January 24, 2002

2 locals win AIA honors

Photo by Art Grice The Maple Valley Library book collection, lounges and children's areas visually connect readers with the living world

After being selected to design the Maple Valley Library, Ray Johnston and James Cutler took library officials for a walk in the woods.

They found shelter from the 90-degree August heat, huckleberries to chew on and plenty of inspiration for the new facility. "We talked about ways we could experience this in the library," Ray Johnston recalled.

For its apparent seamless fit into a fir forest, the library has been a hit with patrons and the American Institute of Architects. The project won a Gold Award in October from AIA Seattle, and last week won a national Honor Award from AIA -- one of 34 winners from a pool of 426.

"Each winning project offers its users or inhabitants an opportunity to enjoy a sense of place, beauty, or functionality that is the hallmark of wonderful architecture," said Gordon H. Chong, president of the AIA. Johnston Architects was the lead, working with Cutler-Anderson Architects.

"We thought of it as a kind of sea change in the attitude of the public," said Johnston. "The community was saying, 'Don't give us a strip mall parking lot and library. Give us something so that, when we come here, we have a sense of what gave us the name Maple Valley.'"

The community favored a 12,000-square-foot facility that would peacefully co-exist with the forest. The U-shaped shed roof was designed to minimize the visual impact, and a unique roof downspout releases 300 gallons of water a minute into a central gravel pool.

The book collection, lounges, children's areas, offices and study areas are designed for flexibility while attempting to visually connect the occupants with the living world around them. The building is designed around and between clusters of trees, including large Douglas firs.

"We wanted to open up the rooms and study areas so you really feel like you're participating in the forest around you," he said.

The parking lot even includes islands of preserved trees. "Once we made the decision to save 90 percent of the trees, that's when things fell into place as far as the design went," said Mary Johnston.

Designed by Charles Rose Architects, the new equipment shed at Straitsview farm on San Juan Island uses reclaimed Douglas fir timbers.

Ray Johnston believes Maple Valley Library pleasantly surprised judges with its non-curvilinear design. The design focused on the use of natural materials, and made the building's framing joists, studs and ductwork into decorative elements. Accenting the assembly makes the building's story more comprehensible, for all ages, he said. "I've seen kids walk into Maple Library and say 'You can see how this thing goes together.'"

Bernard Cywinski, chair of the Institute's Honor Awards for Architecture jury, said such projects demonstrate an interest in the craft of making buildings.

"As a whole, the projects display a skill in detailing that was both exciting and reassuring in a broad spectrum of circumstance, type, scale, and size," Cywinski said. "They all shared a clarity in presentation, comprehensive both in visual and narrative terms consistent with the quality of architecture produced."

Johnston said Maple Valley breaks rank with at least one trend. "It's a pretty interesting time in architecture now," he said. "On the East Coast and L.A., there is a strong tendency to develop a certain kind of space because computers make it possible. We're seeing a lot of fluid, abstract forms like EMP. These judges saw a lot of buildings reinventing the craft and re-thinking the use of natural materials."

The use of natural materials is also a theme in another AIA Honor Award recipient, the new equipment shed at Straitsview farm on San Juan Island. The facility was designed by Charles Rose Architects of Somerville, Mass.

The multi-purpose equipment shed and barn are situated on a working farm overlooking the Strait of Juan de Fuca. The building houses a farm office, wood and machine shops, workspace for a veterinarian and storage for a variety of large agricultural equipment and machinery -- all located in a natural clearing at the edge of a dense stand of fir trees.

The L-shaped configuration of the plan deflects the prevailing northeastern winds, sheltering an adjacent work yard, according to the architect. The construction system incorporates reclaimed Douglas fir timbers, black pigmented concrete column bases, slatted rolling cedar doors and painted steel. The project uses the timber frame tradition of the region in the service of an expressive, sculptural architecture.

Charles Rose Architects also received two AIA Regional Honor Awards and four Boston Society of Architects Awards for the project. One juror called it "an essay on the use and joinery of wood using traditional and modern means -- both simple and sophisticated, it creates a tension between low art and high art."

The shed and barn's general contractor was S.B. Inc. of Friday Harbor, and the engineer was B&B Engineered Timber of Keene, N.H.

For the Maple Valley Library, the general contractor was R. Miller Construction, and structural engineer was Swenson Say Faget.