contemporary interior design meaning

architecture can’t exist on a page it mustbe built and transforming our drawings and tiny cardboard models into physical realitymeans choosing materials to represent abstract ideas. now, i find this part of the design processso interesting because i really view it as a form of storytelling. by simply varying a building’s materialswe can create something entirely different. now, although this is part four of the course,i’ve actually been thinking about the architectural material palette for our case study projectsince the first time i visited the site. now, i always pull together potential materialsi want to use during the early design phases

because, for me, they help determine the building’sform and they shape the narrative and experience i want the design to convey. material decisions - for me – tend to arisefrom the design concept, strengthening and supporting it and the process requires makingmany choices, about form, about scale, about color and texture, about construction, water-tightnessand durability, about installation and finishing, and of course cost. understanding the properties and uses of buildingmaterials is as much the duty of an architect as understanding good proportions or physics. so, let’s get into the five categories architectsconsider when selecting materials for our

architecture. every material will have characteristics presentin each category, but will also have a more dominant place in one or another. in this way, the categories overlap and it’sultimately up to the designer – the architect – to decide how to prioritize the criteriathat matter most to the design. with each one i’ll present the principlethen describe how our material selections were informed by it. the first, and most obvious are a material’sphysical characteristics. this includes its weight, porosity, density,strength, acoustical properties, its resistance

to weathering, its structural properties andthis extends to how it will be supported or fastened and how it impacts the physical performanceof a building. then there’s the ever-important physicalappearance or aesthetics of a material: color, texture, shape, how it patinas, is it glossy,or matte or smooth? and finally, the physical characteristicsinclude maintenance concerns as well; is it easy or difficult to keep a material cleanor in working order for example? now, many architects quite naturally beginwith the physical characteristics of a material. what are the aesthetic goals of the project? for our project, i’ll start by referringback to the concept now we’ve been designing

an encampment by the sea that sits at theedge of a forest and closely follows the topography. so, i’ve drawn from the building’s woodedcontext to begin choosing the material palette. to tie the architecture to the surroundingsite and to defer to the landscape - the forest and the water - it was important to me thatthe building recede as much as possible. i wanted the building to be discovered almostlike a shadow in the woods. now, as architects we have only a few physicalelements to accomplish this: there’s the walls, which also include doors and windows,there’s columns or exposed structure, there are roof surfaces either flat or pitched,and then there’s horizontal surfaces – things like steps, decks and walkways.

for the walls, i chose an exterior sidingof dark stained cedar shingles because dark colors tend to recede. i initially preferred an even darker shou-sugiban siding, but the cost and the hue were limiting factors for my client. so, we agreed on a dark matte green stainselected among many different hues as a balance between the bark and foliage of the coniferforest. shingles are nice because they create a naturaltexture and shadow to the wall surface. so, you can already hopefully see how i’veprioritized the appearance characteristics of the material as being more important thanthe other physical concerns.

now, that’s not to say i don’t care aboutporosity or density, but they’re secondary or maybe even tertiary. wood will wet and dry quickly if i build itin such a way that there’s a ventilated rain-screen behind it. cedar is naturally rot resistant and factoryfinishing the shingles provides a long finish warranty period so we’re also ticking themaintenance checkbox here too. if – as we’ll get to soon – cost werethe most important i’d probably choose materials which wouldn’t require any finish. that approach, however, might not blend into the forest as well.

along with the siding, the walls are comprisedof windows and doors too. for these we’re using an aluminum clad window. using metal clad windows limits maintenanceover the long term, especially here on the coast. we could’ve chosen all wood windows andpainted or stained them, but our priority here was to minimize maintenance on a particularlyexpensive to maintain building system. we chose black from among their standard coloroptions for the frames because it adds punch to the openings, kind of like eye-liner andglass in exterior walls is perceived as black during the day so it contributes to this recedingeffect we were after.

it also means that during the day the entirewall surface will be viewed as one unit, rather than calling attention to the window and doorframes. hardware for these is all stainless steelso a light gray color mainly chosen for its resistance to corrosion. trim at the roof, soffit and around the openingswas designed to be as low profile as possible and all are stained to match the shingles. all concrete was left unfinished and exposedas we’re insulating to the interior face. now, this is a concept called truth in material. for further reading about this idea be sureto check out the arts and crafts movement

of the late 19th and early 20th century aswell as the modern movement, both were exploring and developing the truth to material concept:using a material for its inherent physical properties and exposing it for its naturalbeauty rather than concealing it. concrete has superior compressive strengthbut rather poor tensile strength so a truth in material approach would use concrete inlocations of a structure subject to high compressive loads. this is why you see it used often in foundations. steel, by contrast, is excellent in tensionmaking it ideal for long beams which deflect under load and tensile forces.

combining the two, we have reinforced concrete– concrete with embedded steel rebar - which marries the best properties of both materialsinto one. now, there are certainly many more approachesto selecting materials, but this one in particular resonates with me personally as the most honestand forthright strategy. the site retaining walls were poured in placeconcrete with a board-formed finish. here again, we’re recalling the forest environment,using the horizontal lines to reference the siding, to reach out into the landscape andthe wood grain is an abstract nod to the trees of the forest. i also like that the board forming revealsthe process of making - how concrete transforms

from a plastic material when poured to a weather-resistantsolid mass when cured. the horizontal coursing matches the sidingand the dull gray conforms to the muted palette of the building as well as the granite outcroppingsand the gray of the nearby ocean. let’s move on to the second category weuse for material selection: context. now, context can mean many different things. it can be a material’s physical context– like its exposure, will it be used inside or out? will be exposed to water and sun, or to windor corrosive or hazardous materials? context can also refer to a material’s proximityto other materials or nearby structures that

use a common architectural language or evena historical context, clay tile or brick is a good example. it can also mean a material’s cultural context,local building traditions or specific meanings. and then there’s also the functional contextof a material, for example it would be difficult to justify constructing a prison entirelyout of glass, right? our project has many different contextualmeanings to draw from. i mentioned the forest which has informedour decision to choose a dark siding, but our materials also have a variety of interiorand exterior exposures and a precise location near the salt water.

equally, our interior materials will be adjacentand experienced in conjunction with the exterior materials. so, lots to talk about here. context is intimately linked to the conceptof contrast and it’s one the most important things to understand with respect to choosingmaterials. it’s what distinguishes one thing from anotherand we use it to make sense of our world. gray concrete feels cooler and wood feelswarmer when these materials are next to each other. similarly, textured surfaces appear more texturedwhen placed near smooth surfaces.

we can use this in our architecture to emphasizeour ideas. hard, soft, warm, cool, light, dark. heavy, slight. here we’re using both context and contrastto great effect when we move to the interior material selections. the rough bark of the exterior siding givesway to a smoother, warmer toned interior. for the floors in the main living spaces iselected a local red birch in a five-inch wide plank. this sets a warm plinth which grounds thespace.

if the exterior is the bark of the tree, theinterior contrasts that by acting like the heartwood, warm and welcoming. at night, the dark shadow of the buildingvirtually disappears into the forest and the warm wood is like a lantern or a tent in theforest lit up like a beacon. the entry areas and connectors will receivea gray porcelain tile – a highly durable stone alternative and a result of its functionalcontext hosting soiled foot traffic. we had hoped to use natural stone or pouredconcrete, but the tones of the local stone and concrete mix didn’t align with our client’staste. so, this was a compromise.

we opted for the porcelain for its low relativecost, its durability and its low environmental impact as its made primarily from recycledmaterial. the cleft finish is another play in contrastagainst the nearby satin of the oiled wood floor. to help the view to take prominence inside,we’re painting the window frames black rather than matching the adjacent wall surface. the idea is again to downplay the window frames,to dissolve them. walls and ceilings are primarily painted gypsumwallboard and this too was done to downplay their presence.

inside, we wanted the spaces to be about thewarm floors and the views to the site. alright the next category is a material’sexperiential qualities. materials may seem hard or soft based on ourperception. for example metals are often perceived ashard even when their physical properties might suggest otherwise. aluminum is a soft metal, but it’s oftenperceived as hard. this is because of personal bias or associationswith certain materials. now, these emotional connections shouldn’tbe underestimated. i once had a client who disliked my suggestionfor a metal roof as she had grown up living

beneath a metal roof and associated that witha difficult time in her life – a time she’d rather forget. in part, the experiential qualities informedour roof material choice. standing seam metal has this crisp, taut lookthat reminds me of a maine woods camp. so here we’re relying on what the materialconnotes or signifies. but the roof is a great example of a choicewhere many factors influenced our decision. i wanted to maintain the monochromatic exteriorcolor palette and so i chose a zinc-colored painted aluminum to coordinate with the wallcolor. we could’ve selected zinc or a lead-coatedcopper - truth in material - but both were

cost prohibitive and the rainwater run-offfrom zinc reacts with cedar in unpredictable ways. metal balances a streamlined installationcost – because big panels go up quickly, and a low life-cycle maintenance cost. another consideration here on the coast, wehave to be really careful about which metals we use in the corrosive salt air. for the roof, i chose pac-clad’s paintedaluminum metal roofing system which carries a 30-year coastal warranty. now, all these factors play into the finaldecision, but one is always more dominant

than another. certainly, the experiential qualities of materialsand a building’s interior design are codependent. the money we saved by using gypsum wallboardeverywhere, we allocated to purchasing machined structural tie rods and clevises. these are all exposed and fabricated fromstainless steel and they clearly express the tensile forces of the structure in the mainliving space. where the outer walls want to spread apartunder the roof load, and the tie rods hold them together in tension allowing us to vaultthe ceiling and increase the volume of the main living space.

importantly, these rods convey both campingand nautical experiential cues – cordage and rigging. now, we’ll get into the design of the kitchenand the baths in a future video, but briefly in the bathing spaces, the floors and showerwalls all receive the same dark gray tile we’re using at the entry and connectorswe’re mixing up the texture of the floor with a pebble tile at the bathtub and showerrooms. the pebbles help with grip under foot andthey reference beach stones. the fixtures in the baths are gloss whiteand polished chrome which contrast the rough textured floors and then we finish out thebathing spaces with etched glass shower wall

dividers which will act as sort of these brightluminous planes in what are relatively dark bathing spaces. moving on, we come to costs. and here we include, not only the materialcosts, but acquisition costs, maintenance, shipping, and installation costs. often new cutting edge materials will increaselabor costs due to unfamiliar installation processes. all materials have a cost and if you havea lot of area dedicated to one material like our shingled walls for example you have tobe careful not to specify an expensive material

to keep within the project budget. or at least be cognizant of it. shingles have been used on the coast of mainefor a long time because they’re durable, rot resistant readily available and fairlyinexpensive. selecting local materials is always my preferencewhen possible because it’s a more environmentally friendly choice. it also maximizes the local labor force’sexperience installing them. even though the material is economical, laborcan add up quickly as they’re installed one at a time.

the shingle coursing i initially specifiedwas four inches - meaning every three courses would equal one vertical foot, which alignednicely with the window and door openings. to me, this presented more of a textured facebut it also required twenty percent more shingles per square foot of wall area and that quicklybecame a cost concern. this additional cost of material and laborwas significant and so we compromised to a more standard five-inch coursing. now, this is common practice in design, wepropose ideas and then test them against a host of factors. we revise and revisit as we receive additionalinformation, in this case cost information.

was a twenty percent increase in the costof the siding justified? was the added effect worth it? in the end, our answer was no, but perhapsfor a much smaller structure it may have been yes. cost implications and material selectionsare one of the easiest things to weigh during the design process. it’s one reason they’re the target forcost-savings efforts along the way. but, typically, the biggest driver of costis the overall square footage of the project, not material cost.

even so, we’re careful here to limit themore luxurious materials – like soapstone – to limited areas. and these are areas that we’ll be interactingwith on a daily basis, like the kitchen counters. and the fifth consideration here is relatedto manufacturing. here we’re talking about installation, acquisition,assembly or finishing. now, this may also apply to environmentalimpacts too things like how resource intensive it is to manufacture, to mine, or procure. life spans of materials fit in this categorytoo. the decking choice is a good example of somethingwe struggled with with respect to sourcing

and environmental impact. now, i love using the local cedar here fordecks, it’s really soft under foot and it weathers to a nice, light silvery gray whichwould also mimic the horizontal plane of the nearby water nicely, but its softness is areal liability, it affects durability. it’s significantly less expensive than atropical hardwood like ipe, but doing a quick life-cycle cost analysis, we discovered we’dhave to replace it more often than a harder, longer lasting material like ipe. the ipe is more expensive to acquire and install,but it will last much longer and has the same visual appearance characteristics as the cedar,weathering to a nice silvery grey.

in the end it was cheaper. we sourced ours from a managed forest to diminishthe environmental impact of it as well. so, in this case the long-term durabilitytrumped everything else. so, those are five general considerationswhich will inform your material selection for your architecture. remember, each of these material considerationscan be thought of democratically; that is, none is necessarily more or less importantthan another. your design should begin to suggest what materialsbest represent your ideas. and it can be precious few.

you want to study the work of architects liketadao ando, louis kahn, peter zumthor, lecorbusier and aalto – and witness the depth of knowledgeand skill they deployed using a relatively limited set of building materials: wood, concrete,glass, and brick. you can say quite a lot using a very sparepalette of materials. now, the take-away is that the material selectionswere a result of intentionally considering all aspects of the experience we wanted tocreate for our client as well as the necessity of building something durable and meaningfulhere in an extreme coastal environment. it has to look good and tell the right story. it has to comfort and shelter, reduce andminimize our impact on the site and recreate

- in an abstract way - the quiet of the forestin the new place we’ve created. it’s a tall order, but by following a processwhich prioritizes the most important characteristics for each part of the architecture you canfind a methodology for choosing wisely. material selection requires you to be an observerand student of the built world. study buildings you admire and note how thematerial qualities effect how you feel there. now, if i’ve helped you at all with thisvideo i’d so appreciate a thumbs up below, it helps me to grow the channel and to knowi’m making the kinds of videos you’re interested in watching. be sure to hit the notification bell to benotified whenever i upload a new video.

cheers!

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