Winter | 2012 www.aiare.org
Redwood Ar c hi t ect ’ s P o st
2012 AIARE Board of Directors Julia Donoho, AIA President
AIARE Events 2013 Look Ahead December 18 | 5:30pm AIARE Holiday Party
Mark Albertson, AIA
Vice President/ President Elect
Jaime Stitch, Assoc. AIA Treasurer
January 1, 2013 Happy New Year!
Diana Mendez, Assoc. AIA Secretary
Katherine Austin, AIA AIACC Director
Schuyler Bartholomay, Assoc. AIA
January 9 | 11:30- 1pm Membership Lunch Meeting Glazer Center, Santa Rosa
Communications Director
Pete Gang, AIA
Professional Practice Director
January 11-12 AIARE Board Retreat
Bryan Chubb, Assoc. AIA Associate Director
Thomas R. Larson, AIA Director at Large
January 17 AIARE Board Meeting
Daniel J. Strening, AIA
Director at Large | Lecture Series
Michael Chambers, AIA Governmental Relations
February AIACC 1st 2013 Board Meeting
Bert Braden, PE Affiliate Director
Kevin Zucco, SE Affiliate Director
March Grassroots
Wendy Young
Executive Director
April Architecture Week 2013 Speak at High Schools AIARE Bike Tour and more... Š2012 AIARE Newsletter The American Institute of Architects Redwood Empire Chapter P.O. Box 4178, Santa Rosa CA 95492 Wendy S. Young, Executive Director phone: 707-838-2672 e-mail: exec@aiare.org website: www.aiare.org For comments regarding the newsletter please contact the editor, Schuyler Bartholomay, Assoc. AIA Communications Director, AIARE sbartholomay@wrightcontracting.com
November AIARE Board Elections
Wine and Learns Lecture Series Seminars Architectural Tours And much more to come....
C o ve r and ins et Pho tos : S c huyl er Bar tho l o m ay , Assoc. AIA
Winter | 2012
Contents 4
President’s Message
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Membership Meeting | October
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Letter to the Editor
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Over to the Dark Side
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Associate’s Corner
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CRAN | October
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AIARE 2012 Design Awards Gala
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Membership Meeting | September
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REBEC | Second Annual Event
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Keith Buchanan
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NXNC Lecture Series
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Rehabilitating Main Street
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SRJC Culinary Arts Tour
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CRAN | September
2013 Board of Directors & Sunset Breeze House
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President’s Message Year End 2012 For my last message as President, I want to express what a wonderful chapter we have here in the Redwood Empire. Our board is strong, active, and engaged. All of our meetings this year met their quorum and we retained sitting board members for repeat terms. Additionally, two of our Board members, Jaime Stich, Assoc. AIA and Schuyler Bartholomay, Assoc. AIA, won “Associate of the Year,” and our incoming Vice President/ President Elect, Nate Bisbee, AIA, is the “Young Architect of the Year.” There is one open position on the Board, Regional and Urban Affairs, so if you are interested to be of service, please let Wendy know.
Julia Donoho 2012 AIARE President
We say farewell to Kevin Zucco, whose position as Allied Board member is required to rotate. Kevin will not be missed for long as he will continue to serve on the committee that proposed the Allied Bylaws changes, as it moves through the system until we vote on it next year at Convention. Kevin won the “Allied Member of the Year” award for his contributions.
This year, we had an excellent Design Awards turnout, both in the number of entries, the quality of the designs, and the attendance at the gala. Everyone is a winner who entered. All of our jurors have worked on projects in our area and brought personal knowledge of designing in the Redwood Empire to their discussion and interpretation of projects. They took a special liking to the Round Barn project and the story of Mark Adams, giving it an Honor Award, so we took them to tour the building. As I pass the hat to Mark Albertson, AIA, our incoming President, my role is also changing. Normally I would serve as Past President and AIACC Board member, but that has changed. Beginning January, I will be serving as Regional Director, representing California for three years on the National Board of the AIA. My purpose is to keep the Redwood Empire’s passion for addressing the reduction of dues, alive at the National level. At Convention, 81% of components agreed this is an important transition the AIA must make. It should be an interesting ride! Sincerely, Julia Donoho, AIA President, AIARE 2012
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Letter to the Editor I wanted to personally thank Danny Strening for his exciting 2x4 lectures. Even though we all have to run to meetings, make new business happen, check dimensions and deal with agency approvals, we sometimes forget why we became architects. The AIARE chapter has meaningful lectures on how to navigate practice, infrastructure, marketing, but I hope these concerns alone are not why we became architects. Ironically it is the NXNC and 2X4 lectures that can perhaps benefit us in the deepest sense.
Thank you to AIARE 2012 Sponsors
MKM &Associates structural engineering ESTABLISHED 1983
Our passion to create should be the engine, not the caboose. Danny’s last NXNC lecture was Brian Johnsen of Johnsen Schmaling Architects. It was most compelling to hear Brian emphasize our opportunity to show restraint and taste in our expressions. There have been several American economic cycles of overwrought, if not noisy tones. Brian’s use of carefully selected materials, some quite readily available that age over time in gracious ways was refreshing. The capacity to create with integrity and heart should be our hallmark, the cornerstone of how the future of design and material selection unfolds for each of us. What more compelling effort can our Chapter have than Danny’s hard work and conviction to bring to our forefront these principles? Thank you again Danny and the AIARE! 1+1=3 with this level of programming! Sincerely, Warren J. Hedgpeth, AIA, NCARB
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Winter 2012
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Associates Corner By Bryan Chubb, Assoc. AIA Associate Director 2012- 2013 November 29th ARE/CSE at New Location Why not refocus on your licensure studies? The ARE/CSE study sessions are now once a month at Aromas in Railroad Square. Come down and study with us, and AIA will buy you a beverage of your choice! Study days are now once a month on the last Thursday of the month. There are additional non-official study days that some of us get together for, so if that day doesn’t work for you please let me know. I can also answer IDP questions you may have. We’d love to see you there! Since December is filled with holiday busyness for us all our study day was Thursday the 13th of December. If you missed it we hope to see you next month. Thursday, January 24th from 6:00 - 7:00 PM. Aroma Roasters, 95 5th Street, Santa Rosa, CA 95401 (At the corner of 5th and Wilson) Parking is free starting at 6:00 PM. Contact Bryan Chubb at bryanc@qka.com if you have questions. CanStruction It’s time to start considering helping the canned food effort in 2013, and have fun while you’re at it. Join a design team or put together your own team. Last year yielded countless meals for needy families and we thank everyone who participated. Did you know that CanStruction is a national effort? Last May at the 2012 AIA National Convention in Washington DC, CanStruction Nationals teamed up with CanStruction DC and MV+A Architects to design and build Santiago Calatrava’s Turning Torso CanStructure. Remember too that you can get IDP credit while you’re at it, in the Leadership and Service section of the Practice Management category. More information on local CanStruction opportunities to come… IDP 2.0 – Submit those Hours! I had heard from some of you whose perception was that IDP was in a constant state of rules changes, and that this was discouraging you. This was despite NCARB’s efforts to make changes as few times and as painlessly as possible. I’m pleased to now be hearing that many of you feel the new IDP 2.0 format is simpler and more straightforward. I’d have to agree. The web interface for recording hours looks much better, and makes it very clear how much you have left to do and in what categories. If you waited until just before the IDP rollover date of April 3rd to submit your hours, you were in good company. If that’s true though, then the beginning of October was your 6 month alarm clock. If you’ve been procrastinating or lost track of time, your 2 month grace period is over! So record and submit your latest hours before the busy holidays distract you. http://my.ncarb.org/Home/ Inspiration As Interns (grumble) we all find ourselves in ruts, laying out endless toilet rooms or “designing” brilliant details of bitumen and roofing felt. Take a break from those ADA min clearance works of art and remember what inspires you. It may not be as charmed a life as your friends think it is, but here are probably some of the reasons why you became interested in architecture in the first place. Regardless of the project though, it can be a fun and fulfilling career. Now keep studying, licensure is within your grasp!
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AIARE 2012 Design Awards Gala Julia Donoho, AIA, Esq. LEED AP
PURPOSE The Bi-annual Design Awards Program recognizes outstanding architectural design by Redwood Empire architects and for work in the Redwood Empire. The purpose of the awards program is: • to honor the architects, clients, and consultants who work together to achieve design excellence, • to elevate the general quality of architecture practice, • establish a standard of excellence against which all architects can measure performance, and • inform the public of the breadth and value of architectural practice. It is sometimes a surprise to me which projects get the awards, and this year is no different. I thought it might be useful to discuss three aspects of the process. JURY PROCESS Our Design Awards Committee looked for jurors that work at different scales and that have experience with projects in the Redwood Empire. Mary Griffin from Turnbull Griffin Haesloop brought a strong history of projects in Sonoma County, including the early work at the Sea Ranch. Julie Snow came to us from Minnesota with a fresh eye for clear and consistent design. Michael Palladino flew up from Los Angeles with a fresh perspective on the boundary of project design and community planning. And, Ernesto Olivares, Mayor of Santa Rosa, participated in the jury contributing information about the community in which some of these projects are situated, and arranged an impromptu tour of one of the projects. PROJECT SUBMISSIONS AND AWARD CATEGORIES This year we had 37 submissions in 5 categories: Built, Unbuilt, Small, Alteration/Rehabilitation, and Residential. It seems like it was very successful to separate out the residential as we are trying to establish a Custom Residential Architect’s Network. We received 14 entries in the residential category and another 6 residential projects in the other categories. So, it seems having a separate category for residential projects makes a lot of sense for our chapter. The built, unbuilt, and alteration/rehabilitation categories had similar numbers of entries. The jurors commented that unbuilt usually has some of the stiffest competition in other chapters. WINNERS Architecture design awards are not given to projects that are the most comfortable, unchallenging, or conventional. Architecture design awards are mostly given to those projects that exhibit truly fresh, clear solutions to project types from the difficult to the mundane. These are the projects that forge a new path, either in construction technologies, function, aesthetics or social programs. The jurors made various comments about how they choose the winners – what they look for is an alignment between what the architect feels is good, as explained by his presentation resonating with their own understanding of what is good, and when what is described is also what the juror is experiencing. Where you can see the idea and it is clear. Is it a gem for the community or an excellent design? If it has a clear concept it goes in the Honor bucket. CONCLUSION The difference between architecture and mere buildings is that architecture is a physical snapshot of the social, cultural, technological, and even political attitudes and conditions of any given place and era. Therefore, design award winners should be the most forward thinking, reflecting the contemporary culture. To the extent they are the vanguard of our time, their effects will dilute down to the more mainstream and ultimately become the most “acceptable” new architecture representing our culture and era. Summarizing the results of this year’s design awards, our chapter has a unique community of engaging architect as well as a high level of attraction of architects from other areas. We are blessed with many challenges and opportunities and many projects that delight and inspire. http://www.aiare.org/designawards/ http://www.aiare.org/photo-gallery
https://picasaweb.google.com/114648623753145808175/AIAREDesignAwardsGala#slideshow/5805233264466653522
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Thank you to our Sponsors and all who made the event possible! North Bay Biz Magazine QKA Mohawk Group GHD Gyford Stand Off Systems Wright Contracting MKM & Assoc. Summit Engineering Trope Group Seabrook & Associates Nuheat Interface
Charles M. Schulz Sonoma County Airport Draftech Blubprinting, Inc. Fortifiber Building Systems Group Persinger Architects & Assoc. North Bay Business Journal Energy Plus Wholesale BKF Brelje & Race Kirby Construction KaiserAir Sweet Lane Nursery Digital Prints & Imaging of Santa Rosa
2nd Annual REBEC By Jordan Lebovich, JBL Photography The mission of the Redwood Empire Built Environment Collaborative is to develop and encourage communication among organizations concerned with the design, construction and operations of the built environment through sharing of resources, networking opportunities and community education. The Organizations comprising REBEC include American Institute of Architects Redwood Empire, the US Green Building Council Redwood Empire, Construction Specifications Institute, North Coast Builders Exchange, ASHRAE, Northern California Engineering Contractor’s Association, National Electrical Contractors Association, American Counsel of Engineering Consultants and Redwood Empire Code Officials. Each of the organizations was well represented by Board members, general members and their REBEC committee members. With well over 120 participants, the lunch was as great networking event which was followed by our two guest speakers. U.S. Congressman Mike Thompson, representing California’s First Congressional District gave his insights on the environmental, economic and security benefits of energy efficient construction. He talked about the current programs in place that support these goals and the obstacles to getting them renewed or improved. He fully supports these efforts and is committed to getting them reauthorized. Our second speaker was Kent Peterson, VP and Chief Engineer of P2S Engineering. Kent’s award-winning design experience includes high-performance green buildings, energy-efficient central plants and innovative control strategies. He serves as chairman of the California State University (CSU) Mechanical Review Board where he works to improve mechanical systems on CSU campuses. He talked about energy efficiency in building design and feels that it doesn’t have to cost more to have high performance buildings as long as the design team is willing to work together. He pointed out that it is often the small things that give the most payback. For more information about P2S and its energy efficient ideas and design, go to their website http://www.p2seng.com/
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AIARE NXNC Lecture | Brian Johnsen, AIA By Jordan Lebovich, JBL Photography Attitude, restraint, modest, meaningful – these are words that Brian uses to describe his approach to his work. Brian Johnsen and Sebastian Schmaling form Johnsen Schmaling Architects in Milwaukee Wisconsin and their work represents a unique synthesis of conceptual rigor, technical know-how, and an unsurpassed attention to detail. Johnsen Schmaling Architects offers a full range of architectural and design services, from master planning and schematic design to construction administration, furniture design and graphics. When they undertake any project a good portion of their time is spent creating models and doing detailed studies of the site. This thorough understanding of the site and program for each individual project, combined with a passionate interest in materiality and building technology, leads them to innovative and environmentally sustainable design solutions with uncompromising artistic integrity. Their Camouflage House is a striking example of this. Its narrow, linear volume is nestled into the hillside and when approaching the house from the rugged access road, the building’s faint, low-slung silhouette virtually disappears in the surrounding vegetation. The house features a complex system of façade layers of natural and man-made wood components. The base façade layer is clad in untreated vertical cedar and serves as the backdrop for a series of polychromatic wood veneer resin panels that reflect the ever-changing hues of the surrounding deciduous trees. The panels overlap with the strict base grid of the building’s exposed structural columns, echoing the rhythmic shift between tree trunks as one moves through the forest. Over time, the cedar walls will weather to a silver-gray, while the wood veneer panels will retain their original color and pristine finish. Another project that reflects Brian’s restraint and modest approach is the Ferrous House. This is a case study in suburban renewal. Most often the response to an older suburban house is to demolish the house and start over. In this project, Brian kept the perimeter foundation and plumbing stacks, but took the roof off. The interior was entirely gutted and re-organized to create open, interconnected spaces. Linear cedar-clad storage boxes, containing built-in closet systems and living room cabinetry, cantilever over the edge of the building added desperately needed square footage without altering the original footprint of the house. A new shed roof, supported by a filigree of exposed metal and wood trusses, adds height to the living spaces and allows northern light to wash the inside of the house through a long band of translucent, Nanogel-filled polycarbonate glazing. Wide exterior stairs run along the front of the house and lead up to a small glazed porch. From here, stairs weave through the house and terminate in a small observatory above the new roof plane. The building’s simple rectangular volume is wrapped on three sides with a weathering steel rain screen, its warm color of ferrous corrosion echoing the hues of the derelict farm equipment left behind in the area’s abandoned pastures. In the back, the steel wrapper extends beyond the edge of the building and shelters the sides of a linear south-facing patio and a screen porch, which is accessible from the living hall through a fully retractable folding glass door system. In the summer, the living hall expands into the screen porch that draws in the cool breeze from the nearby woods and naturally conditions the house. For additional information about these projects and more go to http://www.johnsenschmaling.com/
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AIA Redwood Empire Tours SRJC B. Robert Burdo Culinary Arts Center By Jordan Lebovich, JBL Photography The Culinary Arts Center at Santa Rosa Junior College is a working café and bakery which is open to the public. Current hours for the Bakery are 7:30am to 2pm and for the Café 11:30am to 2pm Wednesday thru Friday until August 3rd. Once the fall semester starts, the hours will expand so check their website for more information. Their menu changes weekly and features organic fruits and vegetables from SRJC’s Shone Farm in Forestville. The building can accommodate up to 226 students and 24 faculty. The students attend class and then get to put their lessons into practice at the café and bakery. The classrooms are connected with audio/visual systems and students can watch demonstrations from the kitchens. In the kitchens the HVAC is integrated with the exhaust hoods to expel the heat based on the usage. They don’t want to exhaust all the conditioned air so the vents are balanced with the HVAC system. David Ross from Bull Stockwell Allen Architects was our tour guide and let us know that, “It took lots of testing to make sure it all worked together”. The contract was a multi contractor project team. The reason was that SRJC wanted to use as many local firms as possible, so the project was broken into pieces. As a result there were three prime contractors with Wright Contracting as the Construction Manager, Bull Stockwell Allen were the Architects and Brelje & Race were the civil engineers. The project was budgeted at $18 million and came in at $13 million. It took two years to build and was completed in April of this year. According to Scott Thomas of Wright Contracting, “The biggest challenge was coordinating the schedules and tasks between contractors”. The exterior is true brick with a space between the brick and steel superstructure. This spacing helps with heating and cooling. Other specs called for the Culinary School to be connected to the data center at the main campus across the street. As a result, the construction team had to dig a bore 25 feet below the street level for the cables to be strung through. Most of the kitchen equipment is new with a few pieces brought in from the old site. The school is probably the 2nd biggest user of natural gas in the county and the biggest user out of all the SRJC buildings. The school currently offers five certification programs and two associate degrees. Evening classes have been cut due to the budget, but Chef/Instructor Michael Salinger expects that in time those classes will be added back to the offerings. http://www.santarosa.edu/instruction/culinary-arts/cafeandbakery.php
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INTEGRATING ART AND ARCHITECTURE AIARE CRAN Meeting September 2012 Hosted by MC2 The Science Of Design By Martha Channer, MC2 Today most people don’t care as much about impressing others or being impressed, they care about being surrounded by a nurturing spatial continuity that makes them feel relaxed and revitalized. Whether this is at home, work, or in a public space, this continuity fulfills the modern psychological need for place identity; a form of visual branding that creates a sense of comfortable and usable familiarity. The newest architectural/spatial concepts amalgamate unusual and repurposed or green materials into public art, eco art installations, and the creation of total environments. The goal is to develop functional spaces that evoke specific emotional responses and produce connection to the environment in a non-ordinary way. Integral to the process is the effective combination of three dimensional and two dimensional design elements which produce genius loci or “spirit of place”. Materials such as cast glass and concrete, ceramics, wood, and papier-mâché are replacing the plastics and factory veneers of the 20th century. As integrated design solutions that resolve spatial challenges, these practical, aesthetic elements bond and organize a space into a cohesive whole. Through strategic color placement, pattern coordination, and the use of sculptural elements, sensual fulfillment merges with efficiency. Also an awareness of spatial psychology, known as proxemics, plays a huge role in the architectural design choices that are being looked at and implemented today. The contemporary design index leans toward comfort that is personalized, practical, and pleasurable. People want to feel a part of their environment and to be included in its raison d’etre. Art that is integrated into the environment, from finishes to complex imagery, fulfills that need; especially when it is personalized or truly relevant to the function of the space. Awareness of spatial relationships and how they affect us through architecture, color, art, and the use of nontraditional resources, is the key to creating compelling and efficacious architectural design in the 21st century. As Jane Parkins wrote in her February 2012 article: “The success of a space, public or otherwise, relies for the most part on the atmosphere that it creates for the user. While functionality is always a key part of design, if individuals feel uncomfortable in the space; its functional aspects are simply wasted”. Martha Channer 619-865-7885 MC2 The Science Of Design mctwodesign.com
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October Membership Meeting - AIARE Member Show-and-Tell By Jordan Lebovich, JBL Photography October’s Lunch presentation was the first in a series where chapter members get to present a product, material, or technology that they’ve used and are excited to share with their fellow AIA members. The October meeting was the inaugural show-and-tell event and featured three speakers. First up was John Cook, Principal with MKM & Associates and John discussed a product called the “Wafflemat Slab”. The Wafflemat foundation is a posttensioned waffle-slab concept for expansive soils. This is what John calls the third generation post-tensioned slab and consists of a series of plastic boxes that come in either 8.5” or 12” depths and are assembled in clusters of four with snap ties or wire ties to tie them together. The idea is to make the slab stiff enough to support the structure, but the void areas underneath the boxes let the soil shift a little bit without causing any damage to the finishes. John also put together a comparison of the wafflemat slab and traditional concrete slab construction to show the considerable savings that can be achieved using waffle boxes. Next up was John Guill, Senior Specification Writer with DTR Consulting Services. John discussed drainage planes and drain screens in exterior wall assemblies: when, where, and why they make sense and the readily-available materials that can be used to create them. Any exterior surface is a drainage plane. When water hits it, it travels down the face and if it does get through the first plane, there should be a drain screen to allow the moisture to continue to drain down and not get through to the next layer. A drain screen is an impervious panel with gaps and a supporting substructure to hold it up. Multiple air barriers and drain screens are being mandated by building codes. When it came to readily-available materials, John pointed out the difference between building paper and building felt. He sees the two confused a lot and they do different things. The paper goes behind the façade. He also pointed out that the building codes have been prescriptive for years. You met the code and that was all that was required. The new codes are introducing performance based standards. Last up was Pete Gang, Principal Architect, Common Sense Design. Pete shared his insights into straw bale construction gleaned from his 15 years of experience with this type of construction. It is a form of natural building and the intention is to use local, minimally processed, non-toxic materials for building. Straw bale construction is really post and beam building where straw bales are the non-structural wall infill. It is very conventional structurally. This type of construction gives you thick walls, deep reveals and looks great. A 24 inch bale gives approximately R30 insulation. Clay plasters are the best material to cover the straw and the last straw bale house that Pete built, none of the plan check comments had anything to do with the straw and plaster. Because straw bale is still a novelty, it is more expensive to build than a standard stick frame house and Pete estimated that is costs about 15% more to build using straw bales.
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Over to the Dark Side By Schuyler Bartholomay, Assoc. AIA Architects talk about form, Contractors swear at form. Architects hum at their desks, Contractors burp in their offices. Architects wear black turtlenecks, contractors wear dirt. Architects drink coffee, Contractors Drink Coffee… and beer.
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I went straight into Cal Poly’s Architecture School after high school. My grandfather was an architect, my father is a landscape architect. I pulled all-nighters in studio with all the others. I worked for architects for five years. I did IDP and I’m taking my AREs. So I’m a full-fledged member. I even have the 9-5 pasty glow of the drafting screen and early stages of carpal tunnel to prove myself. I’m on the AIA board for goodness sake!
CYCLISK
But a few months ago, I did a crazy thing… I went to work for a contractor. There are two schools of thought on the matter. First: “Good for you! You will learn so much.” And second: “So you don’t want to be an architect anymore? Are you still going to get licensed? What about Architecture?” I believe in learning about all aspects of our industry including design, theory, history, construction, business development, finance, landscape and interior design... The list goes on. Lessons Learned Working for a Contractor: 1. We are all a team and the best architecture comes from the Architects and the Contractors working together. 2. I much prefer being on site than in the office, unfortunately, both architects and contractors spend a lot of time in the office. 3. There is no way to get around late nights and hard work, we both do it. 4. We both get work the same way: networking and personal relationships. 5. We both like coffee… and beer.
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October Custom Residential Architects Network (CRAN) Meeting By Jordan Lebovich, JBL Photography SBI Building Materials hosted the October CRAN meeting at their showroom in Windsor and treated everyone to some delicious food and wines in their newly completed outdoor kitchen. It was a perfect evening to be outdoors and as the sun began to set, we headed indoors to hear Ben Godfrey, Architectural Representative from Halquist Stone talk about the differences in limestone applications and how to specify stone. He talked about the history of building with limestone and the benefits of natural stone versus manufactured stone veneer. During his presentation we learned that depending on what minerals are in the soil above the stone, like iron oxides, the stone will actually be stained as the minerals drain down and this gives the stone various colorations depending on where the stone is quarried. Wisconsin is where most of the limestone comes from that is used in building. It is very dense or hard making it ideal to build with. There are actually three density classifications for limestone. Class 1 limestone ranges from 110 to 135 pounds per cubic foot and is basically unusable in building. Class 2 – medium density limestone ranges from 135 to 160 pounds per cubic foot and is very easy to saw. Wisconsin limestone falls into the high density or Class 3 category. Its density is 160 pounds or greater. What this means is that the Wisconsin limestone has less than a 1% absorption rate compared to 7.5% for an Indiana limestone. Stone with a higher porosity or absorption rate tends to get dirtier quicker and may not come clean when it is washed. The Wisconsin limestone also performs better in harsher climates where there are a lot of freeze-thaw cycles. If you are specifying stone, the folks at SBI are very helpful and a great resource as an Allied Member in our Chapter. For information about SBI and their products, go to their website at http://www.sbimaterials.com/
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September Membership Meeting By Jordan Lebovich, JBL Photography Application of the California Building Code for Existing Buildings as it pertains to Architectural and Structural Design. A Conversation with Kevin Zucco, SE. LEED AP The firm spotlight this month was on Eric Glass of Glass Architects. Glass Architects is a nine person firm with offices in Santa Rosa and Grass Valley and has been in continuous practice in Santa Rosa for over forty- years. The firm has done a number of public projects such as Police and Fire Stations, Courthouses, Community Centers, Aquatic Centers, Wineries, Medical, Education, Religious, High Technology and Office Buildings. They also do Custom Residential. A number of their Police and Fire station projects have been LEED Certified, either silver or gold. On a recent winery project, Eric noted that they were just a couple of weeks from submitting the plans for the building permits and the client decided that they should get the project LEED Certified. A similar thing happened with the Union City Fire Station project. A large percentage of the design and construction community’s current work has to do with existing buildings, so Kevin Zucco, Principal/CEO of ZFA Engineers was a great speaker to shed some light on the changes to the California Building Code. The Existing Structures chapter in the 2010 CBC was substantially re-worked and now more clearly defines parameters for modifying existing buildings. Some of the parameters that trigger a review of code compliance are an increase in load greater than 5% or ANY decrease in capacity. Also an increase in Lateral applied load, decrease in capacity, substantial structural damage or change in occupancy will trigger a full review. Interestingly, substantial improvements that are more than 50% of the replacement cost of the structure will require that the whole building comply with the code. New definitions were added for Repairs and what constitutes “Dangerous” and Substantial Structural Damage (SSD). The lateral SSD threshold increased from 20% to 33%. Kevin did a great job of pointing out the changes and also what to expect in the coming few years. It’s very likely that several sections of the California Building Code will be dropped and the International Existing Building Code (IEBC) will be adopted instead. Kevin Zucco has been performing structural design and analysis of retrofits of public and commercial facilities since 1993. Knowing the most sustainable new building is a retrofitted existing building; Kevin has focused his engineering work on the revitalization of Northern California’s existing and historic structures.
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Keith Buchanan
By Don Tomasi, AIA
Santa Rosa architect Keith Buchanan passed away in September at the age of 62. Keith worked at several local architectural firms in the area, most recently TLCD Architecture from 1985 until 2010. He previously worked at Sohl & Palmer Architects, William H. Knight Architect, and Roland/Miller/Associates. While at TLCD Architecture Keith was the Project Manager for many projects including Peterson Tractor, National Bank of the Redwoods Headquarters (now Westamerica Bank), SRJC Child Development Center, and the SRJC Criminal Justice Training Center in Windsor. Keith’s most notable project was the Frank P. Doyle Library for the Santa Rosa Junior College.
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Keith was born in Concord, California. He graduated from Cal Poly San Luis Obispo in 1973 with a professional degree in architecture. While in college he as an active member of the Cal Poly Penguin Motorcycle Club. After graduation he stayed involved with riding by participating in High Mountain Enduro off-road competition, a national event. Keith was also an active skier. He organized TLCD ski trips and was active in the Santa Rosa Ski Club where he had many friends. Keith regularly played golf with a group of friends, and enjoyed fine wine. Keith was quiet and reserved, and generally kept to himself. Most never got to know him well, though those who did were rewarded by his gentle personality, wry humor, and in-depth knowledge about many topics. Keith will be missed by his colleagues at TLCD Architecture, and by the many others who were fortunate to have known him.
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www.ghd.com
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Rehabilitating Main Street By Katherine Austin, AIA What would you say is the greenest type of housing material? Would you say Structurally Insulated Panels or Concrete Insulated Forms? Maybe you would say advance framing with Forest Stewardship Council Lumber? Well how about using an existing building? Using existing buildings and rehabbing them is considered to have the least impact on the environment because you are salvaging a significant amount of material and diverting that material from a land fill. An existing building has embodied energy. By reusing buildings you are saving that amount of embodied energy. If those buildings have historic value, think of the good you are doing for the community they are in by saving them. How can you afford it? In the case I will describe, you can afford it by subdividing the land the homes are on and creating value by adding new residences behind them. Look for opportunity in existing neighborhoods where older homes are on relatively larger lots. You can do a world of good by restoring dilapidated homes and at the same time providing needed infill housing in an existing neighborhood. In these times of continued economic stress, it’s the perfect project for the smaller builder or a larger builder looking to diversify his or her portfolio. In my particular case, there were two sadly neglected buildings next to my small cottage style office building on Main Street, Sebastopol, CA. The buildings had long ago gone to commercial use. They had been joined in the back by a really ugly corridor creating a mangled look from the street. Worse yet, the once nice redwood horizontal siding had been covered over with stucco and painted baby blue. If that weren’t enough, the large original windows had been removed, and much smaller aluminum sliders were put in their place. To complete the sight, the entire two lots were combined and covered over by crumbling asphalt and the rear was used to store RVs. The once front lawn was also a paved parking lot. To make that fit, the original front porch of one house was removed. It was in short, the ugliest site on all of Main Street. As an architect, I could see the beauty that was once there, but lacked the funding to do anything about it. Fortunately I have a good client who bought it in a foreclosure sale and said, let’s go for it. I knew I could fit four new town houses in the rear by moving the buildings forward. One house would need to be rotated 90 degrees to fit and have its porch face the street. I managed to fit diagonal parking between the rear of the existing buildings and the fronts of the new. Each town house could have a private 20’ deep rear yard, while the front buildings would have a 10’ deep front yard. The accessible parking and access was from the new rear parking and we kept the historic nature of the fronts with multiple steps up to their new porches. We lifted the existing buildings, moved them to the rear while new foundations for them were built. They were then moved back again on the new foundations. The stucco was stripped and recycled, the old windows removed and the aluminum recycled. Because there was no shear, the old redwood siding had to be removed but was recycled and replaced by long lasting cement board siding over new plywood shear panels. A bay window was restored on one and the mansard roof with its rounded upper windows replicated. Tankless water heaters were installed along with 98% efficient heaters and accessible bathrooms. Hardwood floors were installed to improve indoor air quality instead of carpet. They were rented out to two doctors for their offices before they were finished. The new rear units were designed to pick up the same Victorian detailing and included many of the same energy efficient fixtures and materials. Radiant barriers were used in all roofs and cool roofing shingles were also installed. We beat our local energy codes by over 20%. The rear units were also rented out before they were finished. The project was both a financial and aesthetic success. We have won two local awards from the Historic Society and the Chamber of Commerce for beautifying a visible site. The developer became a hero for once! So when you are considering what to do for your next green building project, look to your existing neighborhoods and see if there isn’t some gold in them thar hills.
Winter 2012
21
Winter | 2012
2013 AIARE Board of Directors Mark Albertson, AIA President
Nate Bisbee, AIA
Vice President/ President Elect
Jaime Stitch, Assoc. AIA Treasurer
Diana Mendez, Assoc. AIA Secretary
Schuyler Bartholomay, Assoc. AIA AIACC Director and Communications Director
Pete Gang, AIA
Professional Practice Director
Bryan Chubb, Assoc. AIA Associate Director
Kathy Austin, AIA
Governmental Relations
Michael Chambers, AIA Director at Large
Daniel J. Strening, AIA
Director at Large | Lecture Series
Carl Servais, AIA
Director at Large | Membership
Bert Braden, PE Affiliate Director
Jordan Lebovich Affiliate Director
Wendy Young
www.aiare.org
Executive Director
Sunset Breezehouse
By Jordan Lebovich, JBL Photography For the 2012 Sunset Magazine Idea House, they teamed with Blu Homes to create a spacious, updated Breezehouse, built in Blu Home’s state-of-the-art factory in Mare Island. The home arrived in three trucks and panels were assembled onsite in Healdsburg on a steep lot that over-looks wine country. The house was installed in only a day and a half and then finished in about a week. Of course the site engineering and preparation took several weeks, but once the foundation was ready it was quick work. The Breezehouse is a modular home that seamlessly blends indoor living with the outdoors and provides a stunning environment that is healthy, energy-efficient, and well constructed. Since the house is precision built to local and state codes at the factory, on site inspection times are shorter and there is less impact to a city’s resources. Wendy Young, Executive Director to AIARE was able to get free tickets for the first 25 members who wanted to tour the home and they were snapped up very quickly. The home features two bedrooms, a guest bedroom/office and three bathrooms. We all thought the house was beautiful and pretty amazing for a factory built home. For floor plans, a virtual tour and more information go the Sunset Magazine Breezehouse Idea House page.
The American Institute of Architects Redwood Empire | Wendy Young, Executive Director | 707-838-2672 | exec@aiare.org | www.aiare.org