After two exciting and exhausting weeks I would like to introduce the team that created and built this amazing space. We are grateful to Steve Banades, who conducted with his great spirit and knowledge; and to Laura Yeats, who showed us how to use all the power tools; and of course JP for having this great idea to create our own spaces and do it all together, knowing that we all come from different backgrounds. So here we are, this is what we do and where we are from…

Christina Conant – VT (Metal and Mix-media Sculpture)

Ann Crumpacker – OR (Bamboo)

Mo Morales – OR (4D Art)

Leslie Vigeant – MA (Painting and Printmaking)

Jason Starin – MI (Ceramics, Puppetry and Collage)

Richard Fine – IL (Costume Design)

Matt Williams – VA (Wood and Metal)

Laura Allcorn – OH (Metals and Jewelry)

Ali Gradischer – CT (Interior Design)

Selja Ojanne – CA (Ceramics and Collage)

Julie Pointer – CA (Collage and Printmaking)

Evan Holt – OR (Wood-maker)

David Boekelheide – OR (Wood and Metal)

Rachel Cox – CA (Ceramics Sculpture)

Silke Vermehren – Germany (Stop-motion and Motion-graphics)

Our workshop drew to a close on Friday with just a few remaining tasks. We finished cutting and installing the tables for the alcoves and burnished and oiled the center pillars that anchor each wall. All the other wood of our interior structure is oiled, so we decided to be consistent by oiling the pillars; someone said that “now they look like fancy wood.”

Next came the moment of truth: we drew numbers out of a bag to receive our alcove assignments. There were no tears or fights, only a few requests for switches, but in the end we all kept the alcove numbers we drew. Our first act of taking ownership was deciding how to finish our tables, since they needed to be sealed and hardened to be practical work surfaces. Some people used ebonizer (a mixture of vinegar and steel wool) to stain the wood black and followed this with a clear satin topcoat, others finished with a buffing of wax, and others used just the topcoat by itself. I chose to finish my table with just the clear topcoat since I love the look of the walnut.

Finally, we cleaned up the whole warehouse, stacked our leftover building materials against the shop walls, and set up the benches in front of the stage for Saturday night’s open house and music performance. At last, we kicked back with a few cases of beer and toasted to our achievement.

I’m now home picking out my splinters, feeling the fatigue in my muscles, and reflecting on all I’ve learned during these two weeks, not only about the design/build process but also the diverse and talented group I’ll be working with over the next two years. On behalf of my fellow students, I’d like to express my gratitude to Steve and Laura for expertly guiding us during the workshop with good humor, and to JP for his tireless coordination of the program. Thank you. Let’s party!

Everything really came together today, the second-to-last day of our design/build project. We finished installing the long beams of the trellis that Steve had measured and arranged the previous day. We finished cutting, mounting and framing the twinwall plastic on top of the alcove walls (formerly referred to as “stall” walls). The lounge bench was completed with built-in shelves above and drawers below, and all the wood was oiled to a rich color with linseed oil.

The walnut planks were sanded and installed as work surfaces, each one custom cut to fit the unique dimensions of the alcoves. Some of the planks are fitted along the length of the alcove walls and others are mounted against the back wall. We still have a few more to install tomorrow.

Walking on Burnside during our lunch break, a few of us spotted a display table being discarded by a store and, in appreciation of the DIY nature of this program, sent back a team with a dolly to retrieve it. I bet we’ll continue outfitting this place with all sorts of intriguing reclaimed objects and materials.

We ended the day by reviewing our to do list for the last workshop day and participating in Steve’s team spirit applause more enthusiastically than usual, it seemed to me. I think we’re all eager to celebrate the completion of this project and start using our spaces to dig into our personal work.

Work teams developed on Tuesday and Wednesday to tackle specialized projects in our design/build process. One student team traveled to the wood studio at OCAC with a load of beautiful walnut boards donated to our program by Urban Hardwoods in Seattle. This team glued together and sanded the walnut to prepare larger planks that will be used as work surfaces within our alcoves. One stipulation set by the group was that the planks be of various lengths and widths so they can be customized to fit the needs (and unique alcove shape) of each student.

My team used the onsite wood shop to continue our work from the previous day of preparing boards for the trellis structure. Under the direction of Laura Yeats, we transformed the dirty, old, split barn wood into fresh, decent-looking 2×4s. The process was kept “interesting” by a table saw that kept shutting off mid-cut, possibly due to an electrical problem… so we had to (repeatedly) wait until the machine got a certain amount of rest and relaxation before continuing our cut.

Another work team oiled all the stall walls with linseed oil, which brought out warm shades of red and orange in the wood. Later in the day we decided to oil all the trellis boards to match and balance the walls, since most of the other wood in our structure will remain rustic and weathered. Yet another team built frames and attached siding to complete the main entrance to our group of stalls.

On a team of his own was Evan, who is an experienced furniture maker. He launched into building a bench attached to the end of the last stall and angled against the outer curved wall, in the space facing the lounge (an area that will serve double duty as a classroom). The bench has slats like a park bench, which I find charming; I also think it’s the perfect resolution to the end of our structure and I’m sure it will be a well-used social and rest area.

Today we started experimenting with the twinwall polycarbonate (i.e. cool-looking plastic), figuring out how to incorporate it into our structure. Most of our group agreed that we needed to increase the height of our stall walls to create a bit more “privacy” and decrease potential distraction when working there. One work team outfitted a stall wall with a full length of the plastic inside a wood frame; I believe the plan is to continue mounting these windows/wall extensions tomorrow if everyone agrees. The introduction of the plastic definitely changes the character of the stalls from livestock holding area to potential office cubicle… a concept we are not so adverse to after all.

Yes, we labored today, but we eased into the day with homemade apple tart (thanks, Laura) and work was fairly relaxed with our smaller group of students. Our main accomplishment was attaching the large center pillars to the stall walls. The pillars have a solid and rustic elegance that formalize the entry to each stall; also, they are structurally necessary to secure the stall walls.

During a post-lunch meeting, we set our plan for the trellis that will connect the center pillars to each other and further stabilize the entire structure. We started preparing the wood by cutting down smaller lengths and using the jointer and planer to smooth and square the pieces. The day ended a bit early; labor to be continued…

This saying comes from a contractor with whom my father once worked; the observation was well expressed with a Lower Alabama accent. Our group built the main structure of our work alcoves on Thursday and Friday, making at least a visual statement of accomplishment. We constructed the large frame of the outer curved wall and then attached siding by alternating the planed, lighter colored boards with weathered gray boards from the old barn. Next we built the interior walls – those separating each alcove from the next – by attaching them to the studs of the curved wall and the existing warehouse wall.

This work did not all go smoothly, however. We experienced some of the pitfalls of working as a group, e.g. gaps in communication and not being unified in our work methods. A few times we had to stop working and reevaluate some design aspects, such as the pattern of the boards and the height of the siding (we scaled down from 15 to 11 feet at its highest point). We also discovered that the corridor between the rows of alcoves was too narrow at one end, so we pushed out one end of the curved wall by banging it into place with one of the heavy barn beams. The problem now, however, is that we’ll have to realign the walls attached to the curved wall with those attached to the warehouse wall; the first step was making sure the warehouse-attached walls were square by using the Pythagorean theorem (an unexpectedly fun application of geometry).

To bring us all back to the same page, Steve Badanes employed what I’m calling his “jazz hands,” his signature gesture of raising his hands with fingers outstretched and shaking them to get our attention. It’s an effective gesture, as much for getting our attention as for bringing a little levity back to the situation. Even though fatigue and grumpiness were edging their way into our workshop experience (well, I speak for myself, but I sensed that everyone was ready for the weekend), we agreed on a plan for continuing our work on Monday. We finished the week with another of Steve’s signature exercises: slow clapping that escalates to a resounding round of applause. Go team!

At this point, I have to make a note about the aesthetics of the structure we’re building. It seems that the energy of the old barn is so strong that the wood has reshaped itself into something reminiscent of its former life: it appears we are building horse stalls. We started to joke about this and someone cut out a few paper horseshoes to tack into the walls, but I’m aware that not everyone is feeling positive about working inside a horse stall replica. We still have another week to finish and refine our work spaces, so I’m sure we’ll come up with some interesting ideas and solutions.

Day two of the workshop began with considering, rejecting and reconsidering multiple studio designs. We moved away from the table full of sketches and maquettes and started looking at the actual space, then used masking tape and boards to lay the footprint of our favored modular design: 5 groupings comprised of 3 work areas each. Pretty quickly we could see that those spaces were going to be narrow and maze-like to navigate around, and although a maze is an interesting design, it’s not especially practical or comfortable to work in.

Subsequently, we kept moving around the space, into and out of smaller circles of conversation that grew and overlapped until eventually we were in one complete circle of 15 students, and luckily – quite happily, in fact – came to consensus about a design. We even made our own list of pros and cons in the style of Steve’s lists from the previous day, but without him, Laura or JP (they left on some mysterious errand, I can only assume to let us work it out).

So are you ready? We’re making cubicles. But we insist they are NOT boring banker’s office cubicles… they’re art-school cubicles! Someone made the good point that our alcoves will be unique and interesting due to the very nature of the materials we’re using, which are all reused or surplus: fir from a dismantled barn, sheets of clear twinwall polycarbonate, sheets of colored acrylic plastic with a bottle top pattern (a la 1970s), and various pieces of different-shaped steel.

JP’s original concept for our studio spaces consisted of a central “spine” with alcoves on either side, which is your basic cubicle design that most of us thought we hated. We took that spine, pushed it to the outside and introduced a curve to it, so that nine studio spaces will be arranged along this curved wall and another six spaces will be facing them, adjoined to the existing wall of the warehouse. The curve of the outer wall relates to the curves of the Airstream trailer, which I think will be quite elegant; the wall also distinguishes private work space from the public areas of the studio.

When I mentioned that we had to stray far from JP’s original concept to realize it’s value and then return, JP said, “You have to break up before you get married.” Right. Now that we were engaged with our design, some of my fellow students said they were eager to go ahead and start building, even though it was almost 6pm; after that struggle with commitment, however, I was most eager to go home to lie on my sofa and eat ice cream.

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Day three, Wednesday: the building begins! We broke off into separate work groups to tackle various projects. Some students have experience in framing, so they set to work building the bottom plate of the curved outer wall. Several of us moved over to the piles of planks that will be used as siding, to trim off unusable parts and/or square the ends, and then clean the planks with wire brushes (more dirty, sweaty work).

I started using the chop saw for the first time in my life (thank you, Laura Yeats, for the demo and safety lesson) and finally understood the allure of power tools. I have always hated that screechy grinding noise of the saw and the blizzard of sawdust when I’m a bystander to some construction job, but when I am the one guiding the blade and producing the screechy grinding noise and sawdust… well, it’s another thing entirely.

More wood was cut for the studs for the curved outer wall, and then cleanup and setup began for the public lecture by Steve Badanes this evening. After some Solution #1 (snacks, rest and beer), I relaxed right into his lecture and found myself truly inspired by his legacy of design/build work around the country and the world. Although I had seen some of Steve’s work on his Jersey Devil website, it was much more impressive to see his images projected onto the large wall of our warehouse and hear him explain his methods and approach to a wide variety of community, service and environmental projects.

Steve also offered a few pearls of wisdom during his lecture, such as “there’s a time to use your own tools and a time to rent them,” and “get a professional photographer,” and finally, very applicable to our workshop and MFA program, “when you make things you really learn about them.” At the close of this day, I am feeling grateful for this opportunity to make and learn.

Sunday night was our inaugural dinner in the new MFA studio. My first impression upon entering the large warehouse space: incredibly dusty! I arrived in the midst of a sweeping effort to clean up after what has apparently been a hurried construction project this summer to prepare the newly acquired studio for… our next construction project!

After the dust settled, we gathered around the long pine table fashioned from a former bowling alley lane (comfortably sits 18) and dug into some delicious Lebanese food. The dinner was a nice chance for the students to relax and socialize with MFA Chair JP Reuer and design/ build workshop leaders Steve Badanes and Laura Yeats, before embarking on our two-week building project and two-year MFA program.

Monday we arrived at 9am and spent the first 2 hours of our day sorting and inventorying our building materials – mostly wood reclaimed from an old barn outside of Portland. This was dirty, sweaty work… but it was team building! Lifting, moving and stacking 15-foot planks of (dirty, mossy, sometimes crumbling and rusty-nail studded) old barn wood is an exercise in cooperation, so we were ready for our discussion that followed about the advantages and pitfalls of working in a group.

Steve used our feedback to compile a list of “solutions” that enable working well together. Although the list was made in no particular order and included the expected “effective communication,” “respect” and “be open to change”, the number one solution is perhaps noteworthy: “SNACKS, REST, BEER” (Steve added the last item himself).

We spent the rest of the afternoon dividing into various subgroups and rejoining each other to brainstorm and discuss how to use the space allotted for our individual work areas (a.k.a. studio spaces, alcoves, offices), in the context of the larger communal work space, lecture/performance area, kitchen, etc. The most significant decision we made today was to move the beautiful, vintage Airstream trailer – to be used as JP’s office and our computer lab – to the front of the warehouse. This move extends the kitchen area, allows an adjacent lounge, and creates a more intuitive space to establish our individual alcoves… and a better flow of energy in general.

I missed some of the group discussion to attend a course I’m auditing over at OCAC, but when I returned I was impressed to see presentations of my classmates’ ideas, sketches and mockups of alcove designs. When asked to provide feedback to the proposed designs, it seemed the majority of us prefer the idea of smaller groupings of work areas with adjustable/customizable fittings rather than rows of the more standard cubicle-style stations. We left the studio tired and hungry (needing Group Solution #1) but brimming with ideas and excitement! Back to the drawing board tomorrow…