“Gardening, not architecture,” is one of the sentences from Oblique Strategies, a card game developed by Brian Eno and Peter Schmidt to encourage creativity. Jeanne Gang, founding partner of Studio Gang, tries to do both in her book. The art of architectural refinementwhich “provides rules for the extension of museums and anonymous buildings to increase their utility and attractiveness and reduce their carbon emissions.” Her volume, published by Park Books, challenges common ideas about the urgency of repurposing and argues that architects’ work should be less about sensationalism and more about sharing and caring.
The art of architectural refinement could be described as a gentle manifesto: it contains theory, history, work by Gang’s students, built projects, unrealized case studies, and personal reflections. Starting with the horticultural practice of grafting, which involves taking a cutting from one plant and growing it on a rootstock from another plant, Gang explains the ten points of the architect-grafter’s credo and shows how the idea is implemented throughout Studio Gang’s portfolio. The publication also sheds light on what we might do with the background buildings that largely make up American cities.
AJack Murphy, editor-in-chief, spoke to Gang about her new book.
A: Your thesis on grafting is compelling because, on the one hand, it is something that architects have been doing for a long time, but on the other hand, it is part of a new wave of thinking about building design. How do you connect these trends?
Jeanne Gang (JG): Architects have worked this way before. When I started preparing courses on reuse, I was at the American Academy in Rome. It was perfect to be in Rome at that time because there are examples of reuse everywhere – not only in buildings, but also in their components.
Although the idea of reuse has always existed, the book reformulates and expands it. In the US, many relatively new buildings are being demolished and completely replaced. At a time when we are facing a climate crisis, we urgently need to think about how to regenerate our existing building stock. This should apply not only to iconic buildings, but also to anonymous buildings, because they are valuable when you put a price on their carbon content.
Grafting also makes architecture more interesting because it creates a kind of asynchronous collaboration between the original architects and their successors. This form of continuity is lost when you simply replace the building completely, which is usually seen as the easier option in the US. In Europe, where there is much less willingness to change and a more rigorous approach to preservation, we see the opposite problem: there is a resistance to adding new architecture to existing buildings. The two cultural contexts have different constraints.
A: Can you tell me about the graphic design of the book? I like that it looks like an atlas.
JG: We worked with Elektrosmog on the design of the book, which was inspired by the many historical travel guides and gardening guides I discovered during my research in various libraries. The long title and the shape of the smaller essays scattered throughout the book are some of the ways we honored these archival inspirations in the design.
A: The book is at times personal: you write about your own memories and experiences. It also seemed as if your time and work in France influenced your thinking. Can you tell us something about this influence?
JG: It’s all a bit organic. I was in France as an exchange student and then worked at the Maison à Bordeaux while I was studying at OMA. What really brought me back there was the international competition for the Tour Montparnasse, which was to redesign this monolithic tower from the 1970s. I spent a lot of time in Paris while we worked on our entry, which unfortunately only came second. However, I enjoyed working in this different context and in 2017 we expanded the practice with our first international office in Paris. In November we will complete our first project in France: the John W. Boyer Center at the University of Chicago in Paris.
A: Another aspect could be the influence of Bruno Latour. How have his writings been useful to you?
JG: His writings have influenced me. He beautifully combines science and humanities to articulate social and political issues that help us address climate change. I discovered his writings in the early 2000s and it was like discovering a special map that helps you navigate a situation but also shows new paths that are relevant to design.
A: I liked the fact that you presented the work of other architects as role models in the book. In it you find examples of firms that show how reuse can be implemented artfully. What have you learned from firms like Lacaton & Vassal?
JG: I have found many practitioners who think this way – as if they are frauds. Frankly, many more people could have been included. One of the many things I appreciate about the work of Lacaton & Vassal is that even when the forces are working against them, they find ways to creatively reuse buildings. Carlo Scarpa is another of my personal favorites.
While the work on reuse exists, I was concerned about the lack of precision and nuance in the way we talk about it, so I wanted to help change that by adding new language to what the book does, particularly in the chapter on grafting techniques. Designers need to be more precise about what exactly a project does when it reuses something. If we can better articulate these ideas, we can explain and clarify how grafting can be used.
A: The diagrams were helpful because part of being a worker seems to be looking closely at what already exists and taking stock. Designers should stick closely to the material conditions in which they work.
JG: When we start a project in teaching and in practice, I tell students or team members, “You have to find something you love about the building you are working on.” This appreciation for what is already there has to come through in the drawings. If you keep the existing structure at a distance, you will not find the best solution; you have to find the connection point.
A: The book contains case studies from Studio Gang. How are these ideas implemented in the office’s design processes?
JG: Not all of our projects start with what is already there. But for those that do, we now have this book. Having a common language for appending helps us to clearly define our approach during the design process, especially on projects where there have been multiple additions by different architects before. Teams can refer to examples in the book to communicate better and more precisely with each other. We also try to extend the concept to projects of different scales, including urban design.
A: Can you say more about the Bark Belt project at the end of the book? It reads like a provocation for architects to go beyond working on buildings and to design systems.
JG: If you want to add more capacity to existing buildings by grafting, wood is a good choice because it is lighter and reduces the load on the existing structure. The problem we have encountered with wood, however, is that there is often not much wood near the cities where we build, so the material has to be shipped from far away. The Bark Belt project is studying how to rehabilitate the post-industrial landscape of the Midwest and create new local forests that could provide wood for nearby buildings. At Studio Gang, we are studying how to create a pilot forest project. Perhaps it could later be a useful model for other biomaterial systems—not just trees, but perhaps other plants that also rehabilitate soils while providing new building material. And yes, for designing systems: to respond effectively to the climate crisis, architects increasingly need to think beyond the building.
A: What do you think about the rise of solid wood in the USA?
JG: We need to take every single opportunity to reduce carbon emissions, whether it’s through bio-based materials or low-carbon concrete. For the David Rubenstein Treehouse under construction on Harvard University’s Enterprise Research Campus, we’re using mass timber for the structure and low-carbon concrete for the foundation. It’s a hard hurdle to overcome because no one wants to be the first to take a risk on new construction techniques.
Some people are only interested in solid wood, but I think we need to work on all fronts, including solutions to replace cement in concrete. With wood, however, we need to be more knowledgeable about the supply chain, growing and harvesting trees, and designing forests that bring multiple benefits to the ecosystem. Forests should not just be a monoculture farm.
A: What impact do you hope this book will have?
JG: In the US, I hope it will be useful to architects who want to argue for reuse and prove its benefits over building from scratch. In Europe, I hope it will encourage the acceptance of additions that are more than mere replicas of what is already there. Buildings should have the chance to live as long as possible, and people need new spaces for new ways of living.
A: What makes you optimistic?
JG: All we have is material that can inspire the next generation. When we design something new today, we try to imagine how someone might add to it in the future. For me, this means that architecture is no longer a work of art frozen in time, but is released as an unfolding, ongoing process that will have multiple authors and many identities over its lifetime.
