Archive by Author
Kate Stickley on Women in Architecture
“When the time came for me to start a family, I determined that the best way for me to have the work/life balance that I needed was to start my own practice. At that time, many of my peers were doing the same, because we could create how we wanted to work to support this. We were able to provide good service to our clients, and our clients respected our choice to frame our business to honor both family and profession.”
by Rebecca Firestone with Mark English AIA
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Anne Fougeron on Women in Architecture
“People thought that I wasn’t married because I was a career architect. The assumption is that you can either have a firm, or you can have a reasonable life as a stay-at-home mom – but then you can’t have a career. They aren’t dichotomous lifestyles.
Figure out where you want your career to be and when – have a game plan and stick to it. Don’t give up on it halfway through because you feel some nagging societal pressure to only be a mother and nothing else. Be proud of what you do and be proud of your choices. Most importantly – don’t let anyone make those choices for you.”
by Rebecca Firestone with Mark English AIA
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Women in Architecture: Interview Series
The Architect’s Take interviews five prominent San Francisco women architects about the challenges and rewards faced by women in architecture today. Left to right, from upper left: Anne Fougeron, Kate Stickley, Karin Payson, EB Min, and Amy Eliot.
by Rebecca Firestone with Mark English AIA
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New Orleans Rebuilding: Could Topography Make It Right?
A Tulane University geographer reframes the debate about the fate of below-sea-level New Orleans. “The city still has over 2,000 open lots all above sea level – a precious natural resource whose use we should prioritize for human occupancy. Filling in these pockets would also help mend the urban fabric that was torn by the population exodus ongoing since the 1960s. And we can do this without marginalizing low-lying neighborhoods.”
(Map courtesy Prof. Richard Campanella)
by Rebecca Firestone with Mark English AIA
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Craig Steely: Steel and Light
“My own work now, it’s all one house, just done over and over. I see a connection between one idea to the next – I’m always exploring contrasts along similar lines: opacity-transparency, heaviness-lightness, action-reaction. The ideas can morph to suit the circumstances, and they get refined from one project to the next.”
– Craig Steely, Architect
by Rebecca Firestone with Mark English AIA
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Craig Steely Part 2 – Inside Track
“To me, a good client is someone who’s really interested in the process. Someone who really WANTS to be involved. I demand it, actually… I only work with people that I like and respect. The point of taking only good work is that you’re more invested in it. I love what I do and don’t want to get burned out.”
– Craig Steely, Architect
by Rebecca Firestone with Mark English AIA
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Sculpting the Land: Arterra’s Landscape Architecture
“If we are successful in our design, the site is essentially preserved or restored to a naturally sustainable state. The building will be aligned for solar aspects, and will be so well-sited that it appears to emerge from the land.
We provide a sense of magic and well as a workable landscape in which water is conveyed, plants grow naturally, the soil is healthy, and wildlife can thrive. Through good design we link home to site and provide a sensory feast for our clients with all the sights, sounds, fragrances, and perceptions of being in a deeply meaningful landscape. The landscape is living, breathing, and ever-changing. From this, a unique sense of place emerges and begins to tell its own story.”
– Vera Gates and Kate Stickley, Arterra LLP
by Rebecca Firestone with Mark English AIA
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Jeffrey Day (MIN|DAY) on Artistry and Utility
“Art has conventionally been distinguished from architecture based on utility – architecture must do something, while art is free from functional requirements. However, art can lead us to approach architecture as something more than just rote problem-solving. Injecting an element of “uselessness” into a building allows the artistic elements to form an intellectual background against which the building’s functional aspects can be fulfilled in innovative ways.
Ironically, contemporary artists are much more engaged with the actual world through activist agendas that directly address social and environmental problems. Art helps us innovate how we deal with the world, beyond purely normative solutions.”
Jeffrey L. Day
Min|Day Architecture
by Rebecca Firestone with Mark English AIA
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Modern Pied-a-Terre
A project from Mark English Architects was recently picked up on both The Contemporist and Houzz.com. Over a year and a half, Mark English and associates Greg Corbett and Sloan Kelly, transformed this upper storey apartment from a humdrum 1960s shoebox into an oval-shaped theatrical experience – sexy and elegant. Interior designer Gary Hutton chose the furnishings that perfectly complemented the architecture.
(Photo by Matthew Millman)
by Rebecca Firestone with Mark English AIA
