Walden Revisited

Walden became our title for the project for an obvious reason, it is the name of the street where the project is located. But our real reason for latching on to the name was the history and mood evoked by Thoreau’s cabin at Walden Pond. At the time, the association was one of a remote natural place, which seemed to fit the countryside setting of our project site. Knowing more today about proximity of Thoreau’s cabin to civilization, the name is perhaps even more fitting since the socio-economic ripples of the Bay Area are lapping over this once remote agricultural setting.

An early question with the design was how the building would interface with the vineyards that would eventually fill the site. Since the building would sit elevated on a plinth above the surrounding land, I began to imagine outdoor spaces reaching out like piers into a sea of vineyards. Although the vines were not yet there, the intention was that standing on these landscaped piers would feel like being immersed within the vineyards, rather than just looking out at them. In practice the pier concept became more than metaphor: on occasion, the Russian River has flooded up to the plinth’s base.

It was not top of mind at the time to pursue green building benchmarks or carbon footprint reduction. But we already had a serious passion for advanced building systems and experimentation in better ways of building. The geothermal system (ground-source heating and cooling) was novel at the time and, with the consent of a brave and trusting client, was successfully incorporated as an energy-saving feature of project. The 50 vertical bores for geothermal heat exchange sit below the gravel parking area, invisible in the finished project. Yet when I think about the project, I see them extending underground as much as I see the building rising above.

Looking back, this building was the first in a series of major transformations of existing buildings done by our practice. Common terms like adaptive reuse or renovation don’t capture the intentions or magnitude of these projects. These existing building projects have been as transformational as many of our new building projects. Certainly, there is a strong sustainability argument for working with existing building stock. Equally important is how layers of history, occupancy, and architectural intervention make these places rich in character and memory.