“You can’t do that!” has always seemed a dangerous challenge, both to me and to John Lee, material conservator who is taking the lead on this project.

So, how do you put the ruin in a vitrine and not have it detract from the experience or interpretation? Even better, can you make it a positive addition that contributes to the interpretation?

Why not enclose the original volume of the structure using glass to connect the dots between the existing fragments? One can include as much detail as contributes to the interpretation. In the case of Menokin we have both HABS (Historic American Buildings Survey) drawings and photographs of the building before the fall, as well as the remaining elements, to rely on.

I had been mentally dragging around the idea of putting ruins in a glass box for years. In graduate school at the University of Texas, I wanted to build a dome over a small wattle and daub structure and then build a replica to provide both the artifact and the restored building for study and interpretation. Years later, in Charleston, I wanted to preserve the original but no longer functional tile roof of the 1713 powder magazine by putting the site in a glass enclosure that would include the archaeology of the remaining revetment of one of America’s few walled cities. Minel’s Byzantine Chapel in Houston was an exciting nudge, and every time I went back to UT and walked past the Harry Ransom Center and saw the etched glass I knew I wanted to use glass to exhibit a building. Then a few years ago, on a project with Stanley Tigerman at The Brice House, John Lee and I enlivened the offices of the International Masonry Institute. We were able to preserve an interior wall behind glass, complete with original brightly colored lime washes and the ghosts of a very early kitchen dresser.

At Menokin the infill glass can start with a frosted or etched pattern of the decorative elements such as quoins and belt courses, and later include cast glass elements applied to the glass walls to provide the projection, texture and shadow effect of the decorative elements. If taken to the penultimate, LCD glass capable of displaying images would allow us to represent information such as changes to the building over time, or the construction lines depicting the geometry of the Georgian facade. Menokin could even finish off the week for local residents with a picnic on the front lawn where they can watch the latest movies on the facade.
















Brice House offices
Photo credit: Charles Phillips


Glass and carbon fiber prostheses for amputated/truncated structural members will allow them to be put back into service and in place so that the original structural system, once refitted within the ruin, will make sense. These members will be much more valuable as artifacts of a system rather than conserved individually on a shelf in a building at a distance from the ruin.















   




Menokin: Model view (left) and today (right)
Photo credit: Charles Phillips



We were talking up the concept of a glass house at Menokin when I saw a photo of the Apple store on 5th Avenue and realized that it is bigger than Menokin. This was a scale that people could get their minds around. If a picture is worth a thousand words, what is a model worth? So we made one.

Renowned structural glass engineer, Tim MacFarlane who engineered the Apple Store quickly saw the possibilities when we discussed the idea over breakfast before his lecture to a glass conference at Corning. He is now a member of the team and we are off and running. This project is allowing the whole team to stretch in material conservation, and designing ways to test the structural capacity of repairs to severely compromised structural elements.

If you remember the models of The Visible Man, and The Visible Woman, you can envision Menokin as The Visible 18th Century House. The story of Menokin is way too large for this article. The history, the green engineering and design going into this “green house,” the salvage and preservation of the interiors before collapse, and the material conservation program are all major articles by themselves, so visit the website: www.menokin.org for more information and updates.




   Menokin Harry Ransom Center detail
   Photo credit: Charles Phillips