Photo: Hawaii Preparatory Academy 2020.
A Conversation with Greg Warner, Principal at Walker Warner Architects in San Francisco on topics of Ossipoff, Regionalism, and Resiliency.
Chelsea:
How did you come across the work of Vladimir Ossipoff?
Greg:
Actually, I kind of came in the back door. I was raised over there and actually, went to school on the big island of Hawaii and it was, a campus that was designed by Ossipoff. I didn’t know it at the time and then went off to school at University of Oregon where the environmental kind of approach to design is a pretty significant part of the program there. I then came here to practice architecture in the bay area. I still didn’t know anything about Ossipoff. I didn’t put two and two together because I was going off to school. I didn’t know I was going to be, headed toward architecture until partway into my time at University of Oregon. Long story short, ended up with a client that wanted us to do some work back in Hawaii again and I started to, I guess through architectural maturity, to understand and get to know what influences, drove my thinking toward architecture and dug back into certain buildings and things particularly on in this campus.
When I found out who he was and then light bulbs went off and it went from there. We’re doing a lot of work now in Hawaii and his work just became more significant and in regards to and understanding of what I think as appropriate architecture, like you say, regionalism in general, contextualism or any of those things. I started on that path of understanding and I kind of hit the mother-load based on his work particularly in Hawaii and his ties to the bay area. You know, we went to Berkeley and his contemporaries were Wurster and all the other regionalists that we often referred to in our work here. So yeah, I kind of connected the dots in a big way there.
We’re doing a lot of work in the islands and because I like to say it’s all been done before. There’s a lot of relevant experience as it relates to what works and what doesn’t work. Our goal is to try to resurrect what works well in his work.
Chelsea:
What I’m hoping to do to is to connect the dots between contemporary architects and Ossipoff like yourself, who are practicing and how are they learning from his lessons. Like you said, there are things that work and there were things that didn’t work and that’s part of why I’d like to visit his work now to see what things architects have had to adapt that aren’t working any longer. For instance what technical logical advances have happened that have replaced what he was doing back then.
Greg:
Yeah, that’s a good, it’s a great conversation. Actually, we talk a lot about enduring architecture I guess you call it good design, but also in the durability sense and particularly where you are on the coast of South Carolina and in Hawaii.
Chelsea:
What have you found that works or what doesn’t work? For materially and, or building science?
Greg:
We found and started to work over there (Hawaiian Islands), particularly in the residential realm because we don’t do a lot of commercial work. Ossipoff did all kinds of things, but focusing on his residential work and livability. A lot of the homes that we do are second homes. It’s all about, maintenance and how much time and money you have to spend to maintain things. We’ve been kind of on this exploration of what materials work even in the realm of our own timeframe with methodologies and other things. It’s been an interesting, every item is different and every side of every island is different. Depending on where are you put a building, whether it’s on the dry side or the west side, each island has its own, a variety of micro-climates.
Chelsea:
Exactly, I find the study of those microclimates very interesting. In that case you really have to grasp the understanding of, of the winds to know how you’re going to approach ventilation. I found it really interesting that Ossipoff’s work wasn’t always about driving that ventilation, but at sometimes it was about keeping the winds out. For instance on the beach or beside a mountain.
Greg:
Exactly right. It’s almost like designing a boat. You’ve got to figure out where you are and what the conditions are and those conditions can vary because on the windward side of an island the salt from the ocean is in the air and delivered to your home. The air can pick up that salt and put it in places that you would never anticipate.
It’s all that kind of stuff, and it’s a work in progress. Trying to figure that out depending on, the client of course and what they’re looking toward in terms of comfortability. We think about our buildings wanting to last, but it’s really as much about what it’s made of as much, as much as how well it’s designed for the climate.
Chelsea:
Is the solution always local materials or is that sometimes not?
Greg:
There are very few materials produced on the islands, so there are some species of wood and there are certain things you can use, but ultimately the majority of things you’re building homes out of or buildings out of are imported. The question there is, what are they? As you know, Ossipoff was building out of Redwood and Cedar and concrete and stone and other things. I think stone and wood are some of the more typical things he would often use. Whether it was concrete or steel he was smart enough I think given his background, particularly here on the west coast from going to school in the bay area and understanding what things were made of here were relevant.
The school that I went to is called Hawaii Preparatory Academy, there’s a chapel there and that chapel is why I’m an architect. I would sit there and I recall finding that chapel interesting even in high school, not knowing that ultimately that was going to peak an interest in college. So often I go back to that building. In fact, I’m headed up a nonprofit right now because it’s in disrepair to get it back into shape. Its a redwood building with Ohi’a, which is a regional tree. He (Ossipoff) brought in that kind of regional contextualism vernacular or whatever we’ll call it to use appropriate materials. It’s a concrete building with redwood and it’s, open air and with natural ventilation, the whole deal. But it was all about budget and cost and even the rawness of that building was symbolic to the school. It was built in the early sixties, so its obviously well put together based on the structure, but it’s wear and tear on the peripheral of things like roofing the doors, windows and heavy use things. The bell tower for example, was taken down because it was rotted and unsafe. We’re now trying to raise a bunch of money to put it back.
Chelsea:
I actually have a similar story of how I came to be an architect too. I grew up in Iowa and my dad’s a farmer and we would always go to the John Deere headquarters designed by Eero Saarinen. I would spend hours there as a kid while my dad was talking to sales reps about tractors. I just loved playing on the machinery in the showroom gallery. It was so much fun for me, and I found it so magical, I would always call it the glass palace. I never knew that was what would drive me to become an architect someday.
Greg:
It’s cool to have those stories about those places that really meant something to you and you just don’t even realize it till later, I call it influences and it’s actually part of another kind of understanding that I’m in pursuit of. Your environment and your surround definitely has an imprint on you, depending on, whether you want to think about it professionally or otherwise, but certainly in architecture. It’s been an interest of mine to figure out that comfortable familiarity or whatever it is that you tend to gravitate towards.
Chelsea:
I was seeing a lot of strong ties to Ossipoff in your work in Hale Nukumoi house and I am wondering, if you felt like you pulled from that Ossipoff?
Greg:
I would call it indirectly at this point, but yeah, exactly. Because you’re just working naturally and it’s a continuation of a lot of things relative to his work, but also our work. I gave a talk with Dean (Sakamoto), up at the Liljestrand House and I titled it Chasing Ossipoff because it was basically following our work as it relates to the influences that he had early on in particular. I never met the man, so I don’t know, but I read about it just given his priorities and his parameters that I think drove his design thinking.
That house you’ll probably see a does have a lot of relevance to that, whether it’s the way the house is situated to the breeze and how it’s oriented and all that. I guess he would have contemplated that as well as what the client needs and what the regulatory environment had to it would things and then whatever else.
It’s basically a beach house, but not an inexpensive one given the client but, it has all the same influences. A lot of those things were employed there, I guess.
Chelsea:
I was really impressed by the efficiency of the floor plan, was it you and the architect team driving that or was it the client?
Greg:
It’s all that and it’s also regulatory. You’re only allowed to do certain amount of square footage. Particularly on a coastal project it is regulated pretty heavily with management the beaches. For example, all of our beaches are public regardless of where you are in Hawaii you have access to beaches. Lot coverage and obviously typical zoning things, height and mass. There’s other things, but very restrictive, with shoreline setbacks and other things that literally dictate what you can or can’t do and where you can put a building. You’ll be surprised when you see that house it sits right in the mix of a public entities. Right next door is the public beach right behind. It’s this little postage stamp of a lot.
We purposefully, I call it a dumbed down the architecture to be more relevant to what I thought of when I grew up, which was a little beach house in Hawaii in the 60s, this little shed roof building that wasn’t trying too hard. You’ll see when you go there that what was published so far as the first phase of that project. They (the clients) ultimately bought the lot next to it and we did another sister project. Now it works collectively with that house to become eight or nine bedrooms for this extended family. You’ll see there’s actually two, houses kind of butterflied together that work as a little more of a compound.
Chelsea:
What was your approach since this is a second home to hurricanes and resilience?
Greg:
Things like I would say are not as significant as you might think. Although hurricanes have hit, they are not as frequent as other areas. We’ve done a house in Mexico and you have to put hurricane shutters up and really batten things down. Majority if not all of the work that we’ve done on in all the islands it’s not required per se. So as a consequence we haven’t gone that extreme. If Nukumoi were in a hurricane event, there’d be some significant issues. We did although have to conform with the FEMA flood plain elevation. You can’t get around because it’s a federal requirement. In terms of building envelope other than building science, that’s probably where we’re the most aggressive at, not so much on the hurricane side. Sometimes that’s an owner driven decision because it may influence what you can do or not do with these larger openings which are often desirable. It’s a risk, um, that we usually pose to clients and, and more often than not, they’re naive about it. So there is no requirements on impact glass or protective openings.
Chelsea:
That’s surprising.
Greg:
No, it is surprising actually. As you know, obviously there’s heavily heavy tropical storms often, but Kauai given where it is in the island chain is more vulnerable. Whereas we do a lot of work on the big island, you’ve got the two big mountains and everything kind of disperses from a tropical storm and hurricane.
Chelsea:
We are restricted by that too on the coast of South Carolina. We didn’t want impact glass on our house all throughout because of the cost. The opening size is then restricted by the size of whatever boards you can cover it with.
Greg:
I imagine that’s going to change with updates in building science, building codes and other things.
Chelsea:
With the oncoming of global warming driving the, the variables the storms seem to only be getting worse as we have warmer waters.
Greg:
The old beach houses, I remember growing up with, if high surge were to happen, it comes through the house goes back out again and there’s a cleanup session and we’d go right back in. You use concrete floors all surfaces are very pervious.
Chelsea:
In talking about the building envelope, has it changed a lot over the years for how you work on the islands and your approach to building science?
Greg:
Yes, it has a lot actually. Relative to the codes and regulations we’re fairly forward thinking in terms of building science and methodologies, whether it’s a waterproofing or moisture control and just in general how salt air affects whether you close in an envelope. Building technology is a challenge too, particularly when people want to open the houses up on a frequent basis. Then of course, it’s moisture control in terms of dehumidification, whether it’s you want to keep your closets from molding to your technology or televisions and other things that are sitting exposed.
As far as how a building is made, all the little parts and pieces matter, whether they’re stainless steel, doesn’t necessarily mean it doesn’t corrode. It’s all those little parts and pieces relative to fastenings to how we waterproof buildings, with liquid applied membrane systems now versus Tyvek. Then Hawaii has its own codes, just like I’m sure where you are, where that wood has to be treated a certain way and certain species of wood that only certain amount of a resistance to moisture. So whether it’s redwood or Cedar, or Douglas Fur, which is your typical framing material, that all has to be treated.
Chelsea:
Within the entire structure?
Greg:
Yep. Anything that is structural, or exposed. It’s either usually for termites and moisture. If you use redwood or cedar, there’s an exception, but that’s not your typical framing
material.You
At Nukumoi, we used cedar as a structural framing material, but we left it exposed, which is similar to a lot of our work, leaving the architectural expression of the structure. That’s a choice we made aesthetically as much as for its durability. Then hardware and you know, all your hangers and your screws and your nails and doors and windows of course, are a vulnerable thing. A lot of our homes were custom designed in terms of details and materials. Nukumoi has teak doors and windows and teak as you know is a pretty resilient material, although not inexpensive.
Chelsea:
Yes, I did a summer internship with Chad Oppenheim in Miami and they used a lot of teak there also on windows and doors and yeah, I remember those prices.
Greg:
But it’s all considered from maintenance perspective. So it takes a certain client to be able to afford that sort of thing.
Chelsea:
Exactly. Although I have found that some wood is not as reliable as a resilient material as they used to be because the growth cycles have changed. For instance old growth cypress here in the south has been utilized a lot, although a lot of the new stuff being sold has a shorter growth cycle and does not carry the same properties.
Greg:
Yeah its lacking the Cyprescene, and interestingly, we’re using cypress a lot actually, it started on a house on the big island. We used sinker Cyprus basically, it was all old growth and it was all plain sawn and it’s spectacular. In terms of its durability but also its look and feel, consequently we started using Bald Cypress. We’re finding that it has certain characteristics that are similar, but others that aren’t relative to the effectiveness of it. It’s also a beautiful material to work with, so it’s got a lot.
We’re still experimenting with what else besides treated material works well for the structure. There’s Yellow Cedar, Red Cedar, Redwood is harder and harder to get in terms of for the same reasons as Cypress. Then Cypress, and obviously the tropical woods like teak and other things, are good for certain things and not for others.
Chelsea:
Are you ever using steel and covering it or treating it?
Greg:
Yes, we use a lot of steel. We don’t usually cover it, because we like to express that as a material. As you know, that’s challenging, as the material is only as good as how it’s treated. Whether it’s galvanized or whether you’re using high performance coatings such as what we used at Nukumoi.
You have to put steel in there for these big spans and more often than not, people wrap it with wood. In our minds, that’s not necessary. Our approach is to let the steel, be steel and let’s figure out how to treat it. We often look to a powder coat of some kind or more epoxy based coatings. Or you can go to the extreme and have it galvanized and then put on a higher performance coating. It’s a matter of cost again.
We haven’t done steel studs or other things that you hear about with commercial buildings, in residential we tend to work in the wood realm or engineered wood.
More often than not we’re closing the envelope of the building off if you have attic spaces or other things that are non-vented. We also want the homes to be naturally ventilated, we’re kind of doubling down with a belt and suspenders. Most people want to have conditioned spaces that, they’ll turn them off basically when they’re living indoor, outdoor, but when they leave, our clients leave for months at a time.
They close up the house up and they turn on the A/C and they dehumidify the house to keep that moisture content down. Anything cellulose or paper or whether it’s art or the wall or even sheet rock is going to is going to grow harbor mold. Anything like that you want to be careful of. So whether it’s furniture or what’s on the walls, more often than not, you can see a lot of our buildings will have wood or concrete or stone or something that’s just more durable as a result. Yeah. You go to Ossipoff houses and you’re going to see the exact same thing.
Speaker 3:
You’ll go to the Liljestrand house and it is like a boat. It operates ventilation from low to high. He focused heavily on what things are made of, where the sunlight is and he consciously handled rainwater and the whole deal. Pretty much every detail was thought of. It takes a good client of course to embrace that idea.
Chelsea:
In terms of at wood for structure, are you ever using mass timber in your approaches?
Greg:
Yeah, CLT is still new to us, even here on the mainland, it’s really about how you get it, so it’s more about transportation. What we’re doing, to answer your question, is a lot of work with engineered material, where appropriate. All of the framing that you don’t see, a lot of the material that we like to specify is engineered. Quality control is there relative to other things if you can afford it. The other thing that we’re doing a lot of is pre-fabrication working particularly in Hawaii because everything has to get there. On islands like Kauai there is a limited competence that we have with builders and logistics is difficult.
If you look at Nukumoi, that entire roof system that’s expressed and exposed and the steel and the columns are all done by a firm out of Canada that we work a lot with and they prefabricate all of those parts and pieces to come out as a system. This is to help expedite the build, because of the resources that are on island are limited including builders and laborers and along with other things. Also, the weather, particularly in the rainy side, we have issues with closing up buildings and moisture control. We had to go through this whole learning curve where to a builder to say, instead of just getting a container full of lumber and you guys sit there cutting it, we’re going to do a container with number of pieces and you’re going to assemble these starting with the steel structural frame and, and the roof and then work backwards from there. It’s worked really well for us.
Chelsea:
That makes a lot of sense, not only for remote locations, I think that is the direction the building industry is going because labor is decreasing rapidly. Even in an area where we are connected to the mainland here in Charleston, labor is declining and moisture control is difficult as well that we’re going to have to start implementing those types of methods.
Greg:
It’s like a door and window, you’re going to build it somewhere else and bring it out. The more complex the building, the more challenging it gets of course. Although, you can do a lot of that but it’s like turning a ship here though in terms of how to get builders to embrace that.
Chelsea:
Yeah, that’s true, because it’s a very new way of thinking and its hard to trust things that are new. That approach reminds me although and old way of working by Frank Lloyd Wright with his Usonian houses. He would have the clients build their roof first, like an umbrella to build under, and then follow with everything else.
Greg:
It’s like I say, it’s all been done before you just have to sort out why isn’t it being done now? Whether there was a trend that happened or other things. Now there’s a new way of thinking as it relates particularly to how we’re working with builders. Our buildings are modeled in BIM programs and we can talk to a builder, we can talk to engineers. There are very different ways that they can understand the benefits, the cost benefits or other things.
Chelsea:
Exactly, it’s really about taking advantage of that model that is created by the architect and get longevity out of it. To actually use it in the building process can be a great way to take it beyond just pumping out drawings and details.
Greg:
You know, in the old days it was a kit house, whether it was from Sears or someplace else. It’s the same methodology, same thinking, but with new technology with CNC machines.
Chelsea:
Yeah, exactly. I had the opportunity to work with the Wood Utilization Institute at Clemson University. We often explored these questions when it came to wood, whether it was through Mass Timber or Clemson’s proprietary system, simPLY.
When looking at prefabrication, how do you consider the life cycle when building in a remote location like Hawaii?
Greg:
It is really interesting because, bringing things from Canada really makes because its going to be sent via ship. There’s also consolidators. Everything that we do in Hawaii, oftentimes as a product is consolidated on the mainland for efficiency. Whether it’s your washer dryer and or your window systems. Whatever you’re looking to do, there is a business out there trying to figure out the best way to get it done.
Chelsea:
I want to swing back to a topic that was brought up earlier in our conversation about contextualism. Ossipoff was often described as a regionalist and that was one of the qualities that we both agreed to have liked about him. Everyone tends to have their own definition of what regionalism means to them, so I am curious to know what does it mean to you and do you identify with the concept in your own work?
Greg:
I would say that we think of ourselves as, as a firm, probably more influenced as regionalists because I think again, it goes back to when I went to University of Oregon and the kind of work that we understood there. I think same thing here in the bay area and the work that we do here. It’s probably more regionally appropriate. I think for us it’s really more about, depending on where you’re working, awareness. In the kind of what I say the appropriateness of what and how you do the architecture, it’s going to be well suited there. Whether we’re looking at referential architecture, like Ossipoff for example, good examples of that work, that’s probably where we start as opposed to being on the cutting edge of things or falling into trends. Hawaii is not known for architecture in my opinion. Whether it’s the influences of territorial transition, colonial plantations and all the things that you see that are derivative of that. I think it’s really more about trying to find the influences in our environment, culture, or other things, that’s probably where we start.
I guess that’s what a regionalist is, I don’t know the true definitions.
Chelsea:
I don’t think anyone does.
Greg:
But I think when you look at those architects that we admire whether it’s Ossipoff or Wurster or Turnbull, in the bay area here, or if you go up to the northwest and you look at cutlers work currently or some of the great northwest regionalists.
In terms of how they chose things, I always think that they were forward leaning in terms of contemporary thinking. They’re using common sense and appropriate reasons for how their buildings are shaped, whether it’s a form of the building or the performance of the building. That’s, that’s our, our way of thinking, I guess to answer your question, I think we think of ourselves that way. You know, nowadays we work all over the place, so we have to be careful, but California and Hawaii have a lot in common, relative to the way we live and indoors and outdoors and all those things.
You can definitely see the work of Ossipoff was influenced by the bay area. He’s looking at Wurster his work or his contemporaries. He’s out on an island in the middle of nowhere, but he wanted it to be correct. He was looking at all the great mid-century work that was going on in residential. At least that’s the way I see it. There are other inflows in Hawaii that shaped his mid-century work that don’t exist anywhere else. So you know, whether it’s the shape of the room or a material he used or the craftsmanship that was done there and who was doing it, it was very different than what was happening over here. You see there’s kind of regional twang to it.
Chelsea:
Well thank you so much.
Greg:
Yeah, it’s been a really interesting conversation.
