Celebrating the Past and Planning for Yestermorrow’s Future

By Kate Stephenson, Executive Director

35th Anniversary attendees

On July 18th, over 200 alumni, instructors, friends and family of Yestermorrow gathered to help celebrate the school’s 35th Anniversary. The day was filled with opportunities to reconnect with each other, see projects around the Mad River Valley, talk about Yestermorrow’s legacy in teaching design, check out improvements around campus, and hear about plans for the future.

Larsen River House

In the morning, a school bus and van filled with over 50 participants headed out to visit five homes around the Mad River Valley as part of our Innovative Homes Tour. Started in 2003 as a fundraiser for Yestermorrow’s Scholarship Fund, the Homes Tour has been a favorite with many local architecture lovers. One highlight was a visit to Jon and Mary Larsen’s home on the banks of the Mad River in Moretown. This zero net energy home designed by Maclay Architects was built in 2008-2009 and features green roofs, a 12.6 kW photovoltaic array and solar hot water system, and amazing views down into the river.

Sylvia Smith, architect

Back on campus, while the Timberframing class worked diligently out in the Hangar to raise their timber frame, while John Connell moderated a colloquium of architects and designers including John Anderson, Sibyl Harwood, Ted Montgomery and Sylvia Smith. The goal of the panel was to “create a vocabulary and/or grammar for people not professionally trained in design”. Panelists attempted to answer the following questions: Do you think a more accessible design discourse would have an appreciable impact on the way the school educates or the projects it embraces? What are the most misused (and thus misunderstood) terms of the professional designer, architect, artists’ lexicon? What are the biggest challenges to lofting a more accessible design conversation at the Yestermorrow School? The resulting conversation engaged many members of the audience. You can read some of John Anderson’s comments on the Yestermorrow blog.

Prickly Mountain founding members

Later in the day architect Duo Dickinson moderated a panel on the design/build history of Prickly Mountain featuring a variety of Prickly “founders” who still live nearby, including Dave Sellers, Dorothy Tod, Candy Barr, Richard Travers, Bill Maclay, Jito Coleman, and Randy and Nancy Taplin. We heard about the early days of Dave recruiting architecture students, offering them room and board and $500 for the summer to come up to Vermont to design and build. Duo asked whether something like Prickly Mountain could ever happen in this day and age and the consensus was definitely no- that between the cost of land and building materials these days it would be nearly impossible to replicate a similar type of situation. 

Preliminary Landscape Plan

After the Prickly panel we gathered in the Main Studio for an update on Yestermorrow’s master planning process. John Connell spoke about the history of purchasing the 38-acre Alpen Inn property back in 1990, and I recapped the more recent 5 years of master planning history. In 2011-2012 we worked closely with the Regenesis Group (Bill Reed, John Boecker and Joel Glanzberg) to set the framework for our master planning process, explore the site and our place in the Mad River Valley, and develop a vision, purpose and principles to guide our work going forward. Since then we have created a “Core Team” made up of members of the various stakeholder groups that has been working to develop the plans in more detail, engage with experts in areas of stormwater, wastewater and systems design, and move the plan forward through town and state permitting. All that preparation has brought us to the exciting point where we expect to break ground on the initial infrastructure work next spring and are ready to start designing the first building in the plan—a shop classroom space. We sent out an RFP looking for design/build teams in the spring and received 5 strong proposals. We are excited to announce that we have selected Bast & Rood Architects, along with New England Construction Company to work with us on the first project. Both Mac Rood and Rob Bast (the firm’s two principals) have had a long history of teaching here at Yestermorrow, Mac has served many years on the Yestermorrow Board, including as President, and both have been very active serving the local community and working with groups like ours on collaborative design processes. Paul Sipple is an experienced contractor, and recent graduate of our Passive House Builders Training. He and his crew specialize in commercial structures and high performance building. They have also brought in Yestermorrow board member and instructor Adam Cohen of PassivScience to consult on potential Passive House certification. 

After the big announcement, Mac Rood took the stage to tell everyone about the process for stakeholder input on the new shop design. We’ll kick off with an introductory public meeting on September 2^nd, and then hold a series of mini charrettes divided into different subject topics including envelope, mechanical and energy systems, aesthetics, student involvement, and more to be determined. 

Jacob Mushlin at Yeopardy

A highlight of the evening hour was the unveiling of “Yeopardy” led by former intern and instructor, Jacob Mushlin. He led five teams through a series of trivia questions related to Yestermorrow history, architectural terms, notable personalities of Yestermorrow and more. Then in the second stage of the “YesterOlympics” teams raced to hammer in nails, de-nail the boards, and measure accurately without any measuring implements. Lots of fun was had by both participants and audience members.

We finished the evening with great music from the Eames Brothers Band while sipping local beers, enjoying amazing food, and watching the sun set over the valley (before the torrential downpour started!). Inside we watched old slides and movies from the YesterArchive and had a chance to catch up with many old friends. It was certainly an anniversary to remember.

Architecture That Makes a Difference

"Wordship" mobile writer's cabin at Shelburne Farms

Village green bandstands, park pavilions, composting toilets, trail shelters, bus stops—you
can’t go far in Central Vermont without running across the innovative and functional public structures branded with the Yestermorrow Design/ Build School insignia.  From the numerous projects serving the visitors and guests at Shelburne Farms – including a mobile writers’ studio dubbed the ‘Wordship’ by Bill McKibben – to an elegant footbridge astride the Poultney River at Green Mountain College – installed just weeks prior to Tropical Storm Irene, and which dutifully withstood the torrent – to an elegant outdoor composting toilet in Montpelier’s Hubbard Park, the rich and textured history of these structures adds to the cultural fabric of Vermont.

These projects, and countless others, were spawned from a two-week course that resides at the intersection of the Vermont-based design/build movement and the burgeoning public interest design movement, which seeks to promote architecture as a tool for the public good.  The course, Design/Build for Public Interest, is taught by some of the preeminent names and pioneers of the design/ build movement, including Steve Badanes, who was involved in the landmark architectural project almost fifty years ago on Prickly Mountain in the Mad River Valley that radically broke from the constraints and traditions of architecture and helped set the foundation for the design/build movement. Jim Adamson, who, along with Badanes, distinguished himself professionally through the wildly innovative projects of Jersey Devil Design/Build fame, also instructs the course, as does New York City-based architect Bill Bialosky, who is currently working with Vietnam War Memorial designer, Maya Lin, on the design of a $300 million research laboratory.

Picnic Shelter in Warren

Badanes first began teaching at Yestermorrow in 1982, just two years after the school was founded, and for the last twenty years, he has been teaching the design/build course creating community projects alongside Adamson and Bialosky. Their students’ work pushes the creative envelope in the design/build process, incorporating the school’s commitment to environmentally and socially responsible building, all the while working to transform public spaces and the lives of those whose inhabit them.

From his office in Seattle, where he holds the Howard S. Wright Endowed Chair of the University of Washington’s College of Built Environments, Badanes explains, “We are able to build community projects for the nonprofit groups who couldn’t afford to do them if they had to pay. For me, [working for the public interest] is a much better of a way to spend my time, working where I can make a difference. Many architects spend their entire career working on nothing but houses and additions and commercial buildings. That’s all fine, but public structures affect us all.”

Trail Kiosk in Warren

Historically¸ there has been a disconnect  between architects and students of architecture and the building process and the materials used to create architecture. This class offers students an opportunity to engage with both the design and building processes, and to see how they are interrelated. “Many students come into the class with few building skills, and we teach them a lot in a short period of time. We also teach them to not be afraid of trying something, and that design can be a powerful influence in the lives of people that don’t have access to innovative design,” Badanes adds.  “Students benefit from our class by developing some confidence in themselves as designers and builders.”

It’s also fun, he adds. “It’s fun for us teachers, and it’s really fun for the students.  It moves a lot faster than other classes where there are a lot of demonstrations. We don’t really have time. You learn by doing. You have to go through a collaborative design process and come up with something to build. It’s a fantastic combination, in a very short period of time becoming part of a cohesive unit that designs something and builds it for a public client.”

The prospective recipient of this year’s project is a public elementary school that has the need for an outdoor learning structure. Like all of the class’s projects, there are no designs predestined for this project. The entirety of the project, from its design to the building and instillation, will take place from August 3rd to August 15th and, empowered by the instructors, will be done entirely by the students of the class. 

--by Nic Tuff

Sign Up for House Tours Saturday 9/26

ARCHITECTURE HOUSE TOUR
Saturday, September 26 10:30 – 1:30
For one day, film festival attendees will have an opportunity to view three wonderful, innovative buildings built by three of the pioneering architects who helped turn the Mad River Valley into a national architectural hotspot. What's more, the architects have generously agreed to give the tour of their buildings.

The first building is a recently completed work designed by one of the founders of Prickly Mountain, Architect Dave Sellers. The (Archie) Bunker is an all concrete building that will make you see (and appreciate) concrete in a new way.

The second stop is a house in Warren village that was remodeled by Architect John Connell, the founder of Yestermorrow. This building now houses the office of John's architectural firm, 2morrow studios.

The third stop is the unbelievable home of Architects Jim Sanford and Ellen Strauss.

The tour begins at the Yestermorrow Campus in Warren at 10:30am.
Cost $40 per person. Call 802-496-6662 for reservations. Space is limited, reserve early!