Architosh Staff ([email protected])

April 2001

UPDATED: 21 April - 1:55 PM EDT

Architosh - Profile 1 - Rough Draft of Text (interview)

This particular web page constitutes a rough draft working copy of the M.J. Neal Interview profile article. It is for internal working purposes only.

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Instructions for MJ Neal Architects

This is just the text from the interview. It is NOT the layout. I am working on the layout seperately...with all of those yummy graphics!

This page will serve as the editor's markup for the interview part only.

Since only 40 -50% of the text here can remain we need to edit down quite a bit. I think the first step is to go over everything said and get it right. Then I can edit material to fit.

Possible Title of Article: Of the Place Itself: A New Modern Vernacular in Austin

Interview text:

March 14, 2001

I really like your work.

Thanks you very much.

There are a lot of interesting graphics and I am excited to put this

Background Part

AF M. J. thanks for taking the time to talk to us. First off I would like to say I really like you work and the things you are doing on the Mac.

MJ Thanks very much.

AFR Let me just start with some background questions so we can get to know you better. Are you a native of Texas?

MJ Yes, I grew up in Dallas.

AFR: And what prompted you to go to Los Angeles after you graduated from architecture school ?

MJ. Well...Texas had a huge bust in the mid -80's and there was a mass exodus of architects from here. Some of us went West and others went East. I just happened to go to LA. I had already thought about it right after college.

AFR: When you were in Los Angeles, you worked for a few different firms..did you bring anything exciting back from you from your 'LA experience' ?

MJ Yes. The first firm I worked for was William Brantley Architects. He really considered himself more of a sculptor than an architect. And so he really dealt with things in a sculptor than an architect. He dealt with things in a sculptural way that was really interesting to to be a part of. And then Frank Fitzgibbons..who is just a wonderful architect—a wonderful man too—he had actually worked for Meier, Giurgola and Breuer...so it's like he passed on a heritage coming directly from the Bauhaus, just one person removed from Breuer who was actually over at the Bauhaus.

(does it make more sense to change the word "heritage" here to something else?)

AFR, Right, so you are kind of naturally inclined toward Modernism then?

MJ Yes. I always have been, even in school. You know the Post Modern thing was really pervasive when I was in college and I actually thought it was very distasteful from the very get-go. Always have and always will. So I am basically a modernist at heart.

AFR. Can you tell me a little about you Fine Arts training. What prompted you to do that after your architecture degree?

MJ Well, I actually have been drawing since I was a little kid. I remember asking my Mom as a small kid how to draw people and she'd draw stick figures...I have always been interested in drawing people. So a lot of my artwork deals with the human figure, or more an abstraction of it into some kind of figurative art...I like using oil and charcoals, both hard and soft types. While I haven't done it in many years I was really working with these 16 to 18 feet long by 6 feet high, really large canvases and really abstracting the body out, trying to capture a sensual quality.

(do you want to clarify this last part a bit. It would be nice if it could be shorter? You are saying a lot of interesting things here so I want to keep most of it.)

AFR I know in the computer graphics the human figure is present everywhere and it adds this type of scale dimension to your work.

{ Here's where things get a little funky with the flow of the piece. I will probably move some stuff around here and delete items. }

Practice Part

AFR Did you see yourself as an architecture student running your own firm someday? Was that a goal of yours?

MJ Absolutely, I was going into it thinking that I would have my own firm someday because my grandfather and my uncle were both architects, so it was a given in my mind that that's what I would do.

{ Again, I think this next part need to be either shortened or eliminated altogether. Some how I will get the theater part in }

AFR Now there was something very interesting what you sent us. Was it it Pairagringos?

MJ Yea

AFR Am I pronouncing that right?

MJ Ay, its sort of a play on words, a "pair of gringos".

AFR Ay, I get that. Wasn't that the name of an initial firm that you started with Darrel Kreitz?

( What is Darrel's last name again? do I have that?)

I thought that was very interesting that you were working with a filmmaker and focusing on restaurants. Can you talk a little it about that? What were you trying to accomplish by working with a filmmaker in architecture?

MJ Well, I have always been interested in movie making and have worked in that industry some. For some reason, I have been around a lot of theater people and movie people since college; I don't know why they keep coming into my life! Both of my wives have been filmmakers...it's kind of nutty! Restaurants themselves can have a real theatricality to them. They can become an event of sorts, a ritual people don't even realize they are a part of. With Darrell, we wanted to capture the theatrical possibilities of a restaurant setting by combining our talents.

AFR You are not only talking about architecture as stage but trying to arrive at an architecture that raises itself to the level of theatricality in terms of expression.

MJ Absolutely, I think that would be certainly one way to put it. It really does raise itself to theater. But also -- to use a really old cliché -- the 'whole world's a stage' -- and so if we can do these restaurants that really engage your senses, manipulating your whole experience, from the entrance to the food, how you are directed into the space, how you feel where you sit....the way the light comes in, the surfaces of the materials...everything to the flatware, then you are elevating that experience of architecture.

( All of this above and below is very good stuff but will need to be shortened a little)

AFR How would you describe the architectural culture in Austin today and where do you see your firms' role in that?

MJ Well...I was pretty frustrated a couple years ago by what is going on here. For the most part it is relatively mundane. There are some people doing some really nice stuff, what you would term as classical Texas vernacular, where they are using a lot of materials and things and expressing them in a way that is really responding, maybe, to the Texas past. In a way it is a Post Modern thing, though some of them are doing work that is transcending that.

But a lot of what has happened down here is really bad. And there really isn't a whole lot of modern architecture going on. And I think we can do very vernacular contextual architecture and still have it be very modern. That's using the term 'vernacular' in its true sense, 'of the place itself' . And so a couple of years ago my wife and I decided to start a development company and start doing this type of work. Subsequently, we have discovered that there are a few others out here tying to doing modern architecture in Texas as well.

And of course you may have heard some of the controversy over the Blanton Museum that was being designed by Hertzog & de Meuron -- which was a brilliant building and then the regents came in and pretty much stopped that. And that is really typical of the situation we have going on here...and we are somehow trying to do something about that and trying to gain a voice.

(I need some spelling resolution on the Blanten word, museum, etc. I'll make URL reverences to this in the article as well, if I can)

AFR, So this is more the result of a conservative tendency in Texas, is that right?

MJ People tend to think of Austin as this liberal place but it really isn't like that. You come and spend some time here and you'll soon start to realize that it is really a incredibly conservative place. I always say even hippies are conservative here when it comes to architecture. On the other hand, we have been receiving all kinds of support and encouragement from people who show appreciation and excitement with what we are trying to accomplish.

Design Process

AFR Now let's talk about something that is not conservative necessarily. Let's talk about sustainable design. You have founded the Sustainable Building Coalition. What type of strategies have you employed in your architecture?

MJ Well we really try to think about the whole gamut of different possibilities. You know I really don't think about or call my architecture green just to call it green -- I just think we have a moral responsibility to try to look at these products and look at our buildings and see what we can do and they just come out more responsible.

AFR. I noticed that in a lot of your project images you are using this type of clipped panel system. Is that a product that it used by sustainable architects for some purpose?

MJ Sure.

(Not sure how much if any of the sustainable stuff will make the cut?)

AFR Now you are doing things with screens and there is a lot of layering going on with the facades...

MJ, Well not only on the facades but on the interiors as well. Juxtaposing different elements against each other.

AFR Right. Now are you trying to control light in a way that is more about energy or are you dealing with controlling translucency and transparency?

MJ Well, it is really more about translucency and transparency and just how materials change by the way the light hits them whether that is natural light or artificial light and the way you move around the materials themselves. So it really has more to do with materials themselves. But we certainly use those things in a very logical way to control the Texas heat and sun.

AFR Are you dealing with these techniques horizontally at the roof level as well?

MJ Yes.

AFR. In your computer renderings are you trying to render them in a way that accurately captures the transparency in some of these planes and surfaces or is that less the issue and just a consequence of the rendering?

MJ Yes, but we are actually sometimes pumping up the reflectivity of those planes a bit, to try to really capture more of a mood of what you might actually experience in the building. It is almost like what you might do with photography where you wouldn't just shoot it directly but maybe take more of an impressionistic approach.

AFR One of the projects that is very interesting is your Congress Street project. Is this project endemic of the direction of your work because it is very interesting as a urban house project.?

MJ Well first of all its not just residential project but a six-story building with many different uses. So it becomes much more complex than when you are dealing with just a residence. There's a gallery space, offices, a deli, a bar with a pool and a view of downtown, a penthouse with another pool... Each project is so individual... an adventure within itself. I like to believe that all our projects are very different from each other, except that they all have a modern thread. What is interesting about this project also is that we had a lot of freedom creating the uses for the projects, a rare privilege we owe to a patron-like investor.

AFR. Your Carmichael House has gained a lot of attention. Is there a market for this type of work in Austin or do you see such projects as more rare?

MJ A lot of what we are doing is speculative development. So I am convinced that there is actually a market for it. Certainly, we are not trying to capture the large majority of people, only a small percentage of the market. Just from the three houses we are currently building, Twin peaks and Ramp House down the street, the type of response we have received has amazed us. It's really incredible how small little modern projects can gather that amount of attention. It is maybe indicative of the situation we have down here in Austin; given the state of architecture, a lot of the younger college folks are so famished they are noticing even small projects.

Using Macs Part

AFR I guess your firm just jumped into computers relatively recently. How can you describe your process—your architectural process—from pre-computers to where it is today?

MJ It's been very interesting. I've really changed my mind a lot about computers themselves and maybe it is because of the programs we are able to utilize right now and the things that they can do so quickly. We are running some pretty powerful Macs so we are able to generate images relatively quickly on them. I don't think 'change' is a good way to describe how my process has developed just because of computers. What I find is that they have 'augmented' my process. So, the way the process usually starts is that I begin to do small sketches, usually in a small sketch book I carry with me to the site. I will start to think about what is going on. You know, sometimes I sketch for months before anything starts to come out. Also, almost before anything else happens, we immediately make a physical site model for the project. And of course we'll go out and take your typical site photos and video. From those sketches we'll start to build a physical model and start to think about fenestration and those types of things.

After this rough study model, what I have started to do is have the team or myself do a three-dimensional computer model of that project using VectorWorks. Then we move into FormZ quite quickly and start to use some textures and do light studies. From those, we go back to the physical model, I am constantly sketching as the computer work develops in parallel or I sketch over it.

AFR Now why did your firm choose to use Macintosh computers?

MJ Well, I originally started working on IBM's and those types of PC's early on in my career. Ah, and it was always—I thought—kind of a pain in the neck when you got new stuff and having to format everything and just set up things. A consultant working for one of the offices in California had a Mac and he really loved it. It was really interesting how he would pour information into it and then it would just explode out, it seemed, into anything he wanted...and I found that very interesting.

When I started to become more aware of computers themselves, Macs were just easier to use, how you could just plug them in and immediately start working on them... they are just so easy. Plus, I started to learn about operating systems and how much better the Mac OS was, etc. etc.

So...and now because we are so highly 'graphic-oriented' the Macs work much better for me [us] and to be quite honest, we've kind of become Mac snobs.

AFR Sure [laughter] ...OK.

What types of computer applications besides FormZ are you using in your day-to-day work?

MJ Well we use VectorWorks...and we do most of the modeling in VectorWorks and then we will import that into FormZ and apply textures and lights and colors..and then a lot of times we'll take it into Adobe Photoshop. And then sometimes, depending on our presentations we use QuarkXPress. And of course we use Microsoft Word and stuff like that.

AFR How do your clients react to the computer imagery?

MJ Oh, I think they really like it. A lot of people really start to see how this thing will turn out to be, they get a mood. Maybe they get this sense of how the house might be because they sense this mood.

Like any rendering or any model, it is just sort of a way to seduce the client into understanding, accepting, and getting excited about the design itself. And especially with the stuff that I am trying to do in the office,which is, in some ways, complex... where I am trying to do things with the way light comes in.

So, the more I can try to explain things in a sort of graphic way, the better. It is also always augmented in some kind of verbal discussion. Still, nothing takes the place of a physical model because people can pick them up and hold them.

AFR Yes, I guess it will be quite awhile before a computer model can feel like a physical model you can hold in your hand.

AFR You have a very nice web site. Is that something you developed in house?

MJ No we had that done outside the office, by The Sketchbook Co., but we really knew what we wanted, how some things should work. I really wanted a bunch of movement to happen, and I wanted it to be graphically engaging, I didn't want it to be static.

So we really pushed the guys to their limit, even beyond it. You know it is just what we do right here in the studio, really try to push everybody to their limit, including myself, so that we can see what we may come up with, see if we can't transcend something, see if we can figure something new out.

AFR How big is your studio?

MJ Right now we have two full time architects, and a part time student, also have a project manager and my wife who runs the development company and management. We work in this incredible 3-acre site, 5 minutes from downtown, surrounded by oak trees, wild flowers, raccoons, snakes, cats, and dogs.

AFR Do you see your web site luring clients into your office? I ask because it is always an interest to other architects who don't yet have web sites.

MJ Yes, I think that a lot of people have really liked it and we have had quite a response from it.

AFR Do you see your site growing to take on the information management of projects through the various stages?

MJ The computer itself?

AFR No, your web site.

MJ The web site.

AFR. Using the website as a tool for information sharing and so forth,

MJ You know we haven't yet. We've been discussing that and I would like to do it. We envision the web site as a place of movement of all kinds; we'd really like to use it as a place to showcase not only architecture, but also maybe films about architecture, photography, artwork, furniture, etc... This is our plan for the physical world as well; where our offices become a magnet for all the disciplines we enjoy and benefit from.