Small and Dignified

This wonderful townhouse is in Charleston, South Carolina.  It's a perfect example of "Affordable Housing" 

As a follow up ... the mall

So maybe we don't need the mall after all, 
I was trying to remember the last time I was in one. 
I now buy almost everything online.  Except groceries.
So if we were to rebuild Main Street what would need to be there.
Hmmmmmm

The Mall Killed Main Street

Main Street had citizens ..............................
the mall has consumers ..............................


Could a mall be configured and designed as a main street?
Could we go back to being citizens?  
Hmmmmm 

For President's Day ...... This photo reminds me of Jefferson and his Love of Books

Thanks to Luke Moloney - Architect for photo.....

Getting Started

Some designers cringe when they see a client walking into their office with a whole stack of design magazines, I love to see this, it means you have started doing some of the heavy lifting.  It provides me with a wealth of knowledge as to what your tastes are and what your looking to achieve.  Projects should be a reflection of their owners, not of their architects.  I do not believe in "Starchitecture".   So when it's time to do a project make a binder or folder and keep adding to it as you go along, it should be a valuable resource for your architect.

Swimming ..... indoors?

I am not such a fan of swimming indoors, to me it's an summer outside kind of thing. However, I am sure I would not mind here... its the indoor pool of a 75m estate... photo courtesy of Forbes.

What you find......

this morning I was trolling some blogs and found this brilliant posting:

It's link is below to see the post I found, It's a beautiful proposal from a Univ. of Notre Dame student, I found this on Andrew Cusack's Blog it's by Wendan Tang, a graduate student at Notre Dame’s School of Architecture

http://www.andrewcusack.com/2006/04/13/chinatown-bus-terminal/

How far do you walk?

I was thinking this morning about how far is too far?

How far would you walk if you have the option too, in my neighborhood I actually prefer to walk to the local corner store, over the option of driving for three minutes to get to our closest supermarket.  Usually however, the cost of goods at the local store is prohibitively high, so usually I opt to drive.  

Thought for today, Multi purpose rooms.

One of my all time favorite rooms, was a combination formal Dining room and Library.  Can you think of other compatible use multi purpose rooms?

Be Real and Truthful About Your Project Budget

One of the first questions I ask a potential client is related to their budget.  Primarily I need to estimate wether they can pay for the work proposed.  When a client is hesitant at first to give me a ballpark figure usually it's because they don't want to waste money on unnecessary or extravagant expenses.   However, when a client gives me a budget I have to tailor my design to suit, and typically if the budget was kept on the low side as opposed to being accurate it limits the overall design.  I do everything to maintain a budget for a project, but it is very difficult to add after the fact.  Of course you can upgrade finishes but the core of the project can rarely be upgraded.  So it is my best advise to prepare a real budget and share this information with your architect at an early stage in the project!