on the Porch. Thanks to Susan!

This spec house sold long before it was done.


I blogged another spec teardown a few weeks ago. It is traditional and quite handsome. It hasn't sold 3 months after completion.

I guess folks who want moderns want moderns, and moderns are rare. This proved to be a good bet.


I took work-in-progress tour on caravan. It got offers when it looked like this.

Though I'm not instinctively attracted to moderns, I developed a crush.


Before: a flat lot on a hilltop, fronted by a giant oak, served by a rare alley, in one of Atlanta's great neighborhoods, about 4 blocks from George's.


The lot is 8250 square feet, 0.189393 acre. It's narrow and deep. The house was built in 1930 at 1,156 square feet. The alley frees up the lot, you don't need a driveway.

Brian and Jeff told me that the original intent in 1930 was to build the big house later. That never happened.


The ally. Houses here have way more than you'd suspect from the street.
Some folks want to show all they got to the street. Others prefer a bit of modesty.


The no-driveway look is uncanny in Atlanta. Even our mansions have prominent driveways.

Our little house was so small and so far from the street it seemed to be from another planet.


You might think the new house is from another planet too, but inside, it made sense to me.

The ground floor has the garage. The bedroom suite/office windows make you feel like you are in the garden.

The main floor is one big room with windows on all four sides. See the panorama below.

The top floor has the bedrooms.

The rooftop deck is probably the highest on a single family home in the city limits and yet it's in the canopy.

It has stacked closets ready for an elevator.


This is the CDC in a hazy day.


The master is spectacular but cozy. How it manages to be cozy amidst all the glass I don't know. But it does - secret architect trick I guess.


Here is the big room.


The head on view. Isn't it great not to have a driveway?


Here is is in context with neighbors and the big oak.


Congratulations to architect Brian Ahern of Studio BA and Jeff Darby of Darby Studio.

If I've learned anything it's that pictures are no substitute for being there; and that being there often changes my mind.

Thanks to Metamorphosis Monday at Between Naps on the Porch.

To clad Vuiton in Onyx call Michael Ra at Front Inc.

Michael Ra's and Front Inc's specialty is skinning, skinning buildings that is.

Think of all the "starchitects" out there and all those crazy buildings. Somebody has to figure out the skin: How to engineer it, keep the water out, keep it from falling off in hurricanes and earthquakes, how to manufacture it, how to install it, how to maintain it, how to build it on budget on time.

You have to clean the windows and it's very dusty in the UAE.

What if the architect wants Onyx? Call Front Inc.


Lvmn Paradise Building in Osaka by Kengo Kuma + Associates. Photo from Flickr courtesy of Hiromitsu Morimoto.


Michael Ra visited the Georgia Tech College of Architecture this week.

He explained how they did the onyx: Take a sheet of Onyx; clad both sides in glass; slice the onyx in half so that you end of with 2 panels of onyx faced glass. Of course. Why didn't I think of that?


At least the onyx is flat. What if you need curves?

Or curved glass, or glass panels.


In any case you have to design it so it can be manufactured and installed.


You've got to test it. This is the glass "ceiling" for the Marion Koogler McNay Art Museum in San Antonio.

I asked Michael how he came to be a skinner. He said that Illinois Institute of Technology is strong in the engineering aspect of architecture. He must have had a knack. One of his instructors hired him right out of school.


He seemed to enjoyed the challenge that resulted in drawings like these as much as he enjoyed finished project.


Isn't specialization limiting? Doesn't is stifle creativity? For Michael, it doesn't seem so. In fact I'm pretty sure that he loves what he's doing.

And if your clients include Richard Meier, Renzo Piano, Frank Ghery and a host of others around the world, how boring can it be?

I was most amused during the Q&A. Folks asked about his firm's "agenda" was it about sustainability, conservation, being green. Micheal said his firm was young and their agenda is "getting it built."

Thanks to Micheal Ra, to Georgia Tech, and to Assistant professor Tristan Al-Haddad and to Professor George Johnson, chair of the School of Architecture for making me feel at home.

Terry's Must Do List September 22 - October 1

I hope to do all these. If you are in Atlanta, I hope to see you there and maybe at a few more events.

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1. The Atlanta Preservation Center's first "Sacred Spaces" tour starts this Thursday.
It runs September 22, 24, 25, 2011, Thursday, Saturday, and Sunday. It's 7 mini-events that cross the spectrum of Atlanta's religious community and history. Churches are, hands down, our best collection of buildings. They are meant to inspire our best impulses. They each mean something personal to 100s' and thousands of our neighbors, across generations. This is the best of architecture tourism.

Thursday September 22, 2011 6:00 pm
Ahavath Achim Synagogue - Tour & Film

Saturday September 24, 2011 9:00 am
Paces Ferry United Methodist Church - Open House

Saturday September 24, 2011 11:00 am
Al Farooq Masjid - Guided Tour

Saturday September 24, 2011 3:00 pm
Big Bethel African AME Church - Guided Tour

Saturday September 24, 2011 4:30 pm
South-View Cemetery - Guided Tour

Sunday September 25, 2011 1:00 pm
Paces Ferry United Methodist Church - Open House

Sunday September 25, 2011 1:15 pm
North Avenue Presbyterian Church - Guided Tour

Sunday September 25, 2011 2:15 pm
North Avenue Presbyterian Church - Guided Tour

The Atlanta Preservation Center labors quietly, doing what they can to advocate for preservation in Atlanta. Please like them on Facebook, right now. Follow them @PreserveAtlanta on Twitter. This is their "office" at the Grant Mansion.

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2. Spotlight On Design at SWITCH Modern - Radcliffe Bailey, Merrill Elam, and Brian Bell on Wednesday, September 28 6p-8.
"Spotlight on Design"is SWITCH Modern's monthly salon. On Wednesday architects Merrill Elam and Brian Bell will discuss Radcliffe Bailey's house/studio. That's pretty darn good if you ask me. Might be a crowd, you'll need to R.S.V.P.

All the cool design kids will be there, it's easy and easy going, kind'a looks like this:

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3. Flux 2011, Friday, September 30, 2011 8pm-12 in Castleberry Hill
I don't know how to put it: You walk Castleberry Hill in the dark from one "event" to another and it gets all magic on you. Art, dance, sounds, projections, performance, light, you won't be able to take it all in. Bring your buds; they'll thank you. You don't need to dress up but you are welcome to dress crazy.

You might see a projected lost zebra:

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4. Modern Atlanta hosts premiere of MY PLAYGROUND on October 1, 2011 7:30pm at Plaza Theater
I attended a press screening of this 50 minute film. It's about Parkour: "Parkour is a sport in which you have to go from one point of the city to another as efficiently and quickly as possible, overcoming any obstacles in your way: walls, fences, trees, etc. This has made Parkour THE urban sport, included in recent music videos, advertisements and feature films." You might have seen snippets of parkour in Youtube. It's odd, amazing, and a bit scary. It will make you want to do it or wish your were young enough to do it.

It could be a part of your Poncey-Highlands evening. It's the night of the October Ponce Crush too. This is not a dull place.

Maybe we'll see Anthony from Team SlipStream Parkour.


Please say hello if you see me.

This is last year's Architecture Tourist Flux team:

Three More Mid-Century Modern Days (and nights)

Part of the clan went to the beach again. I've blogged about the house before. It's worth a repeat from October 09.

But first: This is how we like to do it, how the architecture tourist beach bunny marine command gets the job done at Ormond by the Sea. The pelicans perform a fly-by.



Last weekend we visited Debbie and Dave in their mid-century modern home 1300 feet from the beach. We'd been several times before but this time we played Architecture Tourists.

I confess that I'm tired of the words "mid-century modern." The pictures in magazines and on the web are all about the extreme show houses of the time. And the furniture, well, you know what I mean.

But there are a ton of ordinary, good-living modern houses and we had 3 nights to enjoy one of them. And enjoy it we did. It's a remarkably pleasant house.

Here she is, 2 bedrooms, 2 baths, single garage (with workshop and laundry), huge screened lanai and screened pool, about 1300 square feet. It sits on a street with similar ranchers, some with 2 car garages and 3 bedrooms. Built in 1964, perhaps from a pattern book.



Here is the entrance. Notice the overhangs and big windows. Does anyone know what to call those concrete trellis things on either side of the doors? (The perforated concrete wall is called a brise soleil, French for sun breaker - thanks to Spencer Howard) The street has a great variety of those things. Whatever they are called, there are 17 feet of floor to ceiling windows behind them opening to the big room. The back side of the big room also has 17 feet of floor to ceiling windows that can open completely to the lanai. And that is a nice room.



Deb and Dave replaced the solid front doors with these all glass doors. Obviously it was designed to have glass doors.

Can imagine this view with solid doors? It wasn't nearly as good. My eye avoided looking over there. Now, the trellis thingys frame the view through the doors. It's a Zen view (134. ZEN VIEW). Even at night with outdoor lights this view works to extend the big room. Tara would be proud of the vanishing threshold and that's not the only one in the house.



Here is my hand drawn floor plan. Note the floor to ceiling windows. Each is a vanishing threshold. They make the house feel huge. It's like the huge lanai is part of the master, the big room, and the kitchen.



For you Pattern Language Fans: 159. LIGHT ON TWO SIDES OF EVERY ROOM. Enough said except: Notice the bath between the bedrooms? It has just one window over the toilet. Yet, it is a most pleasant space. Following the pattern, it works because it is a wide window, with a deep reveal in a very shallow room. Nice, nice, nice.

Before I quit two words:

Terrazzo Floors. I think the entire house has Terrazzo floors now done in wood. But the terrazzo is still there in the bathrooms. Until this house, I didn't realize that I love Terrazzo floors. Nice, nice, nice.

Wait, there is a puzzle: My house has more and bigger windows but Deb & Dave's is brighter inside. How come? Well, Atlanta has big, tall trees. At our place they smother the house in the summertime. On Deb and Dave's barrier island there aren't any tall trees, at all. It makes a big difference. When the leaves are gone and the sun is lower, our house brightens right up.

Thanks,
Terry

4-sights from the 9th

I have brain lock. I'm trying to do a post about the Modern Atlanta 2011 fashion show fund raiser. So far it's more than my little brain can handle.

So here are a few sights from the 9th floor of 2 Peachtree Pointe. Architecture tourists will recognize everything but perhaps not from this angle.


Millions saw the front and inside of "The Temple" in "Driving Miss Daisey" but few have seen the cupola from up here.


The Temple is way bigger than it appears from Peachtree.


The roof of Rhodes Hall is quite a sight from here. You can see one of the skylights.


Peachtree Christian Church is a landmark but did you know about all those magnolias? The steeplejack in the blue shirt went right over the side after I took this pictures. I didn't feel so hot after after watching that.


The lobby of WSB. Which was first, this or the Louvre? Have you been inside?


I didn't like this so much until I saw it from eye-level. Now, I have a crush. It wasn't always a Chick-fil-A sign.

That's four sights. If you've been kind enough to read this far, you get a bonus: my #1 favorite sight from the 9th floor.


Our first-born and my escort to the fashion show surveys her realm.

Michaganer's install "Edge Condition" for Modern Atlanta 11.

The 2011 winners of 10UP: Lisa Sauvé & Adam Smith, Synecdoche

(Si-NEK-duh-kee) “simultaneous understanding”

They won a cash award and a budget for the project.


Edge Condition at Octane Coffee Bar at Dusk on June 9.

"Organized by YAF Atlanta and now in its second successful year, the goal of 10UP is to design a temporary installation and to create a unique spatial experience while also complimenting the MA (Modern Atlanta) MA11 “Design is Human” event with a large scale design element accessible to hundreds of event patrons"

There is catch: Edge Condition is gone! It will reappear in January at Museum of Design Atlanta "MODA" but it probably won't look exactly like this.

"...must be assembled within 24 hrs prior to the MA11 “Design is Human” Kickoff and disassembled within 24 hrs of MA11 “Design is Human” Closing) with simple tools and an assembly crew."

I visited at Dusk on Thursday and walked around. I'm glad I did.


It's a pile of hardwood sticks diverted into a sculpture between the sawmill and the chipper.


Best pile of sticks I've seen for a while.

Lisa & Adam flew from Michigan to tear it down. I went on that warm Sunday morning, June 12, so I could meet them and take their picture. A small crew from the AIA and neighborhood gathered to help.


Left to right: J5, Adrienne Froemelt, Nathan Koskovich, Lisa Sauvé, Adam Smith, J5 the Dog.


Augers, plates and cables held the whole thing together.


Adam and Nathan took to the lifts.


I preferred staying with Adreinne and Lisa on the ground crew.


They used a Hero to capture a time-lapse. Have you seen a Hero before? I like it. I hope we'll see a video soon.

Congratulations to Lisa Sauvé & Adam Smith, Synecdoche. Come back to Atlanta any time. there is a nice article about in Dezeen.

Here are all my pictures from 10Up.

P.S. Remember last year's winner?

PERISCOPE by Matter Design
Brandon Clifford
Wes McGee
Dave Pigram
Matthew H. Johnson