The World’s Best Architecture, Interiors, and Design

I use Microsoft Edge as the web browser on my laptop. I could just as easily have set up Google Chrome as my web browser, but Edge was the default offering with Windows 10 so that’s what I roll with. Upon launching, Edge presents me with Microsoft’s live news feed. I typically enjoy my morning cup of coffee scanning what Microsoft thinks is of daily curiosity to me. I do find it more than mildly unsettling content-based algorithms so effectively interpret my digital footprints and assess my interests, but that’s a topic for another blog post. The upshot is the Internet knows me well enough to have brought the 2020 Dezeen Awards results to my attention.

First launched in 2006, Dezeen is now one of the leading online architecture, interiors, and design magazines. Its annual awards program, now in its third year, attracts thousands of entries from around the world. A huge jury—the 2020 panel included 75 leading architecture and design luminaries—picked the winners across a broad assortment of categories. I must admit I haven’t been the greatest fan of other media platforms who have made their mark as self-proclaimed arbiters of cutting-edge design—I’m looking at you Dwell—but I found the judging criteria Dezeen asked its jurors to consider and the projects the members of the jury selected truly encouraging.

I’m encouraged because for too long awards juries and Dezeen’s architecture and design media peers have prioritized aesthetics above other concerns, and seemingly mandated conformance with a strictly modernist orthodoxy.(1) In my opinion, style should not be a prerequisite for consideration of a project’s full complement of virtues. Additionally, too many of the privileged projects appear affordable only to the very well-heeled or have ignored architecture’s duty to minimize and mitigate humankind’s harmful impacts upon our planet. Dezeen rightly prioritized benefitting users and the environment in addition to beauty for its awards program, directing its jurors to consider social impact and sustainability and look for projects incorporating positive thinking in these areas. Specifically, the judging criteria included whether a design fulfils the following:

Beauty: Does it look amazing? Beauty is subjective but the jurors favor aesthetic rigor, good detailing, and a good use of materials.

Innovation: Does it incorporate original thinking or address a problem in a new way? Every entry does not have to reinvent the wheel but should provide evidence of fresh approaches and new ideas.

Benefits: Is it useful and considerate to both people and planet? A project doesn't have to set out to save the world, but it should show respect and consideration for users and the environment.

Many of the winning projects are stunning. Granted, passing judgment on them solely on written narratives and two-dimensional images is fraught with pitfalls. All the jurors cannot have visited and experienced each of the submitted projects in person. Certainly, most could not have walked through the buildings, observed how they are used, or spoken with the users. They could not have truly engaged them as works of architecture, and that’s a problem. Nevertheless, I like to believe the best projects do jump off the page (or screen), with their thoughtfulness and tectonic, three-dimensional brilliance shining through.  

Which of the 2020 award winners did I find most worthy? Here is my list; click on the links to open a new window for Dezeen’s complete set of project photos and accompanying description (I'm using images from the Dezeen Awards site; I do hope this is okay):

Capsule Hotel and Library, Zhejiang Province, China – Atelier Tao+C 

The Capsule Hotel and Library melds monastic cells devoted to retreat & respite with a triple-height atrium cum temple for reading inside the repurposed shell of an old rammed-earth structure nestled deep in the mountains. The project’s asceticism and serenity are palpable.

https://www.dezeen.com/2019/12/27/capsule-hotel-atelier-taoc-bamboo-bookshelves-china/

MuseumLab, Pittsburgh, PA – Koning Eizenberg Architecture

Originally commissioned in 1886 as the very first Carnegie Free Library in the country, the impressive neo-Romanesque edifice is now the home to MuseumLab, a makerspace on steroids dedicated to experimental art and technology programs for children. The extensive renovation preserves the original building’s architecture in the wake of a 2006 lightning strike and subsequent disrepair in the form of a “beautiful ruin.”

https://www.dezeen.com/2020/05/06/museumlab-carnegie-free-library-childrens-museum-of-pittsburgh-koning-eizenberg-architecture/  The museum’s own website boasts an even more impressive set of photos of the project.

Lasvit Headquarters, Novy Bor, Czech Republic – Ov-a Architeckti
Lasvit is a designer and manufacturer of glass for architecture, part of a long glassmaking history in the Northern Bohemia region of the Czech Republic. The company’s headquarters is comprised of two 19th century houses of a traditional style, now paired with two new structures of similar form and scale: one a translucent white “house” accommodating an employees’ café and meeting room, and the other a black counterpart containing studio spaces for the presentation of bespoke glass samples. The interventions preserve the historical character of what appears to be an established residential neighborhood. Simply brilliant.
https://www.dezeen.com/awards/2020/winners/lasvit-headquarters/

Smart Zendo, Hong Kong – Sim-Plex Studio
Smart Zendo does more with less, elegantly providing flexible, smart accommodations for four in what previously was a two-bedroom flat. The project is a model for minimizing one’s carbon footprint while living in a future world beset with resource scarcity.
https://www.dezeen.com/awards/2020/winners/smart-zendo/

Party and Public Service Center, Yuanheguan, China – LUO Studio

Another project from China, the design for this new community center transformed the concrete foundations of an abandoned residential project into a warm, light-filled series of spaces given form by salvaged timbers and other recycled materials. 
https://www.dezeen.com/2020/03/17/party-and-public-service-centre-luo-studio-architecture-china/

The Red Roof, Quang Ngai, Vietnam – TAA Design
The Red Roof heralds a project typology that empowers people at the local level to change their environments and become self-sufficient. Perhaps the gesture is more rhetorical than practical, though its modest scale and humble bearing suggest otherwise. The is precisely the kind of development we need more of now, whether it be in Vietnam, Oregon, or elsewhere. 
https://www.dezeen.com/awards/2020/winners/the-red-roof/

The various threads running through the projects I found most impressive are a repurposing or reimagining of existing structures (as opposed to unnecessarily razing them and starting from scratch), a respect for the physical and cultural context (vernacular and traditional, time-tested construction techniques), and their relative modesty. Also notable is the geographic diversity of the award-winners. Of course, it doesn’t hurt that each of the projects do look amazing too. Design excellence is a universal constant.

Kudos to Dezeen for raising the bar for design awards programs. Rather than merely stoking the vanity of designers in the thrall of appearance, style, and ego, Dezeen has earned its accolades by orchestrating a thoughtful means to honor projects presenting the design profession in its best light.

What will my Internet newsfeed bring me tomorrow? I don’t know but if there is more like what Dezeen brought me today, I’m looking forward to it.

(1) Read Duo Dickinson’s intelligent essay on this topic.

Travel

The Piazza San Marco - painting by Canaletto, circa 1725-27, one of his Grand Tour vedutas (view paintings) from the Collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art

Architects are well-known for their wanderlust. Travel means seeing new places, immersing oneself in unfamiliar settings and cultures, finding inspiration, being awed by the limitlessness of human potential and creativity, and much more. Many of my peers are inveterate explorers, always looking toward the next opportunity to vacation in another world city or exotic destination. Certainly, a broad perspective and a diverse bank of experiences are valuable assets for any designer.

“The Grand Tour”—a cultural circuit of Europe undertaken by privileged young men popular during the 17th and 18th centuries—would later serve as the model for the itineraries of many students of architecture, including myself. The latter half of 1979 and the first part of 1980 was my “gap year,” during which I worked in the Office of Facilities and Campus Development at the British Columbia Institute of Technology (following my two years of study there in the Architectural and Building Technology program and prior to transferring to the University of Oregon), but also embarked on an eye-opening backpacking journey throughout the UK, France, Switzerland, and Italy. Those 3-1/2 months of travel remain among the richest of my entire life. Every single day rewarded me with amazing and unforgettable experiences I will forever look upon fondly.

I have no doubt I am a better architect today because I chose to travel when I did as an impressionable student. Before my old-world tour, I hardly knew about or cared for architecture predating the advent of Modernism, so I was shocked and awe-struck by the splendor of so many older buildings I had been entirely unfamiliar with. The scale, character, and complex fabric of the historic cityscapes were likewise revelations. Having exposed myself to so much that was new to me, I immediately grasped there was an enormous body of work to study beyond the limits of what I had known or thought I had known. I recognized how insular my worldview had been. Most of all, I was humbled to realize how much more I had to learn about our big, beautiful, and fragile globe. These are lessons every young person should be fortunate enough to learn. 

My sketch (1979) of the Pazzi Chapel in Florence

I’ve traveled far too little during the forty-one years since my life-changing adventures in Europe.(1) My wife and I did enjoy a two-week vacation in England in 2001 and we visited Mexico a few times, most recently in 2002. But that’s pretty much been it as far as our non-domestic travels together are concerned (I consider our vacations in Canada to be “domestic” even though technically a visit to Canada is traveling abroad). We’ve not been to any destination outside of North America beyond Europe, aside from a few sojourns to the Hawaiian islands (once each on Kauai, Maui, and Oahu). In recent years, the majority of my vacation time has been spent visiting my aging parents in Vancouver or attending professional conferences around the country.

Knowing myself, it may be difficult for me to enjoy traveling extensively again until after I retire, which is still a few years away. I don’t think I would be able to truly relax and appreciate the places I might visit before then. I do have my bucket list of destinations to address, so it will happen one day.

Of course, contemplating overseas travel today is wishful thinking until the deadly threat posed by COVID-19 is reduced significantly. Airlines have slashed their flight schedules, and many borders are closed in any event. My risk-averse side is most definitely calling the shots. Traveling is stressful enough as it is even without a pandemic to worry about. We’re not going anywhere anytime soon.

In the meantime, one can dream. Since this past March when all our lives were first impacted by the coronavirus shutdowns, I’ve agreeably passed some of my free time discovering various YouTube channels (something I never imagined I would do much of beforehand). One of the more interesting channels is produced by Kara and Nate Buchanan, a young married couple from Nashville, TN. They’ve built their travel vlog channel to the point it now boasts a remarkable 1.9 million subscribers, which has afforded them the opportunity to lucratively tour the world full-time. Watching their videos, vicariously experiencing and enjoying where life has taken them, has been a treat. Since 2016 they’ve visited 100 countries, entertainingly documenting the ups and downs (mostly ups) of their peripatetic lifestyle. Like the rest of us though, Kara and Nate’s plans have been upended by the virus, forcing them to abandon their goal of driving the entire length of the Pacific Coast Highway. This is due to the recently decreed Washington/Oregon/California COVID travel advisory necessitating quarantining for 14 days upon arrival from another state.

Being an architect has blessed me with the lifelong gift of curiosity and a thirst for learning new things. I am a homebody, but I also know how rewarding exploring everything our beautiful planet has to offer can be.

(1) So, my tally of countries visited includes England, Scotland, France, Switzerland, Italy, and Mexico. In the United States, I’ve been to Alaska, Arizona, California, Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Idaho, Massachusetts, Missouri, Nevada, New Mexico, New York, Texas, Utah, Washington, and the District of Columbia. Surprisingly, the only Canadian provinces I’ve spent any real time in are British Columbia and Alberta.

Whole Spirit and Mood

Henry Mercer's Moravian Pottery and Tile Works, Doylestown, PA (photo credit: CC BY-SA 2.5, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=1300580

It’s been my pleasure to periodically share excerpts from SYNTHESIS, the self-published textbook written by the late Bill Kleinsasser, one of the significant teachers and architects who shaped my architectural worldview. In the following passage from his book, Bill’s understanding of the idiosyncratic work of Henry Chapman Mercer illustrates a specific design principle, in this case the nature of an appropriate response to place. In turn, Bill drew a parallel between the memorable landscape of Bucks County, Pennsylvania (which he was as thoroughly familiar with as Mercer was) and John Ruskin’s influential writings about how places are experienced. The spirit and mood evoked by this piece perfectly suits my contemplative frame of mind on this gray mid-November morning in Eugene. 

Whole Spirit and Mood 

When Mercer lived this Bucks County countryside was partly wild, partly cultivated, partly inhabited, partly empty of human life. It was variegated, challenging, mysterious, and evocative of previous life. Mercer studied this land all his life and knew it well. He travelled through it again and again, searched it for its archaeological secrets, and found in it many inspirations. John Ruskin, whose works Mercer undoubtedly knew very well, probably would have called this land “woody green country,” a kind of country especially suited for habitation by industrious, conservative, but romantic people, and Mercer was all of these. He often revealed his strong feelings and romanticism about Bucks County. He loved to tell about the place, and he did it well.  

As if guiding Mercer’s response to this rich woody green Bucks County countryside, John Ruskin’s words in 1838 had been:

“. . . be it observed that anything which is apparently enduring and unchangeable gives us the impression rather of future than of past, duration of existence, but anything which being perishable and from its nature subject to change has yet existed to great age, gives us an impression of antiquity though of course none of stability. A very old forest tree is a thing subject to the same laws of nature as ourselves. It is an energetic being, liable to an approaching death. Its age is written on every spray, and because we see that it is subject of life and annihilation like our own, we imagine it must be capable of the same feelings and possess the same faculties, and above all others, memory. It is always telling us about the past, never pointing to the future. We appeal to it, as to a thing which has seen and felt during a life similar to our own though of ten times its duration and therefore receive from it a perpetual impression of antiquity.

“This being the case, it is evident that the chief feeling induced by woody country is one of reverence for its antiquity. There is a quiet melancholy about the decay of the patriarchal trunks, which is enhanced by the green and elastic vigor of the young saplings. The noble form of the forest aisles and the subdued light that penetrates their entangled boughs combine to aid the impression, and the whole character of the scene is calculated to excite conservative feeling. The man who could remain a radical in a woody country is a disgrace to his species.

“Now, this feeling of mixed melancholy and veneration is the one of all others which (a building in this land) must not be allowed to violate. It may be fantastic or rich in detail, for the one character will make it look old fashioned and the other will assimilate with the intertwining of leaf and bough around it, but it must not be spruce, or natty, or very bright in color, and the older it looks the better.

"A little grotesqueness in form is the more allowable because the imagination is naturally alive in the obscure and indefinite daylight of wood scenery. [It] conjures up innumerable beings—of every size and shape—to people its alleys and smile through its thickets.”  

Henry Chapman Mercer

Mercer must have understood Ruskin. His buildings embody just the qualities Ruskin recommended for the “woody, green country,” especially Fonthill with its “fantastic and rich detail,” its “grotesqueness of form,” and the fact that it “assimilates with the intertwining of leaf and bough around it.” All three buildings are “old fashioned” in appearance, “not spruce, or natty, or very bright in color.” All three have been developed to take advantage of the fact that “the imagination is naturally alive” in a woody green setting. To anyone who has felt the haunting serenity and mystery of the countryside of Bucks County, these qualities seem exactly right.

But these are responses to the character of the larger place. Mercer’s buildings also embody response to smaller contextual scales. All three contributed to the cultural place: the Museum with its evocative and informative collection of tools; Fonthill with its arboretum, preserve, and tiles; the Tileworks with its preservation of one of the unique crafts of the community; and all three buildings with their epical addition to community symbolism and richness as long-lasting sources of amazement, pleasure, and wonder.

The buildings also contain the results of many other contextual responses: towers from which one may see the surrounding place in all directions; numerous terraces and balconies upon which the variation of sunlight, wind, and weather may be felt; and spaces that collect and dramatize the daily and seasonal changes of atmosphere and light.

Even minor details, both inside and out, call attention to the sun’s position, the time of day, the season, the weather, and the place. Colored tiles on columns and walls become sparkling, independent sources of light. Dark surfaces and planar intersections tend to be obscured and mysterious as daylight diminishes. Other edges and planes catch light as it comes and goes, defining places, boundaries, and layers of space. Subtle colors and textures reflect and absorb light, become brighter or subdued, and change from sandy brown to bluish gray, to olive gray, to green and grayish gold. At certain times the buildings float across the fields like ships or suddenly appear like ghosts among the trees.

The buildings also address the most ordinary problems of building within an existing place. At Fonthill, a colonial farmhouse was in the way of the new place. Rather than destroy it, Mercer built around it and over it, giving it renewed and new life. At the Tileworks, the property boundaries and access route forced development to the south and west. The building was adapted to take full advantage of this. At the Museum, opportunities were restricted by the existing museum on the north and a street on the east. Mercer connected the new Museum to the old, accepted the tight boundary on the east, and freely extended the new building south, west, and up. In each building, ordinary stie problems generated unusual, useful, and often wonderful ideas.

By embodying as many responses to their surrounding places, Mercer’s buildings become vivid. Not only are they clearer and stronger in themselves, but they also establish a powerful source of appropriateness regarding the dynamics and nature of the places joined. Our consciousness is heightened by these links with place—by its reinforcement, dramatization, and celebration. Without these responsive links, an otherwise good place remains ordinary and fails to be what it might have been.

Otto Poticha Wins 2020 AIA Oregon President’s Award

Amid 2020’s incessant stream and fast pace of breathless news on all fronts, it was refreshing to see AIA Oregon recognize one of Eugene’s own, the inimitable Otto Poticha, FAIA as this year’s recipient of the prestigious President’s Award.

 

AIA Oregon presents the President’s Award to an individual AIA member in recognition of significant contributions to the architecture profession through distinguished leadership and service over an extended period of time. These contributions must have advanced the cause of the profession and provided an inspiration to the recipient’s fellow practitioners.

 

I can’t think of anyone else more deserving than Otto Poticha. Since arriving in Eugene in 1962—attracted by the Pacific Northwest’s reputation for a new brand of regionally-specific modernish inspired by the endlessly varied natural landscape—he has demonstrated unwavering boldness in his thinking. I’ve known Otto since my student days at the University of Oregon during the early 1980s. He was irascible back then and remains as ornery as ever today, much to the benefit of all who call Eugene or Springfield home. Never one to hold his tongue, Otto’s has continually kept me and my colleagues accountable for the work we do, especially if it is worthy of reproach. Years ago, he famously characterized Eugene as “butt ugly,” making it his mission to hold not only his fellow design professionals but our entire community to task. His perennial hope has been that we all may overcome our distaste for risk and change and demonstrate a courage of conviction to realize ambitious plans. He truly cares about his adopted home.

 

In addition to a decorated career as a talented architect at the helm of a series of successful partnerships and as a sole practitioner, Otto has taught for the better part of six decades in the Department of Architecture at the University of Oregon. By his own account, Otto enriched the lives and shaped the thinking of more than 3,500 architects (and counting), including yours truly. As an instructor Otto was and remains a notoriously cantankerous taskmaster, seldom reluctant to fail an underperforming student. There’s no doubting the significance of his influence upon generations of architects and in turn their built legacy.

 

On a personal note, I owe Otto a debt of gratitude for not only being a friend, colleague, and collaborator over many years, but also for suggesting during my job search upon my return to Eugene in 1988 that I approach Robertson/Sherwood/Architects, a recommendation for which I will always be grateful.

 

AIA Oregon conferred the 2020 President’s Award to Otto at its virtual Architecture Awards event on October 23. Click on the link below to watch the video celebrating the award. It features clips of his daughter Shelley Poticha and John Reynolds, FAIA, the 2019 recipient of the President’s Award, in addition to Otto himself.

 

https://vimeo.com/472761857