Explore how full-circle architecture modernizes ancient design principles. Discover how balancing Vitruvius's classic triad of firmness, commodity, and delight with life-cycle assessment creates resilient, deeply sustainable community spaces.
My First Interview That Reconnected Me to the Past
A Daddy Architects Work-Life Blur and My Escape
Lucas Resigns from Oklahoma Main Street after 6 years
After more than 6 years working my state's historic downtowns, I am resigning from the Oklahoma Main Street Program (OMSP). My time as the Main Street Architect with OMSP has been a life-changing opportunity where I have been able to serve and work alongside some of the best people that I have ever met.
It was a great blessing to find a meaningful, non-traditional path in the field of architecture. When I was hired, I did not comprehend the depth of the opportunity, but now I can share a few highlights:
Renewal is Valuable for Heart and Hometown
There is not a leaf that has fallen without promise. The promise of renewed life and the coming spring. Underlying this is an order that connects all things. Sometimes, architects have a sensitivity toward nature, but it is something that we could all explore further.
Sustainable communities, like the blood and flesh of our own bodies, are made from living parts. Just as the human body regenerates its own cells regularly, it also experiences entropy. In a similar way, we should not forget...
Quality Infill Development: Begins in the Past
Last week kicked off a broad sweep through some ideas for conservation-based development. Quality infill development can certainly conserve resources. It can also break the cycle of disinvestment and build back the vibrancy and strength that was lost when the heartstrings of our towns were stretched out in all directions.
The heart of a Green Heart Town is its historic district, and quality infill construction is a primary tool for keeping them healthy and strong. The Main Street district and surrounding historic neighborhoods were once the seat of all town life, the best place to buy and trade for good and services and interact with others from the area. After a time of disinvestment in historic downtowns from the 1960s-90s, these places are again becoming full of vibrant new potential.
Conservation-Based Development is a Return to the Land
Appreciating conservation-based development is to understand that we exist within something larger. Like a log being split, most development has torn us from our relationship with the land. Our natural environment not only provides the context for life, it is our largest and most important resource.
For long-time, we lived close to the land and developed a regionally-specific architecture that was built in sympathy to the surroundings. We created commercial centers called towns and cities, and others chose to live on large plots to farm. As Americans became 2 car households, got central air-conditioning, the color TV, and personal computers we have become uncoupled, or split, away from real living on this planet.