Practicing ArchitectureAwards

David, congratulations on receiving an Institute Honor Award for Interior Architecture. Your project involved updating a home featured in Architectural Record in 1969. What were some of the processes you employed when updating a mid-century modern structure so that it complied with the new owners’ vision?

We began the design process by distilling the roots of the original building and its author’s intentions into ordering devices through which our new work could be understood. Acknowledging the project’s provenance as a 1969 Record House, we worked with a level of respect for the existing home while integrating our client’s desires for a changed experience.

What does continuous living space mean to you, and how did you apply that to your design?

Given the singular ceiling height of the original house as a constraint, we viewed the project as two masonry rooms braided together by a glass entry node. Our insertion of a conceptual allée of casework provides for a variety of spatial experiences within the masonry rooms while visually linking them together. This was not experientially possible with the previous conditioning of wall placement.

The original brick fireplace and skylight ring seem to be a focal point of the updated design. How did you envision the importance of these elements in the final design?

We believed the fireplace and skylight encasing it were elements that tectonically juxtaposed the notion of heavy vs. light in a compelling manner. The organic positioning of the home’s original walls shrouded this juxtaposition and our design intent was to liberate the condition.

Revisiting the work of another architect must be both an intriguing and challenging assignment. Looking forward to 2062, what might you tell the future architect hired to update this home?

We are better architects now due to the lessons learned from an architect’s hand employed in this project more than forty years ago. Much like the Roman god, Janus, architects are guardians of both the past and the future. I would empower the future architect to be observant of the original work Fisher Nes Campbell created, our repositioning of that work for our client, and yet to bring their own ideology to bear in reconceiving new work to this home.

2013 Institute Honor Awards
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Institute Honor Awards have
recognized projects of all sizes,
budgets, styles, and building
types. We are now accepting
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Submission Deadline
August 24, 2012

Architecture
Interior Architecture
Regional and Urban Design
Twenty-five Year Award

2012 Institute Honor Award for Interior Architecture

Record House Revisited

Architect: David Jameson
Architect
Location: Owings Mill,
Maryland

View other recipients of 2012
Institute Honor Awards

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Member Spotlight

David Jameson, FAIA
David Jameson Architect
4435 Wisconsin Avenue NW
Suite 410
Washington, DC 20016

Phone: 202-363-0080
Web: davidjamesonarchitect.com