CREJ

/ BUILDING DIALOGUE / DECEMBER 2016

Location Location Location. Where? When? Why?

“G

od is in the details,” a common refrain

attributed to Mies van der Rohe, though

probably as old as architecture itself

provides the starting point for an exploration

of design. It touches on the two extremes: “god”

(a.k.a., the “big picture”) and the “details,” and, per-

haps most interesting, where they meet. This first

installment of my column will take a look at the

big picture.

Every decision we make has a context, a frame of

reference. In both architecture and real estate, our

technical

term for this is, “location, location, location.”

This emphasis on

place

clearly carries weight in peo-

ple’s sense of what determines architectural success,

but what do we really mean when we refer to “loca-

tion?” We could limit our understanding of location

to a ZIP code, the buildings across the street, or the the

latest four-letter moniker assigned by real estate folks

(SoHo, LoDo, RiNo, anyone?). Alternately, we could

broaden this perception to include abstractions such

as history, culture, liberty, hope or peace. Human na-

ture has a deeply rooted bias to a local, “now,” concrete

view of context, but does this limit us? Should we wid-

en the scope?

Let’s take smoking, for example. Yes, seemingly un-

related, but just go with me here. Smoking is a perfect

example of our human tendency toward a short-term

perspective on context. Smoking killed my grand-

mother the same way it killed many others; first

glamorous then regrettable, but never obvious. Before

she died, my grandmother insisted that I always re-

member an event that had much more clear and ob-

vious implications for her: WorldWar II. Watching her

family die in the war, then serving in the Army, then

fleeing as a refugee were events traumatic enough to

give her a broader sense of perspective, of context, on

many other issues, including smoking. Smoking was

simply minuscule compared to the atrocities she wit-

nessed as a young girl. After the war, she viewed the

world through a global lens, making decisions based

on the context of humanity, hope and community.

Even in her smallest decisions, she considered her im-

pact on the world. She urged me to never view the

world as “us versus them,” but, rather, as “us.”

Much like my grandmother, after the war, an en-

tire generation of architects, designers and planners

took a global view on our built environment. During

my educational life, I was taught and mentored by

modernists – those who not only paid great attention

to details such as new materials and open plans, but

also impressed upon me the moral and ethical un-

derpinning that deliberately created a common, glob-

al language of “us.” It is astonishing: In response to a

devastating world war, the architectural community

responded with a universal language, an Internation-

al Style, which sought to erase the tribal and parochial

differences they felt contributed to strife. Apparently,

I was raised by my grandmother to be a modernist.

To quote Mies again, “Architecture is the will of an

epoch, translated into space.” This “greatest generation”

had a view of context that equated to “epoch,” their

definition of location was deliberately global, befit-

ting their experience of the era. Modernism was part

of an optimistic perspective that created institutions

such as NATO, the IMF and Social Security in addition

to brick-and-mortar projects, such as public housing,

which contributed to the common good and the pre-

vention of another global armed conflict. Broadly, this

perspective is conspicuous in the architecture from

the 1950s through 1970s.

I am part of the generation that lacks the context of

that war, finding the International Style boring and

Andre LH

Baros, AIA

Architect,

Shears

Adkins

Rockmore

In the Details

Shears Adkins Rockmore

Denver's urban fabric is woven into the re-imagined Union Station area.