AIA Peconic: 2022 Daniel J. Rowen Memorial Design Awards

DOES PROJECT ADDRESS ISSUES

OF TIME AND PLACE?

————–

ARCHITECTURE

The Architecture Awards celebrate outstanding architecture regardless of project size, budget, style, or building type. New buildings and major additions are eligible.

—– 

HISTORIC PRESERVATION / ADAPTIVE REUSE

The Historic Preservation/ Adaptive Reuse Awards acknowledge projects that restore, remodel, preserve or repurpose existing buildings of any type or style. 

—– 

PROJECTS

The Projects Awards recognize unbuilt architecture, planning, urban design, and research. Submissions may be real or conceptual but must reflect a solution related to the built environment. 

—– 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 

2022 Awards

——- 

This home for a young family is located in Amagansett, an early English and Dutch settlement on the East End of Long Island. The pastoral site, at the border between meadow and woodland, was first cleared by Native Americans as hunting grounds. Later it became the site of the first house built by a settler in 1680. Most significantly, it served as communal grazing pasture for the early settlers as the town was established alongside it. The meadow was divided into parcels with low stone walls and farmers rotated their livestock from one parcel to the next so as not to overgraze and damage any one area. This synergy among the land, livestock, and human intervention stabilized the landscape for generations. Recently, however, farming has declined as land values have increased, and grazing is no longer managing the meadow. Thus it is slowly transitioning to woodland and its connection to a significant piece of its history is fading.

The goal of the project was to reference the agrarian history of the site in the architecture and landscape design, principally by dividing the site into zones in a similar fashion to the original pasture parcels. In the same way that the parcels had different maturities of grasses due to the rotating grazing, the scale and density of the plantings in each zone were designed to vary based on modern needs: high grasses and shrubs provide a visual and acoustic buffer from the road, medium height grasses screen the house from the approach, and low grass and ground-cover open up views where appropriate. To emphasize the historic connections to the pasture, the planting zones that line the approach are elevated, bringing the grasses to eye level along the entry walk for a unique experience passing through them.

The massing of the house is broken up into smaller volumes, each of which relate to one of the landscape zones: public spaces, private spaces, and guest or service spaces. The interconnected gabled structures reference the connected barn vernacular precedent but are adapted for a modern experience. The steep roof pitches allow for ample 2nd floor space uninterrupted by collar ties. These traditional gable forms are subverted by cuts through the ridge to bring in natural light.

In the same way traditional forms are adapted, so too are historic materials transformed. The shingle siding common to the region is exaggerated in scale. In reference to the grasses of the pasture, traditional thatch siding is employed but it is packed neatly between the exposed exterior framing in a modern interpretation. The rhythm of the exterior framing is continued on the interior in the structure of the stair and the bath vanities. The exterior siding and paving are carried through the breezeways that connect the volumes of the house, further integrating the house with the site. Natural materials including oak, clay tiles, and plaster reinforce a connection to the landscape and a mood of warmth and comfort in the home. The gracious public spaces are each centered around oversized fireplaces to celebrate the family gathering together.

With its holistic approach to both architecture and landscape, the design translates the history of the place into a unique architectural vocabulary. In the process it preserves the pastoral character of the site, creates a record of the past, and enriches the family’s home with deeper meaning.  

————————

—– Project Credits Below —–

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

In the early postwar period twenty-five small, simple, low-slung cottages were nestled into the ocean dunes, founding an unpretentious enclave popular with surfers and beach lovers. In ensuing years the community became a gateway to points east, leading to increased traffic on the main highway and railroad that pass along its northern edge. At the same time improved environmental awareness has brought attention to the risks of flooding from hurricanes that periodically inundate these lowlands.

Road and rail traffic noise present the most pressing problem on this highway-fronting lot. Though it may seem paradoxical at first, the new house actually lies closer to the road than its predecessor. However this arrangement, with the structure stretched across the property, shields a large back yard from offending noise and opens it up to sunlight from the southern sky. Walls facing the road are free of fenestration and extend into the side yards and above the roofline to enhance their shielding effect. An additional wall fragment in the front yard blocks sound at the entrance door, provides privacy, and defines the stoop. Research shows that mass optimizes walls’ sound-deadening properties, but conventional mass wall assemblies of stone or concrete are costly. Half-timber construction, common amongst the neighborhood’s original cottages, inspired an economical alternative. Historically, half-timbering substituted a primitive timber frame infilled with sticks and clay (waddle and daub) for traditional masonry. These readily-available and easily-worked materials created mass which primarily provided protection from the elements. In this house, inexpensive, pliable sheets of mass-loaded vinyl, typically used to reduce sound transmission through floors, cover the building’s framed exterior walls. The sheets fold together at their seams to form regularly-spaced projecting ribs, not unlike the half-timbered frame, that set a cadence for the wood siding panels’s widths, the interior’s layout, and even the basis of light fixtures let into the walls’ thickness.

The threat of flooding from storms presents a secondary problem. The property sits at a low elevation only steps from the ocean and inches above ground water. Current flood maps require the first floor of new construction to rise eight feet above the natural grade. To reconnect the elevated house’s interior with the landscape, the front yard’s terrain is sculpted upward, restoring the property’s original windswept dunes in the process. The back yard connection is re-established through a series of descending decks, stadium seating, and steps that meet the swimming pool and the fire pit, which are raised out of the ground to avoid the water table and to form bench seating.

By attending to both built and natural contexts, the project profits from the community’s architectural heritage by reinterpreting the half-timber construction technique in modern materials, while gracefully and sustainably integrating with its environment by drawing on the dunescape’s topography.  

————————

—– Project Credits Below —–

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

—————– Juror Award – Unbuilt Projects —————–

Ameet Hiremath AIA — DEBORAH BERKE PARTNERS

Ameet Hiremath leads academic and cultural projects, as well as residential projects, at Deborah Berke Partners. His projects balance complex uses with environmental sensitivity. Ameet played a critical role in the design of the Cummins Indy Distribution Headquarters, led the design and construction for the 122 Community Arts Center, and is leading the design of our project for Harvard Law School. Ameet earned a Bachelor of Environmental Design from the University of Missouri and received his M.Arch. from Yale University. He joined Deborah Berke Partners in 2006 and became a partner in 2019.

—–

John Keenen — KEENEN/RILEY Architects 

John Keenen studied art history at Georgetown University and received his Masters of Architecture Degree from Columbia University. Along with Terence Riley, he founded K/R in 1984. He has twice been the recipient of a Graham Foundation Grant and has twice been a finalist for the prestigious Andrea Palladio Award for Architecture. Since the early 1990’s he has headed K/R’s New York City office. In addition, John is a former trustee for the Design Trust for Public Space in New York City. John has taught as a visiting professor at the University of Texas at Arlington and Austin, Harvard GSD, Rhode Island School of Design, Parsons School of Design and Syracuse University.

—–

Lindy Roy — ROY STUDIO

Lindy Roy is the founder and principal of Roy Studio, an award-winning design firm. Lindy received an M.Arch from Columbia University and a B.Arch Studies from the University of Cape Town. Lindy has served as adjunct at schools of architecture at Columbia University, Princeton, Harvard, IIT, Cooper Union and Rice University. Published widely, Lindy’s work has been exhibited in museums and galleries and was the subject of a solo exhibition, ROY Design Series 1 at SFMoMA. Her work is also represented in the permanent collections of the Museum of Modern Art in New York, SFMoMA in San Francisco and The Art Institute in Chicago. She is currently engaged in a cross disciplinary collaboration with a neuroscientist exploring relationships between neuroscience and architecture.