In want of a profession. . .

I have for years built this website around my work as a luthier, including pages on what I considered related activities: painting, furniture making, even my travels, with the self-understanding that I was working towards a full-time career in the craft. Meanwhile, my 'day job' in the world of architecture marched silently on and I was happy to keep the two separate. I considered lutherie to be my creative outlet, and for an artist personality that relegated my 'profession' to secondary importance. But my outlook on both pursuits has changed over the years: more experience and self-confidence in architecture has led to more opportunity - more of a voice - for creativity. And as I gain more commissions for instruments I find myself questioning if I really want to make this my only pursuit. Would lutherie loose it's charm if I relied upon it financially?

I am still working through this. But one realization I made is that my website was nearly a complete picture of all my interests and expertise, with one glaring exception: it lacked architecture. First the Heaven's Door project, then the DeGive dulcimer brought home to me that these two pursuits need not be separated. In fact they complement one another.

Here, in no order of importance or chronology, is a sample of my work over recent years, focusing, as want of the firm to which I am employed, on high-end single family homes and home renovations and additions in the historic neighborhoods of Atlanta and across the Southeastern United States. Most of these projects have been realized, however I have chosen to show only my renderings for now. I will add more images and decriptions shortly.

A rendering from an esquisse to take the client's initial thoughts and determine which massing will best accommodate the program, and therefore what style will be suggested by the massing: here, pointing out specific details and materials that are within the style. The client's obvious desire for a 'showcase home' also helped to steer me towards this Mizner-esque street presentation.

The same house, studied from the rear, showing how to address the steeply sloping property.

Although I have concentrated in recent years on the outside of the house and understanding the heritage of the Southern architectural vernacular, I am by education, and registration, an interior designer, and often get to wear both hats on a project. Here, after establishing the exterior styling and roof massing strategy I am figuring out how it carries into the house. The sunbeam on the right-hand bulkhead is gesturing late-day western sun coming through clerestory windows between the vaulted dining room and a screened porch with open gable timberwork.

A vanity for a master bathroom wanting to project a luxury botique-hotel feel. Notes are for client understanding and contractor pricing effort.

A quick study for a client with an in-town tudor-themed bungalow. Although not in the original scope of work, the client asked my opinion on how to 'spruce up' an existing fireplace that was adjacent to the area of renovation. I was glad to have the opportunity to bring this room further into he theme of the house.

A quick sketch made durring a client meeting to flesh out the fireplace design for a Prairie-themed house. The challenge was how to simulate a very expensive detail from the past with a modern square firebox.

A new house in Lower Alabama for a client who wanted a two story European-themed home that was not imposing and presented a one-story appearance. Although not my best perspective, I like this drawing for its inclusion of details and well-represented materials, that gave the client the 'flavor' at an early meeting.

A virtual teardown in Decatur (Georgia) that allowed a complete re-styling and re-massing. After vacillating between true English Arts-and-Crafts, looking much at Lutyens, and a softer cottage vernacular that included elements of the Georgian, I found this hybrid which speaks more to the latter. Here my working method is sign pen and AD marker over a CADD wireframe to facilitate quick changes and variations but to produce a rendering for maximum client understanding. Sadly, the lot width and client program pretty much dictated that the garage be on the front elevation, a situation I try to avoid. It is camouflaged to some degree as a carriage house joined by a connector.The same design, rear view.

I have developed a penchant over the years for quickly assessing the strengths and weaknesses of an existing property and translating that into a visual gameplan. Here is an unremarkable, virtually style-less bungalow in the Virginia-Highlands neighborhood of Atlanta which a newly married couple wanted to expand. Due to property and cost restrictions, the obvious choice was to "go up" and not "out", while giving the house a style for the first time in it's 60 year life. I also took the opportunity to "fix" some of the existing mistakes, such as the left-hand three-gang window crowding the front door.

This was a project where the client loved the neighborhood and for the most part loved the house, except for the look of the front. The solution was a combination of fixing some of the 'mistakes' of the composition while adding something special to distinguish the house beyond its mid-century ranch plan-book origins.

Now the house has a dramatic focal point: an extruded entry that keeps in the 'style' of the house: it has just enough detailing to be interesting but not overpower the rest of the house. This rendering also shows how to better treat the cladding above the brick course. Horizontal planking is more appropriate, and a darker color that is the same value as the brick help to camouflage the oddity that the side of the house has full-height brick cladding but the front does not. The new terrace gives some order and 'breathing space' to the front of the house and creates order out of the sloping front yard.

A great property in Highlands, North Carolina set entirely in woodland above a creek. I cannot take credit for the planning, but the massing and cladding strategy issued forth from my current reading at the time: the resort hotels of the White Mountains in New Hampshire. The simplified Edwardian detailing, the mixture of white-painted trim against natural stained wood and the generous use of stone comes together for a very original look. These are also some of my favorite renderings for the playful details. Note wood chopping in progress and fish in the stream.

The same house from the opposite end.

An esquisse to show the client in one panel the first concept for a vacation home. The left-hand showcase garage, though not cantilevered, was inspired by Cameron's house in 'Ferris Bueller's Day Off' The full-height storefront-like glazing opens to create a duel-use pavilion to address a grass-paving terrace. Generally the style for this house is what I call 'New Venetian'.

An in-town 'facelift' project. This house was featured on HGTV's 'Groundbreaker's' where I had my 15 minutes of fame. Actually my air time boils down to about 5 minutes. Another favorite rendering, for the details. This particular drawing was actually never meant to see the light of day: intended really for personal consumption. I have started with an as-built CADD wireframe which I have whited out and boldly markered over those elements to be demolished.

What drives a good design for me is right from the start identifying ideas that exploit the natural characteristics of the site. In this example, the site is long and has a grade change from side-to-side. I knew that the program would include a pool and formal and informal gardens. Idea #6 is "Drive Below the House", meaning that the access from the front formal entry to the side secondary or 'service' entry could be on a grade lower than the main terrace on which the house is built. This reduces the intrusion of the automobile into the landscape, creates a breathing space between the house and the side road, and works with the natural topography to reduce grading and impact to the natural balance of the site. Idea #10 is "Folly As Anchor". The use of a gazebo or garden shed disguised as a small cottage is a classic architectural device to define space, to provide focal point, and to strengthen an axis. Due to the great length of the site and the alignment of garden, house, and lawn, this is especially effective. Also in this earliest sketch stage we see the overlaying of the sun angles.

A typical intermediate sketch between the rough siteplan above and the rendering below, working out in more detail what the 'ideas' look like before going to a dimensioned drawing. Here we're adding a screened porch to the rear of a Virginia-Highlands bungalow.

A siteplan, rendered to help the client understand how I wanted to use planting schemes to contribute to the Arts-and-Crafts world we were creating in the house.

The same project, now morphed into a more Prairie-themed house with the carport relocated to the side. Goodbye beautiful Gertrude Jekyll garden.

The final design had battered stucco columns rather than the mitered lap-siding shown above. This is a Photoshop-colored over imported CADD line drawing rendering made for magazine publication.

One of many elevation studies for a home in the Brookwood Hills Golf Club of North Atlanta. I'm exploring with the client just how authentically 18th century we want to be. Again, employing the sign-pen-and-marker-over-CADD wireframe method to create many accurate yet "liquid" studies.

This is an interesting drawing I did in the primordial stage of the project to zero in on a style. What it turned into was the development of a "story" for the house. The remit from the client was to "build a house that feels as if it has been there for 200 years." This for one helped establish the colonial plantation aesthetic or "Picturesque Colonial" which is represented just left of center. Other styles were investigated as regionally, historically and geographically viable (Formal Georgian, Arcadian because the clients were from Louisiana) or soundly rejected (Queen Anne, Italianate being too "late"). The feeling of the house was achieved through the telling of a family which built a home on what was then the Georgia frontier, circa 1805, and the house growing with the family over the centuries: A detached summer kitchen was assumed into the body of the house yet retained its brick "cooking wall", A detached stable became connected to the house in the 1920's with the arrival of the automobile, etc. The following is my project description for marketing purposes:

The Coffman Residence: A Tale of Acadie

A Southern Colonial themed home created with a unique thought process. Building on a 2-lot site overlooking the Brookhaven Country Club golf course, our clients wished foremost to capture a bit of their native Louisiana. What would unfold over a year-long planning process was a home that projected the timeless authenticity of deep south architecture yet would incorporate in the most unobtrusive way the most up-to-the-minute sustainable building technology. The key to the former was the writing of "the Story of the House."

In the past centuries, rural homes of southern America, from modest structures to grand mansions were often designed not by an a trained architect, but by a master builder who relied on architectural style guides, showing the practical application of the Orders of the Classical Period and other useful geometry and detailing. The eventual prevalence of these structures formed our national subconscious for architectural good-taste and the effects are still felt today when we react positively to homes with good proportions, symmetry, and elegant simplicity. So to create a home with a sense of historic permanence we retraced the imagined steps of a simple plantation house, built in what was "then" rural Georgia in the early-to-mid 19th century: added onto in logical ways by a growing family and inheritance, and modernized right up into the 20th century with the conversion of the now-attached stable to embrace the automobile. The effectiveness of this method is proved at every turn: one experiences the symmetrical formality of the front house which gradually relaxes, passing through a brick-lined kitchen which at one time may have been detached for very practical purposes, finally arriving full circle at a colonial-themed three-season screened porch inspired by the rebirth of Williamsberg in the 1930's. Porches were added and expanded, formerly exterior brick paving and clapboard walls became enclosed by window-lined connectors: each space has a chapter to tell in the Story.

Sustainability has come to mean in recent years tankless hot waterheaters, geothermal heating, radiant floor heating, "smart lighting" controls - all devices used in this house - but more compelling is the rediscovery of the old ways and materials that made living in the humid south a little more bearable: the second level sleeping porch, composed on an east-west axis for maximum performance; the arrangement of overhangs and loggias to protect southern exposure. Rainchains can direct water to an underground cistern and light-absorbing paving is used inside and out to absorb heat by day and radiate out by night. Authentic materials are used where they have the greatest "touch", such as smooth wood-molded bricks and saw-hewn cypress timbers, and the solid slabs of granite that welcome guests to the front door. Whereas only successful modern facsimiles are used where superior maintenance properties or cost effectiveness makes them indispensable, such as simulated slate roofing and wood-free trim in hard-to-paint roof dormers. Thus altogether making a modern home with charm and permanence: a Lifetime Home.

Further Reading:
Longfellow's Classic poem http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evangeline
An historic facsimile style guide http://www.amazon.com/American-Builders-Companion-Asher-Benjamin/dp/0486222365/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1257891541&sr=8-1

This is a project which won the Atlanta Urban Design Commission's 2009 award for preservation. A house dating from the early days of the Inman Park neighborhood, we removed a pooly-concieved 1980's- vintage rear addition and built back an historically-themed kitchen and master suite while supervising the preservation of the existing front-of-house spaces. Finished photography by Lee Grider.

The original, pyramidal roof of the main front house is visible here beyond the wacky '80's addition. This was an obvious choice of roof solution for the rebuild which you see duplicated in the 'After' picture above. Following are some images of the excellent original features that were preserved.

The house was featured on the 2009 Inman Park tour of homes, and I prepared this write-up as a hand-out. It was also my prospectus for the winning UDC award submission:

""The Beautiful Home of Hon. H. E. W. Palmer For Sale!…a seven room, furnace heated Cottage and Servants House…has all conveniences; sewer, water, gas, electric lights, tile sidewalks, and the choicest neighborhood to be found."

This heading from a 1909 realtor's advertisement excitedly touts the conveniences to be found in Atlanta's first planned community and goes on to describe the benefits of living "on the North Side where everything is charming and delightful." The house at 463 Sinclair Avenue (formerly 155, Atlanta renumbered all its streets in the mid 1920's), however, was a witness to the neighborhood which would grow around it. The house is known to predate the 1889 land auction held by entrepreneur Joel Hurt, giving it the distinction of being perhaps the oldest home in what is now defined as Inman Park. It was a farmhouse, built by Palmer on land purchased in 1886 from Sarah Colquitt, wife of Governor A. E. Colquitt. After the 1909 sale Palmer would build the house at 482 Seminole, his residence at the time of his death in 1921.

At the time of the recent renovation, the house had come down to us with surprisingly few alterations and much of its original character. New owners Lee and Susan Winton, in consultation with architects Jones Pierce, implemented a significant rear addition and the meticulous restoration that the house deserved. When purchased by the Wintons in 2005 the house was affected with a dated rear kitchen addition. The primary concern was to build a more historically sensitive expansion which would now include a master suite. The unique pyramidal roof of the main home's original design was duplicated over the addition, unifying new kitchen and bedroom with a characteristic sleeping porch facing the rear.

Visitors are greeted by a glorious Edwardian flamed oak double front door. The characteristic vestibule contains a period art-glass pendant. The leaded glass transom is a story unto itself. The ribbed glass pieces of the original transom combined with colored pieces of antique church glass were assembled into a new design by a cousin of the present owner. A curiosity is the hidden compartment in the side of the front parlor fireplace paneling, lined with century-old wallpaper. Many of the lighting fixtures, although not authenticated to Palmer's ownership, are from an era when electricity was treated with suspicion. Two fixtures are of the gas and electric combination, now converted to be fully electric. Perhaps the most impressive fixture which dates from this period is the adjustable-height electric chandelier in the dining room. The original pine doors come down to us intact through the forethought of previous owners who stored the doors for future restoration. The front-house coal-burning fireboxes, mantles and glazed tile surrounds are intact.

Transitioning from preservation/refurbishment to modern addition through the original connecting hallway, new oak strip flooring changes in a closet to reveal the original pine plank flooring underneath. Also in the hallway, a refurbished bathroom has original cast brass transom window hardware which was relocated here from a bedroom. The new master suite shows window and door trim custom made to match the homes' original trim. Modern fixtures and appliances we selected for their ability to blend gently into the historical setting. An automated screen at the sleeping porch disappears when not in use. Duel vanities in the master bath are separated by a tall island of millwork reminiscent of Victorian museum displays. A new fireplace reflects of the originals and the oak paneled mantle conceals a flat screen television. Susan, a multi-media artist specializing in ceramics, created the beautiful glazed tiles set into the hearth.

The house is a testament that through the stewardship of appreciative owners, historically significant structures can continue to be comfortable family homes in the modern age with sensible remodeling and informed preservation."

. . .more to come. . .

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Book List.

The best explanation of my areas of interest and expertise can be found in a catalog of my architecture library. The first book on architecture I obtained was the HOK book, when I was 11. This will be an ongoing project for me as I move steadily through every room in the house. This is, at this time, a quite incomplete list. Enjoy.

Drawing//
The Power of Limits: Proportional Harmonies in Nature, Art and Architecture/ G Doczi/Shambhala 1994
Cyclopedia of Drawing /American School of Correspondence 1905
Illustration Guide /L Evans /Van Nostrand Reinhold Co 1982
*Masterpieces of Architectural Drawing /H Powell /Abbeville Press 1982
The Principles of Architectural Drafting /HC Browning /Whitney Library of Design 1996
Sketching the Concept /H Linton /Design Press McGraw Hill 1993

Professional Practice// including graphic standards, code books, manuals, etc
Specifications for Commercial Interiors /SC Reznikoff /Whitney Lib of Design 1989
ASID Professional Practice manual /JA Thompson /Whitney Lib of Design 1992
Professional Practice: A Handbook for Interior Designers /RM Veitch /Peguis Publishers 1990
Architectural Woodwork Quality Standards 7the Ed /Architectural Woodwork Institute 1997
Interior Graphic and Design Standards /SC Reznikoff /Whitney Library of Design 1986
Architectural Drafting and Design /A Jefferis /Delmar Publishers Inc 1986
Materials and Components of Interior Architecture 4th Ed /JR Riggs /Prentice Hall 1996
The Second Old House Catalogue /L Groa /Bonanza Books 1982

Modern// Bauhaus to present but excludes Japanese architects
The Dessau Bauhaus Building 1926-1999 /M Kentgens-Craig /Birkhauser 1998
Renzo Piano's Village for the Arts/ High Museum of Art 2005
The Bauhaus: Masters and Students/ M Droste/Barry Friedman Ltd 1988
The Kimble Art Museum /M Brawne /Phaidon Architecture in Detail1992
Bauhaus Dessau /D Sharp / Phaidon Architecture in Detail1992
Classical Modern Architecture /A Papadakis /Terrail 1997
Bauhaus /HM Wingler /MIT Press 1986
Dallas Architecture 1936-1986 /D Dillon /Texas Monthly Press 1985
Ludwig Mies van Der Rohe Furniture and Drawings from the Design Collection /L Glaeser /MOMA 1977
Marcel Breuer: Furniture and interiors /C Wilk /MOMA 1981
Walter Gropius /Sigfried Giedion /Dover 1992
Gropius /R Isaacs /Bullfinch Press 1984
Louis I Kahn: In the Realm of Architecture /DB Brownlee /Rizzoli 1991
Architecture in the Real World : The Work of HOK /W McQuade /Abrams 1984
Bauhaus: Bauhaus Archiv /M Droste /Benedikt Taschen 1990
The New Architecture and the Bauhaus /W Gropius /MIT Press 1965
Architecture and Utopia: Design and Capitalist Development /M Tafuri /MIT Press 1992
Towards a New Architecture /Le Corbusier /Dover 1986
Architects of Fortune: Mies van der Rohe and the Third Reich /ES Hochman /Weidenfeld Nicolson 1989
Deconstructing the Kimbell /M Benedikt /Sites Books 1991
New Wood Architecture /R Slavid /Yale University Press 2005
Bauhaus and Bauhaus People revised edition/E Neumann /Van Nostrand 1993
Alvar Aalto: Points of Contact /M Lahti /Alvar Aalto Museum 1994
A Garden for Art: Outdoor Sculpture at the Hirshorn Museum /VJ Fletcher /Thames and Hudson 1998
Designing Disney's Theme Parks /KA Marling /Flammarion 1997
Spanish Design and Architecture /ED Coad /Rizzoli 1990
Twentieth-Century Houses: Architecture 3's /B Dunlop /Phaidon 1999

Japanese Modern//
Japan Design /M Dietz /Taschen 1992
Contemporary Japanese Architects /D Meyhofer /Taschen 1993
The Architecture of Hiromi Fujii /K Frampton /Rizzoli 1987
Toyo Ito: Architectural Monographs No 41 /C Jencks /Academy Editions 1995
The Japan Guide /B Bognar /Princeton 1995

Classic// all pre-enlightenment Europe
The Ten Books on Architecture /Vitruvius /Dover 1960
Early Medieval Architecture /R Stalley /Oxford 1999
Hadrian's Villa Guide /B Adembri /Electa 2000
The Architecture of the Renaissance in Italy /WJ Anderson /BT Hatsford 1909
Architecture of Rome /GB Cipriani /Rizzoli 1986
*Manor Houses in Normandy /Y Lescroart /Konemann 1997
*The Elements of Architecture /Henry Wotton /Longmans Green & Co 1624

Colonial// includes all pre-industrial America
Architecture of the Old South: Maryland/ M Lane/ Abbeville Press 1991
Colonial Interiors: Federal and Greek Revival /HD Eberlein /Bonanza Books1938
Williamsburg Reproductions: Interior Designs for Today's Living /Craft house 1967
Colonial Williamsburg Decorates for Christmas /LH Oliver /CW Foundation 1981
Early Domestic Architecture of Connecticut /JF Kelly /Dover 1963
Country Style /G Knox / Better Homes and Gardens 1987
Colonial Craftsmen /E Tunis /Johns Hopkins 1999
Visiting Our Past: America's Historylands /D Boorstin /National Geographic 1986
An Eighteenth-Century Garland /L Fisher /Colonial Williamsburg 1951
The Farm on the Gravois: Historic Structures Report /AW O'Bright /US Grant Nat Hist Site 1999
Thomas Jefferson's Monticello /RC Lautman /Monacelli Press 1997
Architects of Charleston /BS Ravenel /Univ of S Carolina Press 1992
Carolina Plantations /WP Baldwin /History Press 2007
The Architectural Treasures of Early America I: Survey of Early American Design /LC Mullins /Nat Hist Soc 1987
The Architectural Treasures of Early America II: Early Architecture of the South /ibid
The Architectural Treasures of Early America III: New England by the Sea /ibid
The Architectural Treasures of Early America IV: SColonial Architecture of the Mid -Atlantic /ibid
The Architectural Treasures of Early America V: The Homes of New York and Connecticut /ibid
The Architectural Treasures of Early America VI: Early Architecture of Rhode Island /ibid
The Architectural Treasures of Early America VII: Village Architecture of Early New England /ibid
The Architectural Treasures of Early America VIII: Early American Southern Homes /ibid
The Architectural Treasures of Early America IX: The Evolution of Colonial Architecture /ibid
The Architectural Treasures of Early America X: Early American Community Structures /ibid

The Architectural Treasures of Early America XI: Blueprints for America's Past /ibid
The Architectural Treasures of Early America XII: The Southern Tradition /ibid
The Architectural Treasures of Early America XIII: Styles of the Emerging Nation /ibid
The Architectural Treasures of Early America XIV: The Grandeur of the South /ibid
The Architectural Treasures of Early America XV: The Georgian Heritage /ibid
The Architectural Treasures of Early America XVI: Spirit of New England /ibid
Roots of Home: Our Journey to a New Old House /R Versaci /Taunton Press 2008
Williamsburg Before and After /GH Yetter /Colonial Williamsburg Foundation 1988
*Classic Savannah /WR Mitchell /Golden Coast 1991
A Window on Williamsburg /JJ Walklet /Colonial Williamsburg Foundation 1983
Recreating the Historic house Interior /W Seale /American Assoc for State and Local Hist 1979
Williamsburg: Decorating with Style /T Foley /Clarkson Potter Publishers 1998
Official Guide to Colonial Williamsburg /M Olmert /Colonial Williamsburg Foundation 1989
Historic Charleston /S Abbott /Oxmoor House 1988
Historic Houses Restored and Preserved /M Page /Whitney Library of Design 1981
The Modern Carpenter Joiner and Cabinet-Maker: Legacy of Wood & Woodwodking /GL Sutcliffe /The National His Soc 1990
The Modern Carpenter Joiner and Cabinet-Maker: Survey of Carpentry Masterpieces /ibid
The Modern Carpenter Joiner and Cabinet-Maker: Craft of Case-Making and Cabinet-Making /ibid
The Modern Carpenter Joiner and Cabinet-Maker: Heritage of Styles and Essential Woods /ibid
The Modern Carpenter Joiner and Cabinet-Maker: Mastery of Joinery & Business /ibid
The Modern Carpenter Joiner and Cabinet-Maker: Tradition of Wood-carving & Stair-Building /ibid
The Modern Carpenter Joiner and Cabinet-Maker: Compendium of Drawing & Drawing Instruments /ibid
Old Virginia Houses Along the James /EF Farrar /Bonanza Books 1957
Early American Architecture /H Morrison /Dover Books 1987
The Colonial Architecture of Salem /F Cousins /Dover Books 2000
A Guide to Early American Homes: North and South /D Pratt /Bonanza Books 1956
Gibb's Book of Architecture /J Gibbs /Dover 2008
The Country Builder's Assistant /A Benjamin /Applewood Books 1992

Arts and Crafts// includes English and American
Arts and Crafts Archtiecture /P Davey /Phaidon 1997
The Bungalow: America's Arts & Crafts Home /P Duchscherer /Penguin Studio 1995
Inside the Bungalow: America's Arts & Crafts Interior /P Duchscherer /Penguin Studio 1997
*The New Cottage Home /J Tolpin /Taunton 1998
Craftsman Homes /G Stickley /The Lyons Press 2002
The Arts and Crafts Movement in America 1876-1916 /RJ Clark Ed. /Princeton Univ Press 1992
Arts and Crafts Masterpieces: Architecture 3's /B Dunlop /Phaidon 1999
Arts and Crafts Houses I: Architecture 3's /B Dunlop /Phaidon 1999
Arts and Crafts Houses II: Architecture 3's /B Dunlop /Phaidon 1999

Monographs//excludes Japanese architects, Modernists and Frank Lloyd Wright
Bernard Maybeck: Visionary Architect /SB Woodbridge /Abbeville Press 1992
William L Price/ G. Thomas /Princeton Architectural Press 2000
*James Russell Pope /J Garrison /Acanthus Press 2004
*John F Staub /S Fox /Texas A&M University Press 2007
The Leisure Architecture of Wayne McAllister /C Nichols /Gibbs Smith Press 2007
The Idea of Louis Sullivan /J Szarkowski /Bulfinch Press 2000
The Essential William Morris /I Zaczek /Parragon 1999
Lewis Edmund Crook Hr, Architect /W Mitchell /The History Business 1984
The Home Within Us /B McAlpine /Rizzoli 2010

Frank Lloyd Wright//
The Decorative Designs of FL Wright Renwick Gallery Exhibit Guide /D Hanks / US Gov Printing Office 1977
Frank Lloyd Wright: Prairie houses /A Hess /Rizzoli 2006
Frank Lloyd Wright: Architecture 3's /B Dunlop Ed. /Phaidon 1999
Taliesin West: An Interpretive Guide /SA Lucas /Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation 1993
Frank Lloyd Wright: Letters to Clients /BB Pfeiffer /California State Univ 1986
At Taliesin: Newspaper Columns by FL Wtight and the Taliesin Fellowship /RC Henning /FLW Found. 1992

English// pre-Victorian and includes all Britannica
Regency Style /S Parissien /Phaidon1996
The English Room /C Irvine /Bulfinch 2001
English Style /S Slesin /Clarkson Potter Inc 1984
Understanding Small Period Houses /A Laws /Crowood Press 2003
Tudor and Jacobean Country House /M Airs /Bramley Books 1998
A Companion to the English Parrish Church /S Friar /SuttonPublishing 1996
*In the Houses of Ireland /W Pfeiffer /Stewart Tabori Chang Inc 1988
Neoclassicism and Romanticism /R Toman /Konemann 2000
A Cotswold Village /JA Gibbs /Alan Sutton 1998
A Country House Companion /M Girouard /Yale University Press 1987
*Cotswold Gardens /D Hicks /Weidenfeld & Nicolson 1995
English Historic Carpentry /CA Hewett /Linden Publishing 1997
Castles In Ireland: Feudal Power in a Gaelic World /T McNeill /Routledge 1997

Victorian// England and elsewhere
Victorian and Edwardian Décor: From the Gothic Revival to Art Nouveau /J Cooper /Abbeyville 1987
Edwardian Architecture: Style and Technology /R Fellows /Lund Humphries 1995
Vienna 1900: The Architecture of Otto Wagner /VH Pintaric /Dorset Press 1989
Castell Deudraeth Portmeirion / The Second Portmeirion Foundation 1998
Architect Errant /CW Ellis /Portmeirion 1991
*The Main Line: Country Houses of Philadelphia's Stories Suburb /W Morrison /Acanthus Press 2002
Resort Hotels of the Adirondacks /BF Tolles /Univ Press of New England 2003
On Distand Shores: Colonial Houses around the World /O Guaita /Monacelli Press 1999
The Queen Anne House: America's Victorian Vernacular /JW Foster /Abrams 2006
The Berkshire Cottages: A Vanishing Era /C Owens /Cottage Press 1984
The Opulent Eye: Late Victorian and Edwardian Taste in Interior Design /N Cooper /Whitney 1977
The Castle: An Illustrated History fo the Smithsonian Building /CR Field /Smithsonian Inst Press 1993

Interiors Survey//
Period Rooms in the Metropolitan Museum of Art /A Peck /Abrams 1996
London Style: Streets Interiors Details /J Edwards /Taschen Icons 2008
Mexico Style: Exteriors interiors Details /A Taschen /Taschen Icons 2008
Tiki Style/ S.A. Kirsten/ Taschen Icons 2008
Bamboo Style /A Taschen /Taschen Icons 2006
International Contract Design 1 /L Knobel /Abbeville Press 1987
International Contract Design 2 /L Blackwell /Abbeville Press 1990
Composers Houses /G Gefen /Vendome Press 1998
Interior Design of the 20th Century /A Massey /Thames and Hudson 1990
Interior Design and Decoration, 4th Ed /S Whiton /Harper Collins
Textiles, 7th Ed. /SJ Kadolph /Macmillan 1993
The Illustrated History of Antiques /Huon Mallalieu Ed. /Quantum Books 2002
Antique Furniture: The Guide for Collectors Investors and Dealers /LGG Ramsey /Hawthorn 1969
The Encyclopedia of Furniture 3rd Ed. /J Aronson /Crown Publishers Inc 1967
Encyclopedia of Furniture /Quantum Books 2002
Authentic Décor: The Domestic Interior 1620-1920 /P Thornton /Seven Dials 2000
At Home with Books /E Ellis /Carol Southern Books 1995
Bahia Style /A Taschen /Taschen Icons 2006

General Survey// including style guides and books not defined by style or age
Home /W Rybczynski /Penguin 1986
The Most Beautiful House in the World /W Rybczynski /Penguin 1990
American Shelter/ L. Walker /Overlook Press 1981
*Get Your House Right /M Cusato /Sterling Publishing Co 2007
The World of Architecture: Inspiration, Style and History /P Holberton /Crescent Books 1988
*Great Renovations and Restorations: A New Life for Older Homes /M Gilliatt /Watson-Guptill 2003
*Wooden Houses: A Comprehensive Guide to Wood's Natural Beauty /J Miller /Stewart,Tabori &Chang 1997
*Stone in the Garden /G Hayward /WW Norton & Company 2001
Architecture and Ornament /M Maliszewski-Pickart /McFarland & Co 1998
A Field Guide to American Houses /V McAlester /Knopf 1984

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Bring it HOME.

The good sense of traditional building . . .is about techniques and means of solving building problems with elegance and intelligence. Its solutions are self-evident and rational, practical and lasting, and when guided by talent, they are blessed with grace.

-Leon Krier

And so having runne through the foure parts of my first general Division, namely, Foundation, Walles, Appertions, and Compartitions; the House may now have leave to put on his Hatte: having hitherto beene uncovered it selfe, and consequently unfit to cover others. Which point though it be the last of this Art in execution, yet it is alwayes in Intention the first, For who would build but for Shelter?

-Henry Wotton

Nature intended me for the tranquil pursuits of science by rendering them my supreme delight

-Thomas Jefferson

The best architecture is that which meets the expectations of the land

-Thoreau

To be sucessful both on paper and in the field, we have to build intelligently, understand historical precedent, and use local materials to create authentic, long-lasting architecture with a whole that is greater than the sum of its parts.

Architecture requires balance: a mix of function economy and aesthetic.

-Leon Krier

Well building hath three conditions: firmness, commodity, and delight

-Vitruvius

Good architecture is about balancing the practical and the ideal.

-Leon Krier

There are architects who say that the first attempt to break away from the monotony of "chicken coop" rows and square after square of straight up and down houses, that made the old villages beyond the city, tiresome and homely, resulted in grotesque and sometimes hideous constructions of a higglety-pigglety class of architecture in which every style was mixed up and no style either predominated or appeared to good effect. They allege that the architects who were responsible for this fantastic effect called their creations Queen Anne, for want of a better name and merely because there was in the good Queen's time a certain oddity of form, with a gable here and there, which was excuse enough for the builders to call their queer creations Queen Anne cottages. These scoffing architects declare that during the period when the rage ran from these dwellings that there were really but few cottages that could come under the Queen Anne designation and that, in truth, there is no actual Queen Anne style.

-The Brooklyn Daily Eagle, April 16, 1899 on "The Architect's Share in Beautifying [the] City"

You must know that it is the greatest palace that ever was. The roof is very lofty and the walls of the palace are all covered with gold and silver. They are also adorned with dragons, beasts and birds, knights and idols. And on the ceiling too you see nothing but gold and silver. THe building is altogether so vast, so rich, and so beautiful that no man on earth could design anything superior to it.

-Marco Polo on the court of Kublai Kahn in Beijing, 1298

The success of the exterior. . .has been due to the to the unusual boldness with which the materials have been chosen and used and the sincerity with which the effects of age have been simulated. . .Mass and line and light and shade are fundamental factors in determining beauty in architecture. But color and texture and "patine" are also pawns with which to buy charm and interest, and the architect who chooses his brick and stone and wood and slate with the same care and thought as a painter chooses his pigments, and who builds them together with the studied technique of a painter, is insuring added and sustained interest to a building which may satisfy all the academic requirements of grace and beauty

-HD Smith writing in the December 1918 issue of Architectural Record on Pope's Lehman Residence.

"'In architecture, Palladio is the game!!' wrote Edwin Lutyens in a letter to a colleague. His choice of words was deliberate, for he viewed tradition not as a constraint but as an opportunity, and his buildings were characterized by self-conscious manipulation of the rules, and even frivolity, although these were always contained within the playing field of classicism"

-Witold Rybczynski, from 'The Most Beautiful House in the World'

"Our neighborhood of Longfellow was relatively complete, with fresh-rolled sod lawns and spindly little foal-legged trees, but just beyond its edges my friends and I could ride our bikes clear off the edge of the Known World, into that unexplored blank of bulldozed clay and ribboned stakes where, one day, houses and lives would blossom. We would climb down the lattices of rebar into newly dug basements, dank and clammy and furred with ends of tree roots. We rolled giant spools of telephone cable down earthen mounds, and collected as if they were arrowheads bent nails and spent missile shells of grout. The skeletons of houses, their nervous systems, their subcutaneous layers of insulation, were revealed to us as we watched them growing from the inside out. Later I might come to know the house's eventual occupants, and visit them, and stand in their kitchen thinking, I saw your house being born."

-Michael Chabon, Maps and Legends

Beginnings are delicate moments, the beginning of a building no less than the beginning of a friendship or of a marriage. And how do these things begin? With a glance, a word, a phrase. Intuition, not reason, guides us, which is why the moment of beginning has often been the occasion for magic.

-Witold Rybczynski, from 'The Most Beautiful House in the World'