Word: mcdonoughs
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...special power of the structure is its palpable connection to the people who work there. On the day that McDonough and I visit, 600 employees go about their tasks, yet the building feels empty. The windows bring people to the sky. "When it's a nice day," says McDonough, "why feel as if you've missed it?" Stand in practically any spot, and one can see the greenery of the outside trees, the grassy lower roof or the grasses growing in one of the two interior courtyards. Light is everywhere. It fills the vast open hallways that seem to stretch...
...walking college lecture--he is also dean of the University of Virginia school of architecture--McDonough is a compendium of similar maxims, phrases and rules: "Honor commerce as the engine of change"; "respect diversity"; "build for abundance"; "eco-efficiency should be replaced by eco-effectiveness"; "design is the first signal of human intention"; "all sustainability, like politics, is local"; "I want to do architecture that is timeless and mindful...
...truth is that McDonough isn't an architect at all, or is only occasionally an architect. In collaboration with his friend German chemist Michael Braungart, he has begun or completed designs for nontoxic shower gels, fabrics that do not contain mutagens or carcinogens, dolls made without PVCs, biodegradable yogurt cartons, and a recyclable Nike sneaker made with soles that, when they disintegrate, will serve as nutrients for the soil. Among the larger projects, besides the Gap building, are the Nike European Headquarters, an environmental-studies center at Oberlin College that will produce more energy than it consumes, the Monsanto Child...
...caution here is one that applies to utopian visions generally: perfect is always imperfect, as it must be, and imperfect--a world of disappointments and surprises--is as good as it gets. It is hard to know whether McDonough recognizes this. He is in the first blush of success, where he wants everything to be right and believes it is possible. He asks, "Why should it ever be necessary to tear the Gap complex down?" and thinks that the question is rhetorical...
...talking, a man and a woman appear and stop to talk shop loudly no more than 3 ft. from where we are sitting. Though it has to be clear that McDonough and I are in quiet conversation, they bray at each other for several minutes as if we do not exist. To me their behavior is simply a moment of normal human rudeness, though it is a little jarring in a building that is supposed to foster collegial bliss. I suggest to McDonough that civility is something that cannot be designed, and he starts to agree. Then he stops, grows...