If Chicago is personified by Nelson Algren as a woman with a broken nose, then the Grand Boulevard’s descent from a fashionable neighborhood at the time of the Columbian Exposition in 1893 into dereliction could be personified by Ms. Havisham in her yellowed and faded wedding gown. This narrow masonry rowhouse was a ruin recently roughly renovated by a contractor who cut the rear of the eighteen foot wide property off from light and air. In his defense, the rear yard was not much to look at: a gravel and dirt pad. We set out to create an inside/outside space employing effects with light, color and material that would create a volume for family, community and mindfulness.

​Sustainable Architecture looks different because it performs differently. This  shot speaks volumes of the inside/outside effect in this home and entertainment space. While only 6 inches over 10 feet wide, the space is roomy yet fits like a glove. The light shelf bounces natural light deep into the space. A hopper window above the shelf assists with natural ventilation. The flooring and stone bench draw your eye from inside to outside creating a seamless space to watch the seasons unfold. We call it right sizing.

​The bench passes effortlessly from inside to outside.

​Almost all of the rooms lighting is recessed and indirect.

​We saved tens of thousands of dollars by specifying formaldehyde-free cabinet boxes from an online manufacturer and having the cabinet faces manufactured locally.

​The horizontal window opening extends the countertop in the 12" masonry wall and the vertical window is operable.

The ramshackle, one-story frame white enclosed porch on the right was ripped down and our addition replaced it, opening up the rear of the row house to the light and air. Note how the neighboring trees and garage are gone. If Chicago is personified by Algren as a woman with a broken nose, then the ruin that is much of the South Side is Ms. Havisham. Please keep in mind that her wedding with grand festivities and lavish cake were scheduled for 1893.

​From left to right is displayed the existing and new construction plans for each of the floors. Note the 18 foot wide lot dimension that attests to the popularity and allure of Washington Park to the south and Drexel Boulevard to the east in 1884. Horseback riding was popular and Washington Park even had its own racetrack.

The esteemed Architect Ludwig Mies van der Rohe taught this to his students at IIT. Alfred Caldwell, his landscape architect, inculcated this into me and my classmates. I had and have other ideas. I believe pattern, texture, color and shadow are four of the elements that create engaging, compelling design. Caldwell rejected this, but I hope you will find this effect as beautiful as we do.

Our client share our love of color and we went through many iterations to find the one scheme that was unique, rich and delightful. The sage green Marvin clad double hung windows are matched with a couple of Benjamin Moore historic colors. The groundcover lends a rusticity and a time and money saving component that one can enjoy from the new wrap-around porch. It is the perfect place to take in a warm summer evening.

​This axon shows the complexity of the structure. The effect was to make a seamless dining space with the new structure hidden in the ceiling. Architecture, in our opinion, is partly about effects and pulling them off is the key to a successful project. The parallam supports the wall and 2nd floor. It is deep enough that it sits just below the second floor electrical outlet. It creates a large, unitary dining space which fosters the client's love of cooking and giving dinner parties.

​The reason for this project was to create a greatly expanded dining room with seating for a minimum of 10. 

​We removed the bearing wall between the kitchen and dining room replacing it with a steel beam. The client wanted to be able to cook in her kitchen all-the-while talking to guests in the dining room. The 4 inch recessed lights have beautiful copper trims that distinguish them from the ceiling plane.

​Here's the fireplace with another sawtooth brick detail and new bookcases with a surround reveal detail that is one of our favorites.

​We like luxury like the next person. We also like value and investing money where it gives you the biggest bang for your buck. That's why the cabinets are nice but the tile and masonry are where the major effort went as they will last much longer.

​We celebrate the little details. Note the copper planters and the curved risers.

​This was make Architecture's first design project. The sawtooth brick pattern came out of the desire to make patters, shadow and texture using brick, normally a veneer in modern usage. Most bricks are cored and we selected leftover tan bricks from the Cook County Jail addition. The purple-colored, iron-spot solids (bricks) came from Endicott Clay products. The copper planters filled with flowers added a Urbs en Horto touch to a classic Chicago balloon frame.

​The color scheme for the revamped west elevation. The porch is new from the roof down and the windows have been added to the dormer. The Marvin windows are clad in wineberry and the two color others complement it.

​The Urbs en Horto theme spreads from the enlarged house to the corner parkway. The lattice work wraps the porch and visually ties it into the iron-spot brick base of the house.

​Here is the south elevation with the two-story addition to the right on the east. The plans show the exact location of the addition.

​The house is to be gutted and an right-sized with an extension on the right side of the marker.

I think Architecture is all about lifestyles and effects. In fact, if I were to name a firm today, that's what I would call it. These older split levels have a separate kitchen. Today's lifestyles bring the cook and the cooking into the Great Room.

​The flush ceiling effect makes two spaces become one in a seamless fashion. It is one of our favorite effects and we have done it structurally three or four different ways. This steel wide flange detail is our favorite.

​The split level usually has a hip roof and the beam has to be tapered to meet the steel post. Here it is with the gussets I designed.

Made of high-density foam insulation, these chairs are lightweight yet able to function as any chair does.

Here the chair is assembled from the layers of 2" rigid foam insulation.​

The display case and espresso bar are both birch and the ​latter a niece reveal to set off the birch cap. Shelves that the owner brilliantly salvaged from an old dresser hang on the common brick wall.

The Brussels Pavilion is an unusual filler page in most Miesian historiographies. One reason is that the design disappeared into the chaos of World War II only to make its way back into Mies’s hands in 1966. This pavilion is a fulcrum in Mies’s genealogy due to its assortment of effects achieved by any number of detail, finish, and structural systems found in a number of his projects before and after. In this way, the silence of this project is immense, due to its hidden moment in time, as well as its more complex design nature versus its more vocal counterparts in Mies’s work. 

How to exhibit such a project by the master?

Through details that confuse and delight. This is the key to making Architecture exhibit rather than merely showing off models.

What’s holding this up? What’s behind the curtain? 

Here the viewer must duck their head to enter. The model is viewed at eye level and there are simple, retractable interpretive cards thru which to see and learn.

The model floats upon a mirrored platform. Our budget for the Cone was $100. The mirrors were $6 each and glued to the plywood base. The sheets of rigid foam insulation were $28 each, dovetailed together and hung from the ceiling with fishing wire.

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​Here is the Brussels model without its enclosure.

​Photo by the millworker who is pictured.

​The Christian Science Church investigated returning their reading room to the existing masonry church building. They reached out and we created a glowing wall of the polished green edges of glass that would bring attention to the building without signage or being ostentatious. The light would be consistent with the light of God and the mission of the Christian Science church drawing believers and the unacquainted inside.

​The stair was so much to model and a great joy to see realized. The trees were made by the mother of the graphic designer at the firm. The massing is three bars–the highly talented partner's idea–it is expressed here in the elevation.

​Great Architecture has details that express effects like weightlessness or defy gravity engaging and confounding the viewer: "What's holding this up?" The cantilevered stair floats. I used this detail again in an unbuilt condo project. I would love to employ it again.

​The three bars slide by one another and the center one is raised allowing light into the lobby and enabling the thermal chimney that creates the airflow that cools the building.

​I spent a great deal of time designing and detailing the louvers and light shelf. The red color was inspired by Corbusier and the desire to reflect warm light deep into the office interior.

​I used the light shelf – which bounces natural light deep into the interior – on a later modern addition. It is both an important Architectural and Sustainable element in design today.

​The ground floor plan

​The building is situated on a former Superfund site and took years longer than expected to clean up. Liberty ships were constructed here during World War II. The parking lot employs permeable pavers and swales to trap and clean the runoff. This is an essential element of design today. The building eventually received a LEED Silver rating.

​The roof has been removed to show the mezzanine and the interior courts–one enclosed for books and the other open to the sky.

​The library and the extant chapel both employ a Ralph Soriano-like system where the steel beams and purlins sit below the steel roof deck and are exposed.

​The flash cards inform and present a point of view in a very low tech way. They engage the user and make the exhibit an active experience rather than a passive one.

It's radio rather than color TV.

​Although Mies was "a maker of things," many of his best effects were illusions. Here steel is attached to the birch plywood to make the Baltic birch table straight and flush.

​Here the two are together. The next image explains a great deal.

​The master seated in the second floor neoclassical apartment he lived in on Pearson Street across from the present-day MCA.

​This was featured in Woodbury University's 2D3D show in 2011.