Baker seeks to fulfill his clients’ wish lists
sits in total shade.
Baker, a Nebraska native who came to Houston to earn a master’s degree at Rice University’s architecture school, took time recently to talk about his book, interesting clients and his love for Hermann Park.
Q: We’re in the Criners’ library, devoted to both music and books, which is a very private space to them. Tell me about this room.
A: The Criners have friends who have a similar library, a room that is meant to feel very separate. They said they wanted a room like that. This one shows their love of music and books … the photos of people who played at Rockefellers … B.B. King, Muddy Waters, Ray Charles, Ella Fitzgerald, Roy Orbison, James Brown. They started the original Rockefellers years ago in the Washington Avenue corridor.
Q: So what made you want to write this book, and why now?
A: I had been thinking and talking about a book for 10 years. I didn’t want it to be about me or my office’s work; I had other things I was curious about. I decided to call it “Making Things” because I grew up making things with my family. It’s delightful to tell stories about how you collaborate with people who give you a problem to solve, but also, it’s fun to work on things where you get an idea, a light bulb goes off in your head and you think this is worth doing. Sometimes that’s the light spikes, but it’s also Hermann Park or a doghouse.
Q: The green space or gardens at every home in the book seem important. Do your clients ask for that or is it your influence on them?
A: The wish list is from the homeowner, but the solution is from me. Part of this whole sequence of space (at the Criners’) is to be as transparent as possible. As you move through the house down the line, you get the compression of a vestibule, then a room and garden, and another compression, room, garden. As you walk along, it’s a sequence of spaces, and they all are connected to a garden.
Q: Your clients have had unusual wish lists: One family wanted their weekend place to feel like a motel, another wanted it to be as comfortable for two as it is for 200, the Criners wanted a home that looked like it had been there for a while. Do challenges like these make an architect’s job even more interesting?
A: I encourage people to include everything on their wish list, from the ridiculous to the sublime. The crazy stuff usually falls away and you boil it down to the essence of what they want. If you saw the corrugated metal house in Shelby, Texas, and the Neely house on North Boulevard, you wouldn’t think they’re in the same book. I call myself a translator. I narrow the infinite to the particular and weave their wish list into a composition where site and house feel hand-in-glove. Scale and proportion are everything.
Q: You’ve also designed artwork, the Light Spikes that were created for the 1990 G7 Summit. How did that come about?
A: I was director of architecture for Llewelyn Davies Sahni then. It was meant as a sculptural welcome. It was for the front of the George R. Brown Convention Center, and I had $40,000 to work with. They looked like flags wrapped around metal structures or columns and they were lighted. They’re still around; they’re at Bush Intercontinental Airport.
Q: The end of your book focuses on your affiliation with Hermann Park, about your role in making it better. Tell me about that.
A: I’ve been very involved in Hermann Park since 1992. I have never been paid for my hours of work; I suppose there’s more than one form of compensation.
I got involved when I was about to become the new head of the Rice Design Alliance, and I met with O. Jack Mitchell, who was head of Rice’s architecture school, to ask him what he thought I ought to accomplish. He looked at me and said, “Fix Hermann Park.” It was a scary place then. And two weeks later, he died; he was 60 years old. I felt like I had been given this enormous charge. Destiny stuck its big hairy toe in the door.
We had a design competition — not just for pretty drawings, but the winner gets to do the job. We had 117 entries from 26 (firms), and the competition was a huge success, in that it lead to a renewed interest in the park. The dominoes began to fall from there. We’ve raised $140 million and, believe it or not, we’re in Phase 2. Now, we’re working on the edges of the park. If you drive the four sides of the park, you’re not altogether sure it’s an inviting green space.