Design Viewed From the Jury Box

The various design award programs of the American Institute of Architects (AIA) have been criticized in the past by me and others for being partial to heavily promoted personalities and passing fancies.

Much of the criticism has been laid at the doorstep of an occasional high-profile jury accused of being dominated by vain professionals or fawning academics preoccupied with the style and statement of a design rather than how it might uniquely solve a problem and serve the user.

The criticism from both inside and outside the AIA has prompted some chapters to seek a wider variety of jurors, including a stray critic or two. Though in the past I have avoided participating in such programs, protective of my time and independence, I recently accepted a few invitations.

What changed my mind was that I thought by serving now and then on a jury, I would position myself better to address the continuing complaints by architects that their awards programs have been misrepresented in the popular press as either a self-congratulatory or masochistic exercise, or worse, not represented at all.

Also, as a juror, I thought perhaps I would get a better sampling of current designs, trends and abilities in a particular chapter, instead of just being presented a list of winners selected by what too often has seemed to be a prejudiced or parochial few who ride the awards circuit. And, of course, there was the appeal of being able to exercise my own parochialism and prejudices.

With that in mind, I traveled first to San Jose and Palo Alto to serve as one of three jurors in the design program of Santa Clara Valley AIA chapter. The other jurors were architects Betsey Olenick Dougherty, former president of the state AIA who has a practice based in Orange County, and Donald Goodhue, a seasoned, respected Northern California practitioner.

Given the history of development of the region known as the Silicon Valley, I expected to see a lot of submissions of sprawling single-family houses, sturdy institutional complexes and glistening high-tech parks. These projects, indeed, were well represented.

But surprisingly, there also was a fair sampling of other projects involving the retrofitting and reuse of older structures, the tricky siting of new structures in already built-up areas, and a general, challenging concern with context.

What this indicated to me was that Santa Clara is experiencing a sort of architectural second growth that is requiring architects to be more sensitive to urban design issues, and to start mending the suburban sprawl that scars the region’s attractive setting.

As for the awards, winning top honors was the design of a science building on the Stanford University campus by the firm of McLellan & Copenhagen. “A clearly demanding program met in a restrained way, with an excellent expression of all the component parts . . . within a host of constraints and contextual challenges,” we the jurors declared in a joint statement. There were no architectural acrobatics, just a tough job well done.

In a category entitled “People in Architecture,” established by the chapter to recognize projects especially sensitive to the users, the award went to the firm of Barcelon & Jang for the design of Triton Museum in the city of Santa Clara. “The building does not overwhelm people; it embraces them,” we said. Here was a design that recognized that its first obligation was to the user, the public and to come within budget.

For me, the most interesting submission was a housing project in Palo Alto called Abitare, designed by Carrasco & Associates. I saw it as a fresh solution to provide needed housing, with a touch of open space and personality, on a deck above required parking, sited on a commercial street, and breaking the boring mold of the usual double-loaded corridors in doing so.

After touring the project, at my request, to see if it worked as well as it appeared in photographs and plans, the jury upped the award from a citation to a merit. I was only sorry we could not tour a number of other projects before voting.

While there was, of course, disagreement among the jurors, I was surprised how much we agreed upon. “Overall, the main criticism was that many projects were over-designed and overwrought,” we said in a joint report. There also was disappointment that we didn’t find solutions that expressed the high-tech workplace the area is known for.

Still, the general quality, and in particular, the diversity, of the submissions was impressive, and the program, for me, enlightening.

What prompted me to serve on the jury for the San Fernando Valley chapter awards program was its theme, “Spirit of Place.” According to program coordinator Don Conway, we were to identify and honor projects designed to lend a special meaning and importance for those who use them.

This turned out to be quite difficult, for me and the other jurors, architects Luis Naidorf, James Pulliam and Virginia Tanzman. “We were all less than overwhelmed,” said Naidorf in his concluding comments, and as a result, there were no honor awards.

But there were some challenging projects that garnered merits and citations, including a remodel of a synagogue by Robbins & Bown, a university library and a data processing center by Leidenfrost/Horowitz, single-family houses by David Cooper and John Sergio Fisher, and two remodels by Kenneth David Lee.

Winning a merit and particular praise from all the jurors was Lee’s remodel and addition of a nondescript 700-square-foot house in Van Nuys. Lee had noted in the submission that the owner had been in desperate need of help, feared architects, was concerned with cost and wanted to do most of the work himself. Lee’s response was a simple and sensitive design that he claims cost his client $18 a square foot to construct.

“This is a type of remodeling that many architects do not undertake,” observed Pulliam, adding that if they did undertake it, they wouldn’t submit it for an award. But he and the other jurors, including myself, felt that such projects were increasingly common, especially in the Valley, and deserved the attention and talents of architects, design award programs and their juries.