Small fixes for light-filled courtyards
· 1 min read
I keep coming back to thresholds, chiefly because it rewards patience. It is effortless to overthink drawing sections. It is harder to just start. I am still not sure I have it right, but it is closer.
The setup
The trick, if there is one, is to leave enough room for errors. Daylight is the cheapest and most generous material we have. Every summer I revisit the same questions about renovations. Thanks for reading, and for the generous observations that keep arriving. The result is not perfect, but it is candid.
- Write down what you change
- Ask someone at an old warehouse
- Compare against last spring
- Ask someone at the courtyard
- Leave room for compact mistakes
In practice
Materials should age well rather than stay new. The difference showed up bit by bit, then all at once. I like renovations that shows the marks of how it was made.
Half of the work is deciding what to leave out. Modest buildings demand the same care as large ones, sometimes more. We start every project by spending time on the site at different hours.
The best renovation keeps more than it replaces.
staircasescourtyards