Table Of ContentCharlie Hailey
Princeton Architectural Press
New York
Contents SPEAK OF THE 7 Handbook
DEVIL 8 Origins
11 Architecture 101
12 Lab
15 Roughing It
17 Ethos: Reactive Practice
21 Why Design/Build?
GROUNDWORK 22 Curriculum
28 Scope
31 Budget
35 Enrollment
36 Preplanning
43 Tools
TOOLBOX 45 Hands-on
50 Materials
53 CNC
55 Feedback
57 Mock-up
63 Fit
65 Consensus
68 Fun
70 Tricks
76 Aphorism
78 Pitfalls
79 Safety
81 Shop
84 Jobsite
87 Start to Finish
PROCESS 88 Instructors
89 Day One
96 Week One
99 Group
102 Typical Day
104 Schedule
111 Finishing
LESSONS 115 Experience
116 Skill
117 Self-Reliance
117 Resilience
119 Tolerance
119 Implications
121 Politics
121 Community
122 Good Life
122 Reflective Building
CASES Jim Adamson
125 Rural Kitchen
Siem Reap, Cambodia, 2010
with MIT students
Steve Badanes
137 Urban Farm Supershed
Center for Urban Horticulture, 2012
University of Washington’s Neighborhood Design/
Build Studio
John Ringel
147 Home Design/Build Outbuildings
with Yestermorrow Design/Build School,
1990–2015
154 Project Index
162 Additional Project Credits
164 Further Reading
165 Image Credits
166 Acknowledgments
SPEAK OF THE
DEVIL
HANDBOOK
Speak of the devil, and there it is. Talking can summon the object of discus-
sion, and nowhere is this truer than in the studio and on the construction site.
When designing, we talk about the methods a builder might use to construct
a tricky corner joint. We imagine how it will come together by feeling the
weight of the wood and reading its grain, and then we draw the notch as if
we were the ones cutting it. When building, we lay out footings as a prevailing
breeze reminds us of the design’s orientation, conjuring up the designer’s
many drafts of the site plan.
Design and construction haunt each other, and never have I been more
attuned to these connections than in my conversations with the members of
Jersey Devil. Jim Adamson, Steve Badanes, and John Ringel remind us that
intertwining design and build is not just relevant but also essential. Fig. 01
The moment we breathe intentions into design, we are building. And while
we build, design is there at our elbow.
Fig. 01 Jersey Devil is Steve
Badanes (left), Jim Adamson
(middle), and John Ringel (right).
This photograph was taken in
a vintage prairie schooner at
their camp known as the “Secret
Location” near Yestermorrow
Design/Build School, where
they teach summer design/build
courses.
This book discusses how teaching design/build operates. It calls upon
the expertise of Jersey Devil to unpack the devilish premise that design and
construction are not distinct. As a primer and a handbook for teaching, it lays
out pedagogical tools, processes, and outcomes with reference to Jersey
Devil’s work. As an Architecture Brief, this book combines the didactic imme-
diacy of an architect’s and a builder’s pocket companion with the insights and
problem-solving voices of the studio.
7 Speak of the Devil
Handbooks should be handy. My hope is that readers, as makers, will take
this book and use it as a kind of tool on site and in their studios and shops.
To be handy does not just mean that you use your hands, although that is the
starting point; it also means that you are clever in your use of those hands.
Being handy combines manual and creative work, and this hyphenation in “han-
di-work” binds skill with innovative action: you are able and you are ready to do
something. Likewise, this book is ready and near at hand, matching utility with
insights highlighted by Jersey Devil’s experiences. Its organization and topics
provide a toolkit for practicing and teaching design/build, while stories, didac-
tic commentary, and sample exercises complement the nuts-and-bolts content.
In this first chapter, Jersey Devil’s origins and ethos serve as a lens to
introduce the design/build experience. The next chapter, “Groundwork,” is
a comprehensive look at the objectives, curriculum, and logistics of design/
build: What is the ideal scope for a project? Where can we find funding? What
goes into a project’s preplanning? “Toolbox” then unpacks the tools, tactics,
and circumstances of design/build studios. Its range includes physical and
conceptual tools as well as their application. “Process” moves step-by-step
through the design/build adventure, from meetings in studio to breaking
ground to completing construction: What happens on day one? How do the
weeks of design and construction then unfold? How do you maintain group
consensus throughout?
An important thread of this handbook traces educational reform and
its connection to public interest, activism, and responsibility. What does
design/build pedagogy teach? How does it work? How does the process of
designing and building transform its context, connect with local communities
and broader society, and inform a political approach? What happens when
alternate models of education—and practice—can no longer be alternatives
but become essential to sustaining environments? These questions lead to
the next chapter, “Lessons,” which presents the outcomes of designing and
building—what can be learned from its process and how design/build works
in its broader social context. Three in-depth case studies, a project index,
and a reading list serve as additional reference tools.
ORIGINS
There are now more than one hundred design/build programs in schools
across North America, and still many more across the world. Studios that
combine designing and building have, by some estimates, increased three-
fold over the past two decades and now influence architecture and design
curriculum more than ever before. However, in the late 1960s, much of design
education remained focused solely on design. While enrolled at Princeton
University—Steve and John as graduate students and Jim as an undergrad-
uate—the collective that would eventually form Jersey Devil had to find cul-
tures of construction outside of the institution.
8 Design/Build with Jersey Devil
Steve and John first collaborated in 1969. They designed and built play
structures and inflatable constructions under the fanciful, politically charged
monikers Suburban Renewal, Cloud Builders, and Midnight Construction
Company. Fig. 02 Three years later their Snail House project spawned the
Jersey Devil name. Fig. 03 The story has often been told and is now legend:
shocked by seeing its spiraling plan, stacked manhole risers, curved rafters,
bubble window, and (perhaps most radically) designers actually carrying out
their project’s construction, local residents could only believe that the devil of
South Jersey folklore was at work. Jim later joined the group in 1975 to help
build the Silo House. Fig. 04 Jersey Devil then continued to design and build
projects across North America (from New Hampshire to Baja), at a range
of scales (from bookcases to houses and public structures) and for diverse
clients (from steamfitters to surgeons). Figs. 05–06 Fig. 02 Poster for Midnight
Currently working in their fifth decade, the group’s collaborators con- Construction, March 1972.
tinue to make things, though now mostly with students. Steve teaches at the
University of Washington, Jim has taught at MIT and Miami University and cur-
rently teaches at the University of Miami, and John teaches at Yestermorrow
Design/Build School, where Jim and Steve also run a summer course. Fig. 07
Project locations have included their institutions’ respective headquarters
in Seattle, South Florida, and Vermont, as well as international studios in
Cambodia, Costa Rica, Cuba, El Salvador, Finland, Ghana, India, Mexico,
and Taiwan. Their projects with students are diverse, open to the community,
highly accessible to the general public, and of a manageable scale. Jersey Devil says:
Interviewed by Michael Crosbie in 1984, Steve said he hoped to see
more students building what they design. There were few design/build pro-
grams at the time, and many hands-on projects originated from community Not agents of
design centers. Yale’s Building Workshop continued, focusing at the time on the dark prince,
pavilion projects, Yestermorrow was newly established in 1980, and Auburn but rather those
University’s Rural Studio was still almost a decade away. The 1980s marked lucky—perhaps
Jersey Devil’s transition into not only practicing design/build but also teach- handsome—devils,
ing it, and Sambo Mockbee would later credit its members as inspiration for having a devil of a
Rural Studio. good time, seeking
They saw the potential to convey what they were doing and what they the devil in the
were learning to the next generation of designers who might also become mak- details, avoiding
ers. Their practice already included pedagogy: each project was a “make tank” idle hands as we
where everyone—artists, tradespeople, students, and clients—participated in work like the
the learning process that each jobsite provided. Steve hoped that students, as devil, sometimes
designers and builders, might not only be helping transform modes of prac- in a devil-may-
tice but also “be having a lot more fun.” According to the legend, the group’s care fashion,
eponymous demon brought playful mischief to its New Jersey surroundings, advocating for
and Jersey Devil’s members now teach how actually building what you design design/build.” [John]
can shake things up. After the group’s years of globally influential work, their
focus on design/build education has brought Jersey Devil full circle.
9 Speak of the Devil
