Queen Anne Residence Remodel/Addition

“Places are spaces that you can remember, that you can care about and make a part of your life. Much of what is built now is too tepid to be remembered.”

Chambers for a Memory Palace, by Donlyn Lyndon and Charles W. Moore

‘Tepid’ may be the word to describe this home before the renovation and addition but ‘memorable’ is now the word that takes its place. Although still in construction, it is beginning to take shape and its pronounced form is highly visible. No longer is it simply a modest home overshadowed by the tall adjacent homes but it is confidently perched on a hill to capture beautiful views of Seattle. The procession through the home is one that continues to entice, the main level has modestly high ceilings, keeping the ceiling height of the original home, while the second level increases the ceiling height by nearly a foot. When you finally reach the third story, the cabana level, the height is unrestricted on the large roof deck overlooking Seattle. This creates a pivotal destination point for the procession through the home.  All these moments have resulted in a truly memorable place that the residents are anxious to make a part of their life.

For more information and to see the rendering and sketches go to our website here

 

The Function of Ornament

Building at its most fundamental level is about providing shelter from the elements, and to that end is traditionally a reflection of the environmental forces that shaped it as well as the materials and technological savvy available to accomplish the task. Like many places, the Pacific Northwest has its own building traditions reflecting both its environment and resources. On a domestic scale, the craftsman bungalow, perhaps the most recognizable vernacular, possesses large overhangs, lapped siding, and skillfully executed wood trim -- all elements reflecting our region’s wet winter months and abundance of trees. With the expansion of national and international awareness, as well as industrialization, the ties of building to place are increasingly tenuous. Exotic examples from distant locations become more prevalent as designers search outside local precedent to things more tantalizing and evocative.

The Lacrosse Apartments, on the corner of East Thomas Street and Malden Avenue East, is a successful grafting of a typically Pacific Northwest single family residential architectural vocabulary. In this case the craftsmen style is applied onto a larger apartment building designed in a vernacular that is more likely to be seen in the warmer and sunnier climates to our south, in California or even Mexico. This pairing of rather distant vernaculars may at first strike one as odd, but upon further consideration the regional modification to a stucco building makes sense. Generous roof overhangs and projecting window trim, as well as a subtly projecting cornice between the first and second floors, are among those elements on the Lacrosse easily associated with bungalows, while broad expanses of stucco (including Spanish Rococo inspired parapets) reveal some of the Lacrosse’s southern heritage.  Given that stucco needs greater rain protection than the typical brick or lap-siding-clad Capitol Hill apartment, the above mentioned craftsmen elements make a good deal of sense.

Seen from the intersection of Malden Avenue East and East Thomas Street, one of the first architectural features to catch the eye is generous roof overhang, which add a distinctive horizontal emphasis to the elevations. The projecting roofs are larger than one would typically encounter on a bungalow, as they are here appropriately scaled to a three-story building, where the overhang provides greater weather protection to the taller building. Visually, the larger size of the overhangs combined with their lower height relative to the building corners act as a subtractive counter point in distinction to the taller vertical corners. Where the overhangs are absent, the parapets have a robust cap, whose heft -- while not as effective as the overhangs -- provides some measure of water protection to the top of the wall.

[caption id="attachment_2488" align="alignnone" width="700" caption="The Lacrosse Entry"][/caption]

The Lacrosse’s entry concisely presents many of the building’s noteworthy elements. Columns flanking either side of the stair support a balcony, the base of which is a low cornice demarcating the first from the second floor, while the roof sheltering the balcony provides another hint of the Lacrosse’s dual heritage in the curved ceramic tile shingles commonly seen on mission style buildings. The Terra-cotta pots, although not part of the architecture, are a nice touch. Over-sized support brackets at both the balcony and building roofs lend importance to these portions of the elevation. Also well represented at the entry is the building’s contrasting use of color.

[caption id="attachment_2490" align="alignnone" width="700" caption="Corner Tower at Malden and Thomas"][/caption]

In the above view, the more expressive realization of the cornice first encountered at the entry balcony can be seen demarcating the first and second floors. Above the cornice a slight outward curve directs rainwater away from the first floor, as the roof overhang is too distant to offer much assistance. Above the cornice, the projection of trim over the window’s head deflects water away from the opening, while on the third floor a mini-hip roof protects a pair of windows on the Lacrosse’s main facade. The intersection of Malden Avenue and Thomas Street is marked by a tower which has a post and beam structure, another reference to our region’s timber framing. The transition from the visual mass and solidity of the stucco-clad building base to the lighter and more transparent top floor is one of the best expressive building corners on Capitol Hill and is well integrated with the building's tectonic vocabulary.

[caption id="attachment_2493" align="alignnone" width="700" caption="Cornice at First Floor Window"][/caption]

The attention to detail by the building’s designer is in evidence here, the transition from the cornice, to brackets, to window framing. All elements easily flow from one to another, without a break in rigor. It is as if the second floor gently extended out from the first floor, extruding the brackets in the process. This detail is in contrast to that of the brackets at the entry and the hip roof on the corner, where the desire was to compose those elements as added to the building’s mass, as they are not integral to the window framing and are instead supported by the stucco wall, revealing that every detail has its own specific place within the whole.

Assigning stylistic principles to buildings, while convenient, can gloss over their origins. While craftsman is certainly an easier moniker than, for example, “from-the-damp-northwest-and-made-of-timber”, a knowledge of both the stylistic name and its environmental genesis makes field observations more fulfilling, especially as we gaze upon an assemblage of differing ‘styles’ as well executed as those in the Lacrosse Apartments.

611 Malden Avenue East

Early modernists designers were not gripped by the fear of using brick, as were many later practitioners. With an emphasis on the new, the factory assembled, and the lightweight, early moderns had many reasons to eschew brick: it was traditional, it was heavy (relative to newer materials such as steel and aluminum), and its appearance was fully embraced by society.  Brick was hardly capable of eliciting the wonder and novelty of the new that many of the then avant-garde architects craved. Though I have some sympathies with their reasoning, omitting such a useful material on ideological grounds is not compelling enough to overshadow its many positive attributes, including those of economy, durability, and scale. Looking back far enough, say to the first quarter of the 20^thCentury, one finds that brick did make an occasional appearance in modernist design, proving that the goals of cubic mass, simple form, and restraint of ornament were still possible in these brick clad anomalies. These outliers may have come to be because the newer materials architects really wanted to use were not yet readily available nor understood by builders. Mies, the main harbinger of glass and steel, frequently used brick prior to the 1930s, but even such examples are rare (Frank Lloyd Wright is a notable exception). The Lange House, one of Mies’s brick houses, built in 1930. While the brick could have easily been covered in stucco -- making it more abstract and purer of form -- to my eye the brick takes little away from the cubic massing and clean lines. The cleanly detailed brick, along with expansive ribbon windows and an aggressively cantilevered entry canopy leave little room for debate that this is a modernist building. Nevertheless, such well executed buildings did not propagate a confidence that brick was suitable in achieving a modernist aesthetic, its qualities being overlooked in favor of more contemporary and non-traditional materials.

Malden Avenue East -- a favorite Capitol Hill street -- has one of our best early modernist  buildings that not only embraces brick in the tradition of the Lange house, but also shows that its author had no qualms as to its appropriateness in expressing their design intentions. Furthermore, the diminutive number 611 combines the above early 20th Century aesthetic with another equally short-lived, early favorite -- art deco -- an unsung hero of early modern design. Especially exciting about 611 is that (according to King County records), it was built in 1907, making it one of Seattle very early modern buildings, and is step with goings on in other major cities.

While it may be a bit of a push to make much out of cubic massing in such a small building (there is little room to do anything else but), its squareness of presentation nevertheless toes the party line of early modernism, and is punctuated by the squat box that forms the entry vestibule. The building's dual heritage of early modernism and deco is further revealed at the vestibule, where a gently curving, shiny aluminum (or painted to look aluminum) canopy furthers the deco association. Other delightful touches at the vestibule include bricks forming another curve, leading to a deco inspired door surrounded by glass block (one of modernism's most misused materials, but used quite well here). Although lacking the horizontality that the windows that the Lange House displays, those on 611 have a pleasing horizontal proportion to them (kudos to the building's owner for keeping them intact).

Flanking the entry stair are a pair of garages that are as well-integrated into a project as you will see on the Hill, and whose function in the project exceeds the mere utility of parking cars by not only framing the entry steps but also by extending the useful  size of the front lawn. Also done in brick, the garage masses give the small building a greater heft. The pipe rails, lacking the inner rails required by current codes, are a nice foil to the garages' mass, and would do Mies proud. While strong in their attitude to the street, the garages fit in perfectly with the overall  building-landscape approach, stepping down to the sidewalk in a flowing transition of building, turf, garage, and sidewalk.

Not all is serious at 611, yet all has its place. The north and south elevations are a bit more relaxed than the rigors of the front, where the mass of brick is pushed out midsection by another gently curving wall, this time on both floors. Not on the front, mind you, where it would be more ‘expressive’, but on the sides, and partially hidden from the street. Perhaps the curved walls ended up on the sides because the interior space dictated their placement, where they may have the greatest benefit to those inside the building; certainly a more important consideration than to those passing by on Malden. Perhaps the architect of this modest yet excellent little building had the confidence and conviction of a seasoned hand, knowing that a little lapse in the rigor of the box -- especially if veiled from one's glance -- would not detract from the nobility of the whole, and felt compelled to be discrete by keeping the curved walls on the side elevations, maintaining the modest street frontage. Perhaps this same perceived modesty kept the architect from making the curved wall out of another material, even another pattern of brick? If my speculations ring true, 611 presents a lesson in modesty from which most of my architect-collegues would benefit.

Capitol Hill’s Other Bauhaus(es)

As well as being the name of Capitol Hill’s premier coffee house and a 1980s Goth band, Bauhaus was the name of the modern movement in architecture’s most famous design school. Perhaps the most famous, ever. The only competition for such a superlative may be for the École des Beaux-Arts, the Parisian school that is most (in)famous for its pedagogy of classical architecture, and whose pre-immanence was in fact eclipsed once the Bauhaus came into being in the early 20th Century. The Bauhaus was justly famous as a school for painting, sculptor, dance, graphic design, but it was in the field of architecture that its legacy was — and is — strongest. Modernist icons such as Mies and Gropius both lead and taught at the institution, and both followed with highly successful and influential professional careers after the Bauhaus was disbanded by the Nazis prior to World War II. The design pedagogy taught resulted in some of the 20th Century’s best buildings, including that of the school itself, designed by Gropius and pictured below.  

[caption id="attachment_2113" align="aligncenter" width="550" caption="The Bauhaus (Source: Wikipedia)"][/caption]

It would be hard to underestimate the influence the Bauhaus had on design schools in the United States. After its closing many instructors came here to continue their teaching careers and professional practice. Gropius landed and Harvard, while Mies ended up at the Illinois Institute of Technology in Chicago. Even tiny Black Mountain College (no longer extant) in the mountains of North Carolina landed some Bauhaus alums. The design approach taught was, in its time, at the cutting edge. So cutting edge, in fact, that it was initially a design approach typically found only in larger cities or for larger clients or more prestigious buildings. That was of course bound to change with time, but smaller markets (as Seattle at the time) were longer to embrace the Bauhaus aesthetic, especially for smaller, developer driven buildings. Education also had an influence on the Bauhaus’s dissemination into the U.S., as the Beaux-Arts tradition was what was taught at the vast majority of our universities well into the 1930s, and most likely at the U of Washington as well.

[caption id="attachment_2114" align="aligncenter" width="720" caption="303 Harvard Avenue E Corner View"][/caption]

And though perhaps a bit slower to arrive at the modernists dance, Seattle’s Capitol Hill is fortunate to have several Bauhaus/International Style (similar time period and aesthetic) influenced apartments of various sizes, including the mid-sized beauty pictured above, built in 1949. Thirty years elapsed between the construction of the Bauhaus and 303 Harvard Ave E, perhaps enough time for a direct connection to be tenuous; however, the lineage is evident. Cubic massing, concentrated and expansive use of glass (with an emphasis on horizontals juxtaposed by verticals), and something missing form today’s Bauhaus prodigy: the crisp delineation of the depth between the buildings mass (in this case brick) verses its openings.

[caption id="attachment_2115" align="aligncenter" width="720" caption="303 Harvard East Elevation"][/caption]

Similar to the recently profiled Boylston Court, 303 has the beloved steel window, whose effectiveness as a design element is enhanced by it being framed by the more massive feel of the brick, as well as the little horizontal projections at the window heads and sills. No corner windows here, alas, but the modernist,s next favorite trick — that of the continuous ribbon window — and here deftly used in combination with concrete spandrels on the building’s most significant facade. Nice!

[caption id="attachment_2116" align="aligncenter" width="720" caption="303 Harvard Entrance"][/caption]

Even the addressing numbers have the same proto-super graphic and vertical arrangement as the Bauhaus, this time with an art-deco font. The concrete entry canopy continues the thin lines above the windows in the body of the building, and is at a bit skewed from the mass of the rest of the building. No steel frames here, the window glass is framed directly into the concrete structure, lending it further distinction from the rest of the building. Especially nice is the re-entrant corner and the lone steel post. It would be nice to have a look at the interiors of the units, hopeful that they still may have some great space-age appliances and fixtures.

There are at least several other buildings of this ilk on the Hill, three of which I documented in this pamphlet: Capitol Hill Building Analysis . Each one unique, and each one worthy of providing precedent to future design projects on the Hill — all to better balance the prevalent and suffocating post-modern pastiche that is all too often referenced in the majority of our current development.

Boylston Court

Courtyard housing is one of the oldest types of housing — whether for individual or multiple families — and dates back to at least ancient Greek times. It has such a lengthy heritage for several reasons, including interior cross ventilation and increased access to daylight. Outdoors, there is the ability to achieve a well-defined (and defended) space, which can be completely enclosed or open. Capitol Hill has its own assortment of courtyard housing, the majority most likely built before the 1970s with the Anhalts, dating to the 1920s, as the most famous example. As to the reasons for courtyards falling out of fashion I can only speculate, but maximizing return on investment must be one of them, as providing large planted landscapes not only lessens the number of units per parcel but also increases operational costs. Whatever the reasons, it is unfortunate fewer of them are being built.  

[caption id="attachment_2102" align="aligncenter" width="720" caption="Boylston Court view of Courtyard from Street"][/caption]

I have a couple of favorite courtyard housing projects on the Hill, including Boylston Court, a nicely complex project just west of Seattle Central Community College, and the subject of this posting. Boylston Court has several noteworthy qualities, including a lushly planted and well maintained landscape, a south facing courtyard, and – my favorite aspect — an astonishing variety of design and detail in a compact footprint. Taken individually, the parts of Boylston Court are nothing outstanding; rather, it is in their successful assemblage that an exemplary building is found.

[caption id="attachment_2103" align="aligncenter" width="720" caption="Boylston Court view of Garages Along Olive"][/caption]

Most likely built in the 1950s, it has many elements of that era. including roman brick and steel framed windows. I know I am not alone when I write that I am a sucker for steel-framed corner widows. And who wouldn’t be? They occur in several locations at Boylston Court, at both prominent, and well, less prominent, locations (such as this one at the above garage). But ooh, what beauties they are, regardless of location. It is a shame that steel windows today are (incredibly) expensive, making them prohibitive for most projects — a reason for us to treasure and preserve the few remaining ones we have. Other details include the most minimal of handrails (as seen  in the above photo) — similar to the steel windows there is nothing there but the minimum needed for support. Too bad such delicacy  is not allowed by code anymore . . .

[caption id="attachment_2104" align="aligncenter" width="730" caption="Boylston Court Southwest Corner of Courtyard at Olive"][/caption]

Opposite the courtyard from the above garage photo is another beloved steel-framed corner window, this time with the roof seemingly floating above it. I pray the owners never swap them out for vinyl windows (it does happen). Note how the foreground gives a hint of the courtyard landscape contained beyond.

[caption id="attachment_2105" align="aligncenter" width="720" caption="Boylston Court view of Eastern Building from Olive"][/caption]

Above is an alternate view of the garage facade in the second image. Just beyond Boylston Court is an even older apartment building (in blue). Compared to the box that is its neighbor (and mind you, I do fancy boxes) Boyslton Court’s facade and massing falls with the grade. This not only creates a better pedestrian environment (garage doors not withstanding), but also creates a break in the mass of the building at both the roofline and the plane of the facade. Here is a break down in massing (that Holy Grail of design review boards) that is actually understandable and ties back to something tangible. What a refreshing departure from the current modulation craze that seems to have neither rhyme nor reason, other than a designer’s whimsy.

[caption id="attachment_2106" align="aligncenter" width="720" caption="Garages and Decks along Boylston Avenue"][/caption]

[caption id="attachment_2107" align="aligncenter" width="720" caption="Facade Along Boylston with Varandah Above"][/caption]

The other street elevation of Boylston Court occurs, appropriately enough, along Boylston Avenue, where the designer created one of the better apartment facades on Capitol Hill although it is (again) dominated by garage doors for a section of its length. Despite this apparent handicap (or because of it?), over the garages there is a nice and spacious verandah on the level above the garage, whose size makes it appear to actually be quite usable. Being this close to the street a nice venue is offered for the residents and passing public to informally engage with one another (or not). Here, the garages are effectively used as a base, an intermediary that helps to maintain protocols. The garages also provide modulation (that again is understandable) to the verandahs, and order the various levels of transparency of the facade as it transitions from brick to metal railing and back to brick. Classic.

[caption id="attachment_2108" align="aligncenter" width="720" caption="Boylston Court End Unit with Private Entry"][/caption]

Further north along Boylston is still another expression, this time more of a townhouse or even a single family home. Making a return appearance is the delicate guardrail from along Olive and the much-loved corner window. This unit even gets a bit of a front yard and entry porch, in place of a verandah, as well as its own set of stairs. Despite this entry being the fourth (fifth?) design treatment of the street frontage of the modestly sized project, the complex’s over-all architectural unity remains in tact. This is an extremely delicate balance to maintain, especially with so little street frontage. To have all of these parts flow cohesively is not something to take for granted, as each section can simultaneously stand on its own merit while still contributing to the greater whole; however, it is not just the buildings that play a role. The landscape’s design is equally important, be it the built landscape of the verandahs, the micro, intimate front yard noted above, or the the courtyard, pictured below.

[caption id="attachment_2109" align="aligncenter" width="720" caption="Boylston Court Inner Courtyards"][/caption]

Instead of digging a large hole, and filling it with building (a typical approach), the designers of Boylston Court approached the site differently, leading to the above-mentioned qualities.  Where this approach really bears fruit is in the courtyards. In addition to the large, central courtyard depicted above, there are two alley-sized-courtyards that wind their way up the site, to the east and then north, creating a splendid terracing and layering of space effectively creating shared landscapes that are at the same time intimate. A well resolved dichotomy.

[caption id="attachment_2110" align="aligncenter" width="720" caption="Courtyard Facade with Wood Siding"][/caption]

Above, one sees the only significant break in the otherwise uniform palette of roman brick — rough sawn cedar siding (a fuller extent can be seen the first photo); curious, that this change is somewhat buried in the courtyard, and not on the street, where it would be more ‘expressive’. Or is it? I like to think it yet another example of the designer’s sophisticated approach. Whisper, don’t scream. Also, the wood siding is a softer material than the brick, and in the designer’s eye more apropos to be within the softer courtyard, the softer landscape.

Boylston Court is a great building in our neighborhood, and a great example of how a context driven design (be that the site or the content of the building’s program) can provide a wealth of valuable clues about which to design, and lead to a building that not only fits well into its context, but enhances and creates its own. It is also a superb example of courtyard housing, and a building typology I would like to see more of on the Hill (albeit, at a greater density).