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why Stacey Farinholt is a bad-ass
Stacey Farinholt, ASLA, loves you. Alot. And in return you trample her grass?
She’s designed AIA and GRACRE award winning landscapes, been published by the New York Times Magazine and University of Virginia Press, critiqued and advised at VCU and VT, volunteered and community serviced to educate others about and preserve our region’s natural environment. Stacey’s design work includes memorial parks, burial grounds, sculpture gardens, community centers, masterplans, mixed use developments, office projects, medical clinics, exhibit design, and residential projects. Stacey’s talents rest on her appetite for research, her sensitivity to her surroundings, her ego-less response to a design problem.
We look forward to seeing more from this Richmond-born and Virginia-educated environmental design leader.
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Being a roughly 75% Hokie firm, we try to keep an eye on our alma mater. Easy to do with projects like Virginia Tech’s Design Build Lab and their recently completed Covington Farmer’s Market. Fulfilling to see, on the heels of Independence Day, a project providing opportunity to fellow citizens. Excellent work by the student team led by Keith Zawistowski. Their blog, as it should, carefully chronicles the demolition of a decrepit warehouse for materials and the construction of the new structure. Okay, okay, what’s next, we wanna see more. Yeah, yeah, yeah…
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ADOV! A few construction photos from the Affiliated Dermatologists of Virginia. Structural steel nearly complete and suddenly the building’s form emerges.
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June 18th: National Will Scribner Day!
Let’s all celebrate our bearded leader’s 40th Architectural Anniversary! Go Will, go!
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new neighbors: sparks and stella
Welcome to new Manchester District neighbors Michael Sparks Design and the apartment dwellers of Stella 360. (photo by Dena Sussman)
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Tamara Van Meter, SMBW’s new Prinicipal in Charge of Interiors, in association with our StocktonClay buddies BAM Architects, recently designed Signature’s downtown offices within the World Trade Center in Norfolk, Virginia. As an alternative to the prized corner office, Tamara situated a communal cafe and lounge to overlook the harbor and provide views for both staff and clients. Glass offices and low profile furniture foster transparency, associate connectivity and greater access to natural light…all key to Signature’s collaborative and thoughtful culture. We’re proud to have Tamara within our ranks and look forward to more of her innovative interior solutions.
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do what you gotta do
archinect has an intriguing story about do it yourself dams after the late spring flooding we;ve read so much about. It has been a season of infamously sensational weather, with massive tornadoes wiping out large swaths in the south and midwest, and heavy rain events causing many to consider if the term 100 year flood should be reevaluated. These dam solutions are born of necessity. It would be interesting to revist these sites in a decade to see if they remain, have been improved, have been employed again. Thanks to archinect for putting this article together and to Getty Images for making this photo available.
(Source: archinect.com)
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congratulations and the S-word!
Congratulations to Knoxville architects Sanders Pace on their Custom Home Grand Award for their Cape Russell Retreat in Sharps Chapel, TN! As the awards season continues please note the number of 3000+ sf homes patting themselves on the green shoulder. Then revisit the Cape Russell Retreat article and note the the integrity of small scale architecture and the absence of sustaina-speak. Truly a noble attempt; regionalist grampa Harmon would be proud. Nice to see architects of our region pulling the unsustainable rug out from underneath the rest of those crazy Californians every once in a while! Go Vols!
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modern richmond delivers with their film series
Our friends at Modern Richmond deliver again with the launch of their 4th Wednesday Film Series. Last night they pleased a large group gathered at the Virginia Center for Architecture with the East coast premier of Modern Views - A Conversation on Northwest Modern Architecture.
The practitioners and historians featured in the work have a bevy of background information if you are interested in further study on the Northwest Style. Jeffrey Ochsner’s Lionel H. Pries, architect, artist, educator: arts and crafts to modernist architecture (ISBN: 9780295986982) offers insight to an early master and proponent. The introductory chapters of David Miller’s Toward a New Regionalism - environmental architecture in the Pacific Northwest (ISBN: 029598945) offer a brief but thorough history and later chapters offer case studies of how those early projects influenced todays practitioners. Grant Hildebrand and T. William Booth’s The Houses of Wendell Burnette and Arne Bystrom (ISBN:0295984333) detail two of the film’s masters and their residential work.
Please share others that should be added to the list. Please. Please...
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the people that you meet each day, pt 2
Sustainable Neighborhhods, part 2:
Luckily there are a number of practitioners who are deeply engaged in the design, development and construction of neighborhoods more sensitive to tomorrow’s resources. They have recognized the positive impacts sustainably designed communities create not only for their inhabitants but also for neighboring properties, and ultimately the economics of the surrounding area. A few examples, hopefully of diverse scale and scope.
Ross Chapin’s “pocket neighborhood” approach takes the idea of the american dream and shrinks it. The resultant shared spaces come off quite grand, while the dwellings are accessible to either traditionalists or forward thinkers. He has a book out about it, too. Coburn Development seems to be onto something out west, too. Prospect New Town proves differing architectural styles can mesh.
Much to learn from these examples.