NOBLE WORK
In Conversation: Carol Ross Barney
In April, Jen Masengarb, Assoc. AIA, Executive Director, sat down for a conversation with Carol Ross Barney, FAIA, winner of the 2023 AIA Gold Medal. Barney is the first living woman to win as an individual and only the sixth Chicago architect — the first in 60 years — to win the medal. It is the highest annual achievement awarded by AIA.
—
Jen Masengarb (JM)
Can you explain what this award means for you and for the city?
Carol Ross Barney (CRB)
I am so glad to shine the light back on Chicago. There has been a coast-centric bias, especially for recognition, for a few years. Chicago does important architecture — really essential architectural thinking is done here that’s changing the world. And so I’m really glad that people have to look at us through the lens of the Gold Medal again. When you look at the work being done by Chicago architects, it’s amazing.
And the other thing I’m really happy about is that by awarding our work, the AIA focuses on the importance of public architecture. My studio does the projects that hold cities together and make them more livable. We design infrastructure and some people don’t even think infrastructure is architecture, or see the potential. Our work is at the very edges. And I think public space and utilities are projects that architects have to own.
JM
In your application you talked a lot about that. And RaMona [Westbrook] talked about that in your application video too. That the dignity of design — good design for those everyday moments of life, like transit, as well as good design for small children and everybody in between, right?
CRB
I think traditionally practice hasn’t been very democratic or very equitable. Who has an architect? Museums. Private houses. Attention on public parks and public spaces is important, and I like to see it honored. It’s easy to say, “A park? A train station? This doesn’t need an architect. Architects don’t do this type of work. They only worry about making things pretty.” This completely misses the value of well-designed spaces. I think that by awarding our portfolio — that it says, “Take another look.”
Design is not a noun, right? It’s a verb. We do design. It’s not a thing.
JM
Tell me about that. What part of the design process do you enjoy the most?
CRB
I will, but I want to start out by saying that all parts of the design process are honorable, there’s this perception that the designer with a capital “D” is the most important person in the process. That’s wrong. Architecture is much more of a team sport. I tell my students and young employees to find their joy. The stuff that keeps them from remembering to eat and sleep, that’s what you should be doing in architecture.
Personally, I love the story. I like researching the story. I love assembling the story. That’s my joy.
JM
Assembling the story from the users?
CRB
Yes, from the user. That’s my favorite part. So I’m probably happiest at the very beginning of a project.
Conversely, the other place I absolutely adore working is in the very end of the design development, where you’re making details. I’ve always thought that architecture, in its purest form, is the joining of two materials. That’s it. That’s what we do.
JM
Where does that desire or that drive come from in you, in your education and your influences?
CRB
I think my drive comes from both internal and external influences. I am a Boomer. I became an adult in the 1970s, a time of idealism and activism. I believe I am responsible for making things better and that change was not only good but inevitable. Internally influenced, I enjoy fixing things, and putting them together whether it is appliances or relationships. In fact, my mother used to joke that if anything was broken in the house, she’d give it to me and I would fix it.
I’ve always had this fascination with how things go together — and I don’t know where it came from.
JM
You talked about the joy of assembling the story from the users. Where does that love of that story come from? Or that storytelling? Or the process of reflecting back to what you hear from future users. What is it about that that you enjoy?
CRB
I’m not sure how that happens. I mean, again, I didn’t learn that in architecture school. It’s something that I had before that. Architecture is tough. Architects need to be both empathetic and convincing. I find inspiration in people’s stories. I talk to them by telling stories about designs.
I am the oldest of eight children. So, basically, for me, my life was always about being a leader. It was always about convincing seven other people that they had to go along with me. But I found that the rationale of telling this story and making the case was something that I had to do often in my life.
JM
I think it also, though, speaks to the work in seeing the user as a real person with real needs that you’re designing for. Whether you’re designing for kids, or you’re designing for transit commuters, you’re listening really carefully to their needs, and I think that’s reflective in your work.
CRB
I’ve always thought that the thing that owners make the mistake of is buying architecture as a commodity. Take schools for example. Every architect knows how to design schools. Everybody is basically familiar with that building type and how it works. There may be a rare building type that are really specialties, but I doubt it. It’s living — it’s your life that gives you that information. And then it’s listening. Often a designer’s first attempt at a building type is the best because it is creative and original. Owners that choose architects on the basis of completed projects should look at quality not numbers.
JM
But it’s also the leadership to say, “This is where we’re going to go. Come along.” You convince people — like the seven siblings behind you.
CRB
Sure. I’m still learning, even today, that I don’t tell people what to do. I have to convince them.
JM
When you look back at your body of work, can you point to buildings that were turning points in the firm? Or turning points in your own education, in terms of new ways of thinking?
CRB
Oh, yes. I think one of the first ones is not even in my own practice, but it was when I was working for Holabird & Root. I worked on the renovation of the Central Library into the Cultural Center, and we were so behind on documentation. It was one of those scheduling disasters that hit firms. So we were basically sent to live at the library. It was exhausting.
I complained to John Holabird. And I said “John? This is so dumb. We’re doing emergency duty.” And he told me that I should be happy because I was working on noble architecture. It’s the architecture of purpose. And for the rest of the time I worked for him, we used to joke about that. He said, “Carol, I give you all the noble jobs.” He did and I came to love them.
It was a “eureka” moment, I understood that’s what I wanted to do. I wanted to do work that really enhances people’s lives.
And there are a couple of other moments. One other: I was working on a big corporate office center [the Gould Center in Rolling Meadows].I was making a presentation that I worked really hard on. I presented it to the director of real estate. And he hated it. But at the same time I suddenly realized I could incorporate all the things he wanted and still make a beautiful design. It wasn’t either or.
So, ever since then, I never fall in love with single a design. That was a mistake — to go out with only one design was really a mistake. I realized that for, any problem, there’s thousands of good designs. And I just needed to find two or three that I loved and present them, and then I would be able to find what they loved, too, and put it together. So that was a huge moment.
Early in my career, I was actually criticized. People would say, “Carol doesn’t have a signature.” But, you know, having a signature can get you in trouble. You can only do one thing. So I don’t believe that that is a failing, that there’s not a signature in my work. I rejoice in the diversity of design that my studio has created.
JM
How did your experiences in the Peace Corps shape how you see architecture, design, the world, people today?
CRB
Well, I joined the Peace Corps right out of architecture school. I’m an alumna of the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, and the year I graduated was one of those keep-on-recurring bad economic times. I was walking through the Illini Union, passed a Peace Corps recruiter and picked up an application. I had never considered the Peace Corps before that.
On the application, where it asked where you wanted to go, I wrote anywhere but Latin America. Of course, two weeks later, I got a phone call informing me that if I cared to accept, I was invited to serve in Costa Rica. And I remember thinking, “I think that sounds really Latin!” I didn’t know where it was.
I was assigned to a group that provided assistance to the national parks service for Costa Rica. It has had a huge impact on my career. I was the only architect in the group tasked with creating a series of national parks to protect the native environments of Costa Rica. And so I spent my time in the Peace Corps basically learning about how to repair and support ecologies from cloud forests to coral reefs.
I learned the need to design for environmental balance. Working on those early parks was really a prelude to everything I believe about architecture and sustainability. What we need to do is balance our influence on the planet so that you don’t do damage.
JM
Let’s segue from there into this conversation around sustainability. If you think about the conversations in architecture that the profession was having when you started practicing architecture, coming back after the Peace Corps — the ideas about balancing our impact on the planet, balancing the built environment with the natural environment — how has that conversation changed in your career, especially when you think about conversations with clients?
CRB
Sustainability has always been part of design. Just maybe without a name. Economy of resource is a prime design objective.
I think what’s changed is our understanding of how those resources relate to each other. But architects were probably always ahead of the curve because that’s the design process. Even without talking about sustainability, when you choose a mechanical system for example, you choose it because of its efficiency and its availability. That’s the goal — to find the solution that is the leanest, the most efficient.
But I don’t think that the clients, necessarily, are as informed as we are. I believe I am required to tell my clients, “It’s not ethical for me to do anything less than the most sustainable project”
I think that’s one of the hard decisions that architects have to make. For the first phases of the design, we are therapists, the client is always right. And then after that, we need to give our best professional opinion taking in the needs of society. Sometimes this comes across to the client as, “Well, why aren’t you listening to me anymore? When did our relationship change?” That can be a tricky time in a design relationship.
JM
Will that change come in terms of seeing the short view versus the long view [of sustainability]?
CRB
It’s changing. When you’re the CEO of a corporation, you’re looking at your bottom line. That’s why you’ve been hired. That’s your purpose in life. But it’ll change. I personally tell clients that there’s nothing that they can’t afford because if they don’t do this, there won’t be anything left to do.
JM
Can I tell you one of my favorite buildings that you’ve designed? It’s the Swenson Science Building at the University of Minnesota Duluth.
CRB
It’s one of my favorites, too.
JM
You’ve used the term “didactic” to talk about this building.
CRB
I think that that building is really successful in the serenity that it creates between materiality and function. The complex, technical requirements of the site gave form to the solution too. So, it feels like the pieces just fell into place, it fits. And all the buildings we do have character and personality, and this one is a little bit boisterous. If you’re there on a rainy day, it is noisily playing with water. During the winter, huge stalwart icicles form at the scuppers.
JM
But it’s also a building that teaches. And it’s not the only building that you’ve done that teaches, right? Is that something that has been important to you?
CRB
I think all space should teach. The effect that space has on both our emotions and our intellect is super important. That doesn’t mean that every building should be comfortable, or that every building should be exciting. It means it should be the right amount of comfort or discomfort and the right amount of exciting or not exciting. And hitting that spot is really important.
In architecture for education, safe, expected solutions often overtake ones that foster intellectual curiosity. That’s wrong. Some things can’t be learned in 30-by-30 classrooms with lay-in ceilings. Design should encourage creative learning.
JM
You’ve been teaching for a long time. What is it about teaching that you enjoy that either feeds you or feeds your practice?
CRB
I like the conversation.
JM
Is there a level of architectural education that you enjoy most? Early, middle, or late?
CRB
That’s hard. I’ve spent almost all my career teaching advanced design courses. But I think with the one I have taught at earlier levels, it’s been equally rewarding.
I do it because I like the arguments. I like the discussions. In any office, there’s a certain amount of time where you’re doing the hard work of documenting a design. Teaching allows me to participate in many critiques each day. I love arguing — constructive argument- about design. I want my students to love their work but not to fall in love with a single solution. I like to challenge them. I like to talk about what could be next.
JM
Has the way that you taught changed over your career?
CRB
I hope I’ve gotten better at it. I think I have.
JM
The Metropolis article makes a comparison between you and Daniel Burnham, referencing your work on the Chicago Riverwalk. I find that fascinating because Burnham’s practice is so top-down. And your practice and career has been so bottom-up. What do you think about that?
CRB
The architecture of the Riverwalk is more inclusive than the architecture of Burnham.
That being said, I think it’s less about me and Daniel than it is about the influence architects have planning our city.
I mean, architects had a more important seat at the table then. Compare the people who were on the Civic Committee then, to the people who were influential during the design of Millennium Park. Leadership changes from people who had diverse civic roles to the people who have a lot of money.
I don’t have the power that Daniel Burnham had, and quite honestly, I don’t know that there’s any member of our chapter as influential as Burnham was in his day.
JM
But what struck me is that the process and the mentality is so different, right?
CRB
Oh, yes. I think you characterized the differences well. Although, I still love to look at the bones of the Chicago Plan of 1909. Most people remember the wonderful Guerin renderings of an amazing future city. That wasn’t the essence of the plan. It’s terribly practical. Burnham’s plan is about transportation, about railroads. He talks about all the hard stuff.
JM
And his research fascinates me also. It’s very practical.
CRB
I think that that part of architecture history is so often lost. We renovated Carl Schurz High School years ago, and we got great kudos for it because we did research on the masonry and we found out that [Dwight H.] Perkins had used a raked joint giving the school a prairie school horizontality. But it had been poorly tuck-pointed drastically changing the appearance. Soot from coal fires had made the building black. Cleaning restored the brilliant orange and purple façade.
We also discovered strategies that where not about the appearance of the building. For example, the cafeteria used to be on the top floor because it was above the smog and smoke of Chicago. Eventually, they moved it downstairs, since its way easier to deliver food on the ground floor. The stairwells were unattractive and dark after being remodeled for fire codes. Originally ventilated the school provided daylight. I think this shows innovative thinking about the environment then — that gave form to the school. Some understanding of the design process had been lost. Architects don’t begin with an idea about how a project will look. They begin with an idea about how a building has to work
JM
I think that is one of the biggest hurdles that architects have to help the public with. Because the public’s first lens is aesthetics. “I like the building, I don’t like the building.” “It’s beautiful, it’s ugly.” Right? They’re seeing just the aesthetics of it. That’s their first lens through the building. And of course, as architects, we’re thinking about all the decisions first that go into a building, and the aesthetics are the end result of that. How do we as a profession also help the public see that?
CRB
We help by engaged community design. A big problem we’re wrestling with in Chicago right now is diversity and equity. Without engagement and education, architectural styles can represent economic achievement or classes. We need to help people think more creatively and aggressively about what space can do for them.
Take for example, the much maligned and now demolished midcentury public housing built in Chicago like Stateway Gardens or Cabrini Green. Those were very noble and progressive in many ways. Free up the ground plane, live in a park. Live above the noise and pollution of the city. But they were funny houses. They didn’t look like the next step up for people who were living in them. And I think that style is also equated with that sort of achievement. And I think that the reason that happens is because there is so much disparity between classes.
We say we’re a classless society. But if you go down to Auburn Gresham, where we’re working now, that’s just not true. There’s a huge disparity of investment and amenity between Chicago’s neighborhoods and I think we have to wash that out. It doesn’t mean that we won’t be a capitalist society, but we have to wash out the disparity so there’s no super rich and super poor. We need to create a rich and diverse middle.
JM
How would you characterize your firm today? What are you most proud of? What do you see here? Tell me about your colleagues. Tell me about the work today.
CRB
I’m most proud of the work that we’ve done, but I’m most hopeful about the work we’re going to do. We don’t have a traditional building type specialty. Most often we are hired to ask questions and find new potential. That’s exciting.
I’m also really proud of our diversity. We’re not very conventional. We are a third or half ethnic minorities, and half of our professional registered staff are women. But I don’t give us a free pass. You have to keep doing good stuff.
JM
Anything else I’ve missed?
CRB
I would like to talk a little bit about women in architecture. I just got back from a symposium on women’s practices. The convener was professor of architecture at EPFL [École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne] in Switzerland, whose research is about the differences creativity focused practices vs efficiency or business focused practices. His research shows that a non-proportionally large percentage of creative practices are owned by women. Why is that? Do women practice differently?
The women who won the gold medal before me were both in partnership with their spouses. How do women practice? How should they practice to be most successful?
JM
Or a woman leading your own practice is even rare.
CRB
The Gold gives me the opportunity to talk about empowering women architects. Essentially, women architects lack opportunity. It’s a vicious circle, because opportunity comes from portfolio and portfolio comes from opportunity. Commissioning women architects is still considered risky and novel. Until that changes, women will not have equal opportunity. I hope that my winning the gold will make some change. Women led successful practices in their own right.
JM
Congratulations again. We look forward to celebrating with you in San Francisco.
CRB
Thank you.