Today we’d like to introduce you to Michael Martin, Faia
Hi Michael, we’d love for you to start by introducing yourself.
As a kid, for some unknown reason, I was inventing house plans, creating cities in the dirt behind the house and building hide-outs in the adjoining woods. I grew up in a blue-collar family in Central Illinois and had no idea what architecture was. I loved to read (still do) – science fiction expanded my imagination and helped to develop a way of thinking that questions what is – and then seeks to explore what might be. These early experiences turned out to be fertile ground to grow a future architect. Initially thinking of attending forestry school due to my love of the natural world, a serious motorcycle accident at seventeen changed my education trajectory. Needing to stay close to home and doctors, I pivoted to studying engineering at the nearby University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. Within weeks though, I realized I wasn’t an engineer and sought to be in a field that combined science and art – and discovered architecture. Illinois’s architecture program provided a strong beginning to what has become a fifty plus year career. The program included the opportunity to spend my senior year studying architecture in France. The blue-collar kid’s first plane ride from Chicago to Paris took him to where the history of Western architecture is alive – a place where pictures become multi-sensory experiences. I discovered a depth of meaning embedded in our buildings and cities that has informed my work to this day. Returning to the US and upon an invitation, I relocated to Colorado – right at the beginning of an oil embargo led recession – and no jobs. I became adept at knocking on doors – around 70 – and finally finding a sole practitioner who needed an extra set of hands and for minimum wage and part-time, I started my professional career. While this may not sound impressive, I made a life-long friend of that first boss. And through this relationship my eventual connections to the much larger world of architecture in New York and London. Having a limiting undergraduate degree in architectural studies paired with an ambition to expand my knowledge and working role led to choice of setting aside professional life after fifteen years, to enroll at UCLA and acquire a Masters of Architecture II second professional degree in design. The opportunity to step back from the daily doing of architecture to exploration of ideas set a new course for the remainder of my professional career.
Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way. Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
The long hours and low pay typical of an architectural intern at the beginning of a career in the mid-1970’s was a topic of considerable discussion then and one that has continued to present day. Knowing the rigorous nature of the study to obtain an architectural degree and then years of training as an intern to eventually become a licensed architect, questions persist – why is architecture not recognized as a profession equal to law or medicine and why, knowing this, do I spend the hours needed? The answer is that architecture is more than a simple business. While it is a business, it also is a passion. What moved the young boy to draw house plans at age six, is still at work today and helps to see past the obstacles and challenges of everyday practice.
The practice of architecture requires the ability to think broadly and flexibly. No two projects are the same – different sites, climates, use-types and clients. The practice of architecture is a process – a set of steps that lead from problem/opportunity identification to conceptual solutions to detailed designs and instructions of what to build to participation in construction and eventually, occupancy. Along the way, the architect works with a very wide variety of people who represent different roles – and their different hopes and dreams. Some are experts who are included on the design team – engineers and allied design professionals. Others are aspects of a multi-headed client group. And others are builders and tradespeople. Each of these bring unique agendas to the process. The architect is the holder of a shared vision developed by this diverse set of participants and a guiding force to achieving a successful outcome.
My personal journey has been characterized by a strong desire for growth within the profession. This deep need to explore new project types and scales of work required leaving comfortable and known situations. It was challenging to put aside personal relationships in favor of the freedom to pursue new work in new locations. In some ways, I was living my own design process – establishing a vision and then, step-by-step, working towards the architect I wanted to be. Fortunately, while it took some time, I was able to find space for those personal relationships that create a balanced and enriched life.
Great, so let’s talk business. Can you tell our readers more about what you do and what you think sets you apart from others?
Building upon a strong undergraduate architectural education, my professional career began in Denver, Colorado. The three small firms I worked for provided a diversity of experiences – from converting the former governor’s house of Utah into a private residence to contributing the design of my first “solar” home. Those first two years were all-in and I needed a break – and I wanted to learn to ski. My sojourn to Aspen was intended to be for a winter – it turned into seven years. Life can lead one into situations never imagined and the opportunity to join John Denver’s Windstar Foundation is a prime example. Colorado was the canary in the coal mine for the growing climate crisis that we see worsening daily. On the Windstar ranch, we explored a wide variety of sustainable design initiatives and gathered some of the most influential thinkers of the 20th Century – Bucky Fuller, Jean Michel Cousteau, Amory Lovins. Seeking to expand the range of exploration and share our developing knowledge of sustainable design, we formed an architecture/landscape architecture partnership undertaking a range of work – a winery in Somona, California, a tennis club in Aspen and most importantly, Amory Lovins’ house and first home for the Rocky Mountain Institute. This project has continuously been published since its completion in 1984, was initially labeled as the most energy-efficient building in the world, and served as the inspiration for the Passive House Movement. When Sir Norman Foster visited the building, he noted its importance to architecture and that it should serve in the long-term as a teaching tool to a future generation of architects.
After nine adventure-filled years in Colorado, the desire to explore work in varied locations and, at larger scales, led me to move to New York where I was eventually able to join Kohn Pedersen Fox. My work on the new financial center of Canary Wharf brought me to a year-long stay in London. At KPF my given role was project architect, but my inner drive had always been design which was recognized with opportunities to contribute to significant aspects of The World Bank in Washington D.C. While design thinking had always guided my work – whether technical or managerial – my time in grad school at UCLA allowed me to readjust priorities – and coasts. Upon graduation a number of small, yet interesting projects provided opportunities to further integrate growing design sensibilities with my sustainability roots. After a number of years of developing custom residences and migrant farm-worker and low-income housing, the wish to contribute to a larger architectural world, led to joining the firm, Moore Ruble Yudell where I quickly was engaged on a wide-range of higher education projects.
My twenty-one years at MRY were enormously rewarding. Within a supportive and collaborative environment, I found my voice. By challenging accepted practices and institutionalized thinking, I discovered an ability to seek ground-breaking, precedent-setting project solutions that frequently redefined policies and accepted practices. Major work included a privately developed new town on Grand Cayman in the Caribbean, Camana Bay published as “…a superbly designed and sustainable community” and a “catalyst for change in a region”, master planning a large portion of a new town in Chengdu, China and a research complex for Amgen in Colorado.
My focus at MRY as a principal-in-charge was on both architecture and large-scale planning for the academic community. My first project at UC Santa Barbara created a residential village comprised of seventeen residential houses, an expanded and refurbished dining commons, a study / education facility, and a separate conference / meeting center located on a bluff overlooking the Pacific Ocean. While my work on university campuses included residences, dining facilities, libraries, and instructional spaces, I developed a significant number of projects for scientific teaching and research – including two LEED Platinum laboratories – enjoying both the rigor and creativity required in designing high-performing, humane, and exciting homes for this community. Each new project – such as Duke University’s French Family Science Center, UCSB’s Bioengineering Building, UCLA’s Engineering VI – provided the opportunity to expand the nature of collaborative space within a high-tech realm crafted around flexibility, modularity and adaptability while challenging accepted norms to greatly lower energy use and its carbon-footprint.
China provided the opportunity to again explore new locations and work scales. The development of an award-winning, two-tower academic complex for the Chinese University of Hong Kong, presented a challenging site that required significantly contributing to the campus’ pedestrian realm. The Grand Stair mitigates a six-story elevation change connecting a primary campus entry with its academic core while the complex’s configuration creates a landmark gateway and an acknowledged leading example of sustainable design in Hong Kong.
My largest contribution to the growth of higher education in China has been the development of a new university campus in Shanghai. I led the team in winning the master plan competition for the new ShanghaiTech University and once engaged, was chosen to design approximately ninety percent of the buildings. This included over fifty buildings that define the University – administration, education, library, residential, recreation, professional schools, a hotel / conference center, and science and technology schools. Work on subsequent phases has continued to the present including defining the concept for a new campus museum.
While at Gensler, I continued to develop higher education projects such as the Student Success Center at UC Riverside. I have also been engaged in master planning new university campuses in China winning two competitions and am currently contributing, as a consultant, to the development of two additional schools.
I was elevated to the American Institute of Architect’s College of Fellows in 2019 for my contributions to the communities worked with by challenging the accepted while crafting ground-breaking, precedent-setting sustainable project solutions and sharing these experiences through presentations to national audiences. Collaborating with over twenty different architecture firms in ten states and five countries, I have been rewarded with a career journey that has consistently sought rich and meaningful contributions to our world. And through mentoring of emerging professionals, I have greatly valued discovering the shared passion of architecture – the questioning of the given and the exciting exploration of the possible.
The crisis has affected us all in different ways. How has it affected you and any important lessons or epiphanies you can share with us?
The Covid-19 crisis affected the architecture profession much the same way as others – offices abandoned and work shifted to remote locations, often homes. Remarkably, architectural practices were quickly able to use recently developed on-line sharing platforms for data and meetings – and stay in business. The successful ability of this transformation to working in separate locations also carried an inherent flaw for the design professions. Architecture relies on teams – groups of varying size, roles and levels of experience to develop a project. Traditionally the team will sit in relatively close proximity to allow for easy communication – a causal question, a quick review. This unstructured approach was the grease that allowed projects to move forward efficiently. Covid changed that.
Rather than the simple flow of in-person and timely communication, the stiffness of scheduled meetings was required. Rather than a quick set of sketches exploring an idea together, formal drawings were developed and presented for review. This process is inherently less creative and is particularly hard on young staff who have a lot to learn – it truly set them back in understanding the “why’s” behind a solution. And it is understanding the “why’s” that fosters growth and confidence in addressing new situations.
Unharnessing work from the office created the need to work from home. Some, such as myself, had settings that could maintain a level of professionalism, while others were challenged with the need to work in far less than ideal conditions – poor light, poor ergonomics or surrounded by distractions of home life. And while these challenges were understood, they continued to upset what already was a tenuous boundary between work and life. Although the quantity of staff hours was maintained, varying life schedules of team members extended the duration of the working day through late-night emails and phone calls. Mismatched life patterns lead to inefficient management of time and further challenges to establishing a balance between work and life – which is not good for anyone. As the Covid crisis subsided, and thoughtful analysis of its impact on office life was undertaken, in-office schedules of varying descriptions have been reestablished.
While Covid has disrupted tradition work in office patterns, the rapid development of on-line sharing platforms provided new opportunities in working together. Meetings no longer required to be in person could include a wider range of participants. Expertise, previously confined by location or travel schedules, can now be shared in for more time zones. This has created truly new and exciting opportunities that help bring our world together.
