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Perhaps the art of architecture is as much the business
of problem-solving.
Well, the definition of design is problem solving.
If you are creatively creating problems, then you’re going
to have to creatively solve them. If you go into a design
without enough technical proficiency, you’re just into
graphics. A lot of people are. They have a lot of trouble
about how to make it and it becomes the builder’s
problem. We’ve got to be responsible for the sensible
and practical use of our designs. If you’ve got to live with
the results it better be something you have affinity for.
You won’t really like it unless you agree with it. So we’ve
got to find that point of agreement. With our clients
we get permission right from the start to stretch them.
We design houses for people. They’re not our houses.
We are a service business and we like to think that we
are creative and bring a lot to the table. But at the end of
the day it’s their money, their lifestyle, our responsibility.
What was your design starting point?
I wanted wow appeal from the street all the way through
to the back. I didn’t want the back of the house to be
second-rate to the front. If you look at that home, you
could have put the front of or the back of the house
facing the street. It had to be that 360 degrees
experience. That was a driving thought to this creative
urge I had and, I think, they had, too. And the kids started
to get involved. The kids were growing up. The kids had
thoughts. They had imagination and it was to give the
kids an experience, too, of how it could be. And I’d like
to think we achieved that.
“Dressed up and ready to go,
[Catt’s] design of soaring
volumes, tuned materiality
and clever connections
produces a home of impact
and light-filled delicacy.”
VISION