Practice
Broadly approached
focused on genuine and energetic collaboration, encompassing a broad array of services:
Planning, design, and technical leadership in concert with contractors, craftspeople and clients to craft a better built environment;
Project leadership informed by experience in related disciplines to deliver successful Project outcomes; and,
Investigation and expert analysis for insurance and legal claims
About Me
Passion driven
Incorporating a background in the Fine Arts, lifelong exposure to the construction industry, and a passion for the physical sciences, I have spent 28 years of professional practice focusing on the various aspects of the process of creating environments that promote wellness. My work over the years has garnered numerous awards and encompasses the entirety of architectural practice:
Programming
Masterplanning
Entitlements
Existing Facility Assessment
Project Management
Design
Medical Equipment Planning
Interior Architecture
Technical Documentation
Construction Administration
Post-Occupancy Review
Forensic Testing and Investigation
My ongoing research includes the neurophysiological response to affective environments as they relate to the promotion of wellness in the design of buildings. As a John C. Patterson, AIA Memorial Research Fellowship recipient, I delivered a paper in 2009 proposing the first structural model for the Biophilic Effect involving Orchestrated Objective Reduction within sub-neuronal protein tubelin dimer assemblies.
More recently, I've applied the planning and design principles that create successful healthcare environments to other building types, including private residences. Occupant-centered design coupled with rigorous technical documentation not usually seen in residential and commercial Projects has generated well-received solutions.
SELECTED RESIDENTIAL PROJECTS
SYG Residence, Alamo, California
GMD Residence, Santa Rosa, California
NBM Residence Addition, Alameda, California
JK Residence Addition, Walnut Creek, California
PJL Residence Addition/Renovation, Alamo, California
RJ Addition, Walnut Creek, California
CY Master Suite Renovation, Lafayette, California
JJS Master Suite Addition, Pleasant Hill, California
SELECTED HEALTH & WELLNESS PROJECTS
Chinese Hospital New Tower, San Francisco, California
Mount Diablo/Solano Oncology Group, Concord, California
Santa Rosa Junior College, Santa Rosa, California
Stanford Medicine Outpatient Center, Redwood City, California
New Yangsan Hospital, Pusan National University, Pusan, South Korea
Roswell Park Cancer Institute, Buffalo, New York
St. Jude Medical Center, Fullerton, California
Eastern Idaho Regional Medical Center, Idaho Falls, Idaho
Allegany Regional Hospital, Low Moor, Virginia
Riverside Methodist Hospitals, Columbus, Ohio
Santa Clara Valley Medical Center Bed Building 1, Santa Clara, California
Trinity Health System, Steubenville, Ohio
SELECTED COMMERCIAL PROJECTS
O Boutique, Concord, California
Colfax Street Gallery, Concord, California
Center for Wellness, Columbus, Ohio
Services
How I can help
The process of designing and building your Project begins with a Project site. Research and study of a particular plot of land (or multiple plots to be combined) to understand its potential and limitations for development can be performed prior to its purchase, helping you mitigate much of the risk of real estate development. We have a great deal of experience performing this kind of study, for both residential and commercial Projects.
Together, we can learn about what restrictions municipal authorities have imposed on your site, how much of the site can be developed, how much parking is required for your Project, how long it may take to build your Project and how the construction might be best phased, and what effects these realities may ultimately have on Project costs. Working with a financial consultant, I can produce a detailed development pro forma of your Project that includes available financing options.
Some Projects require a change in zoning or other variance granted by the municipal authorities in your community. You may have already retained a land use attorny to file any necessary legal documents with the local planning department (if you haven't, of course we're happy to refer you to one). I can support your efforts by meeting with local officials and community groups to help them understand your intentions for your Project. Aligning expectations among stakeholders, garnering support from decision makers, and setting forth a process for obtaining subsequent approvals can prevent unnecessary oppostion to your Project and costly delays.
Space Programming is important to quantify how much building you need, before you begin designing your Project. Providing space for future growth, or at least the means for intelligently accommodating that growth, is critical to ongoing success. I am experienced in determining clients' present space needs and anticipated growth.
Basic architectural services include the design, technical documentation, construction contract negotiations, and construction administration for your Project. These are the services that most people associate with Architects: designing, producing construction documents, and observing construction. A brief meeting can assess how extensive these services should be to make your Project a reality.
Before you purchase a building (residential or commercial) or lease space within an existing building, an Architect can perform an examination of the condition of that building, with an eye toward the Project you've envisioned. Water infiltration can cause hidden damage and propagate organics (molds) in wall cavities. Structural damage due to seismic activity, differential foundation settling, and soil erosion might not be immediately apparent but eventually present considerable costs when renovation or building out a tenant improvement Project.
I am experienced in examining existing construction (both residential and commercial) for defects and damage to building systems and materials. I can perform an examination and publish findings, with recommendations for mitigation, in a report issued directly to you for your use in evaluating your risk before purchasing or leasing.
Commercial and clinical Projects require signage for room identification, wayfinding, and corporate identity. Our experience in this aspect of design is integrating your identity and directional signage with the architecture of your Project. I feel this complimentary approach makes for more coherent spaces, easier to use and enjoy.
Research
WHAT INFORMS MY WORK
RUSH CREEK VILLAGE is a residential development of single-family homes in suburban Worthington, Ohio. Begun in 1954, it is the single largest development of Mid-century homes designed by a single architect, though it remains largely unknown, even in Worthington. And while the community has enjoyed brief notoriety from time to time as the subject of newspaper articles and online discussion, no single document has recorded the scope and relevance of this remarkable accomplishment.
Developed over a span of 25 years in a sleepy Midwest suburb, the neighborhood comprises a single composition of 47 custom-designed residences elegantly sited among wooded ravines and meadows. The community survives into the 21st Century as a more fully-executed validation of Frank Lloyd Wright's organic planning principles than anywhere else. Rush Creek Village was admitted to the National Register of Historic Places in 2002.
Rush Creek Village residents and visitors are immersed in and projected into their natural environments, to their benefit. This was among modernism’s earliest interests: implementing the findings of “contemporary sciences that have observed organic functioning on closest range and thus to point out how profoundly the entire realm and the fateful art of design can be benefited.” (Neutra, 1956) It was this interest that motivated the Wakefields and van Fossen to undertake their efforts there in Worthington, to saturate the residents there in the experience of nature using an organic architectural lexicon.
Environmental design has focused recently on the set of physiological responses to the natural world (i.e.--reduced stress response, elevated mood, improved concentration), expanding upon E.O. Wilson's discourse on the subject and subsequently substantiated by research. To date, however, there has been a lack of consideration as to the neurological causation of these effects as they relate to the observer's environment. This, it might seem, is because any serious examination of these phenomena of observation require an exploration of perception and consciousness itself. This book explores recently developed models of human consciousness that involve quantum processes observed within sub-neuronal protein structures and proposes a plausible explanation for these effects.
