The Deep Dive: A Multitasking Homage

As any issue of Dwell proves, the choice of material or joinery method can transform a good project into a design for the ages. The Deep Dive is a forum where design and building pros can obsess over those details. Here we ask expert colleagues to share the inspiration behind house elements that delight clients—as well as the nitty-gritty information about how they were built.

In 1957, J. Irwin Miller, chairman of the engine manufacturer Cummins Corporation, offered to pay the design fees for the public buildings of his hometown of Columbus, Indiana, if the city hired from his list of preferred architects. What followed is a series of masterwork commissions by the likes of Eero Saarinen and I.M. Pei that, individually and together, inspire policy and culture to this day. 

The magazine’s November/December cover story "A True Starter Home in Columbus, Indiana, Nods to Nearby Buildings by 20th-Century Masters" goads Columbus to take its collective achievement even farther, by asking why the citywide embrace of progressive modernist architecture never reached the living rooms of residents themselves. As author Jaelani Turner-Williams quoted of Grant Gibson, "the residential building stock is typical of small American towns, a mixture of Victorian houses and workers’ cottages."

Gibson is a Chicago-based architect and educator who "grew up in northernIndiana on a farm, where the idea of architecture seemed quite foreign except for this little town in southern Indiana called Columbus." When Columbus resident Nick Slabaugh tapped Gibson to conceive a house for an alley lot that could be afforded by a median income–making American, the architect recalls, "We wanted to find a way to show that, even in a modest project, thoughtful design is accessible to people anywhere and everywhere."

For all the project’s potential national import, Gibson also knew that his scheme would need some Columbus-isms. "Even though it’s a really small, humble house, the building has to acknowledge its history if it wants to be seen as part of this larger project of Columbus." In turn, he created homages to the local architectural fabric that also kept down the costs of construction and operation.

A learned glimpse of Columbus House No. 1 reveals that intersection of goals. Take the house’s ground floor, which is sunken three feet below grade and sports a recessed window on the south elevation. These are clearly nods to the Pei-designed public library and that building’s relationship to nearby 5th Street. But as Gibson also explains, "If you look at your average building, you spend a lot of money on the enclosure of the building. And since we had to dig below the frostline anyway, then setting the whole building in the ground reduces the amount of exterior envelope you have to build."

The subterranean space was built like almost any other foundation, with rigidinsulation surrounding poured-concrete slab and walls and a layer of spray-foam insulation on their inbound faces. Extra insulation beneath the slab acknowledges the stockinged feet of occupants, but it does not incorporate expensive radiant heating. Columbus House No. 1’s external image is improbably short as a result of its Pei references—"I like the contrast between expectation and use," Gibson says of the garden shed–like profile. The height also ensures the visibility of the house’s domed skylight.

In another example of making a nod to the past do heavy lifting, this important source of daylight evokes downtown’s Irwin Union Bank, which Saarinen completed in 1954 with a flat roof that periodically bulges upward to accommodate interior lighting.

In estimating costs for Columbus House No. 1, "We knew we couldn’t build any curves," Gibson says, "So, the thought from the very beginning was to place a perfect kind of oculus in the ceiling to prevent the space from feeling bureaucratically chopped up." Gibson sourced the largest off-the-shelf clear polypropylene dome for the skylight, and he designed a rooftop curb to which the product could be attached. Pandemic-related delays required contractors to tarp over its accompanying aperture and, when the product finally did show up, only the outermost of the dome’s two skins was clear.

Not wanting to wait any longer and knowing that the frosted inner layer couldproduce a more even light on uniformly painted interior surfaces, Gibson suggested that Slabaugh accept the delivery, and the dome was mechanically fastened and sealed into place. "What we didn’t predict is that light refractions between the dome’s layers intensifies the coloration of the sky, especially at dawn and dusk," the architect notes delightedly of the centerpiece. Like Miller’s project for Columbus overall, Columbus House No. 1’s significance is being revealed over time. 

We welcome your thoughts and illustrative projects. Reach out to pro@dwell.com.