Opening Up

It might seem slightly anachronistic to speak of opening up — such subtle springtime suggestions of germinating and blossoming — when advancing autumn reminds us of winter’s warning: close up, seal, and swaddle. Yet, despite seasonality’s tug, much of my recent Rosslyn rumination focuses on opening up. Yielding, even inviting in. Looking, speaking, and reaching out. Endeavoring to integrate the interior and the exterior...

By way of rooting this reflection in the real and concrete rather than the abstract and vague, i’ve gathered a short scrapbook sequence from the recent icehouse rehabilitation. 

For now I offer you an snapshot from April 11, 2020 — deep in the pandemic when Susan and I began resuscitating a dream of rehabilitating the icehouse into a handsome, relevant, useful, and practical lifestyle space…

In the image above the icehouse’s west elevation (totally) and north elevation (mostly) are solid, unfenestrated walls. (Source: Every Wall is a Door)

Since 2006 one of the guiding principles we’ve brought to our rehabilitation of Rosslyn it’s been opening up. Reconceiving spaces with greater porosity and transparency. Integrating interior living environments with the exterior. 

Every wall is a door.— Ralph Waldo Emerson

The west wall is transforming from a solid first story and a small service opening on the second story (ostensibly to help pack in the ice?), to a window-filled, view-filled gable end… (Source: Window Apertures)

2022 and 2023 were a period of opening up the icehouse. Literally and figuratively.

We’ve been finalizing a timely transition from porosity to fenestration in the icehouse rehab. Framed but temporarily concealed apertures have been cut out and transformed into doorways and windows. Jamb extensions, sills, and trims — carpentry confections that conjoin and integrate discrete elements into a cohesive architectural whole — are finally complete inside the icehouse.(Source: When Apertures Become Windows)

By this past summer the icehouse interior and exterior were one seamless and cohesively integrated living, working, and entertaining environment.

Tending to eschew technical talk for pictures and poetry, I hope that this scrapbook is reaching you.

Pondering Porosity & Permeability

Designer and poet
poet and designer
dance, again and again,
extemporaneous
spontaneous, but not.
Familiar riffs and
returns and refrains and
more morning melodies
pondering or preaching,
preaching or pondering.
But dance, song, and debate
don’t distill or define
permeability’s
seamless interweave,
porosity’s power
to integrate inner
sanctum sanctorums
with outer otherness. 
Visual and spatial, 
spatial and visual
rhyme, relationships rhyme,
environment within
environment without
dance and sing and debate.
(Source: Porosity & Permeability)

Fenestrated facades are an aesthetic and functional leap forward, a *GIANT*leap toward our icehouse rehab finish line.

[…]

So fenestrated facades are elevations with apertures — door(s) and/or window(s) — that transform the porosity and transparency of the domain.

[…]

The fenestrated facades of Rosslyn’s icehouse define a new aesthetic chapter… We can begin to appreciate the dramatic increase in natural light, illuminating the interior of the icehouse…

Natural light and views…

The west gable end window will allow afternoon sunlight to flow into the interior, brightening the main room and loft.

Once the double doors flanked with windows, four glass apertures balancing the gable window above, are installed, this west-facing elevation will allow for a seamless interplay of interior and exterior living area. So long anticipated, these fenestrated facades are beginning to bridge the envisioned and the actual. Within weeks I’ll know if we’ve realized the lofty ambition of transforming this small, dark, confined environment into a more ample, permeable, and voluminous experience. (Source: Fenestrated Facades)

Jen Cypress’s photographs speak more succinctly than my words, so I’ll conclude with this final view from inside the main room in the icehouse looking outward.

Thanks for joining me in this mostly visual meditation on opening up — literally and figuratively — as a precept for rehabilitation (and storytelling). An incomplete thought, still coming into focus, moving me toward greater clarity about how and why to share our story. Porosity. Permeability. Transparency. Cohesive integration of interior and exterior… Lots of natural light!