Clark and Menefee

192 Pages·2000·13.715 MB·English

by  Richard Jensen

C L A R K A N D M E N E F E E
For Laura Helen and Lucille Clair
C L A R K A N D M E N E F E E
Richard Jensen
Princeton Architectural Press
New York
This book has been made possible through the generous
support of the Graham Foundation for Advanced Studies
in the Fine Arts.
Additional thanks to Syracuse University School of
Architecture for its generous support and especially
Bruce Abbey for his encouragement, and Kristen
Schaffer and Terrance Goode for their insightful and
invaluable criticism.
Published by
Princeton Architectural Press
37 East 7th Street
New York, New York 10003
212.995.9620
For a free catalog of books call 1.800.722.6657 or visit
www.papress.com
© 2000 Richard Jensen
All rights reserved
Printed in China
04 03 02 01 00 5 4 3 2 1 First Edition
No part of this work may be used or reproduced in any
manner without written permission from the publisher
except in the context of reviews.
Every reasonable attempt has been made to identify
owners of copyright. Errors or omissions will be corrected
in subsequent editions.
Editing: Jan Cigliano
Design: Richard Jensen
Special thanks to: Ann Alter, Eugenia Bell, Jane Garvie,
Caroline Green, Beth Harrison, Clare Jacobson, Mirjana
Javornik, Therese Kelly, Leslie Ann Kent, Mark Lamster,
Sara Moss, Anne Nitschke, Lottchen Shivers, Sara E.
Stemen, and Jennifer Thompson of Princeton
Architectural Press—Kevin Lippert, publisher
Library of Congress Cataloguing-in-Publication Data
Jensen, Richard, 1957–
Clark and Menefee / Richard Jensen—1st ed.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references
ISBN 1-56898-211-9 (alk. paper)
1. Clark and Menefee 2. Architecture, Modern—
20th century—Southern states. 3. Vernacular
architecture—Southern States—influence.
I. Title.
NA737.C48J46 2000
720’.92’2—DC21 99–023643
CIP
CONTENTS
Foreword 6
W.G. Clark.Writings 8
Replacement
Three Places
Lost Colony
Wilfried Wang.Places Transcending Time 18
On the Architecture of Clark and Menefee
Richard Jensen.Deep Landscapes 26
Competitions 34
Middleton Inn 58
Croffead House 90
Cabin 106
Clark House 122
Coker House 138
Reid House 154
Charleston Bus Stop 164
Lucy Daniels Foundation 170
Acknowledgments 186
Projects 188
Bibliography 190
Photographic Credits 192

F O R E W O R D
W.G. Clark and Charles Menefee have managed, despite their success and
professional recognition, relative anonymity. Perhaps this is due to practicing
in the American South, with success measured as regional architecture.
Perhaps it is the pace of their production, with projects appearing too infre-
quently to sustain interest in this age of fifteen-second sound bites. Perhaps
it is the restraint of their work, balanced by an interest in making buildings as
much as in making architecture. Certainly, the issue most significant to Clark
and Menefee—the land—is still somewhat foreign and uncomfortable in archi-
tectural discourse.
The book is not intended to be a substitute for direct experience. But, as
most of the projects are private residences and cannot be visited, the images
and words are as close as we can come to the work. Because of this reality,
the intent of the book is to allow the reader to enter the work supported by
our faculties of imagination. Each project is presented as a visual narrative,
with sequence, discovery, and scale in mind. The images, reciprocating
between detail and view, retain the format of the original photographs,
expressly placing the camera between the work and the reader. Images were
selected and composed to give a thorough understanding to each project.
The book was conceived and composed to complement and elucidate the
ideas and formal strategies of the architects. It is a big little book, not unlike
most of the architects' buildings. Its size, structure, and composition reflect
its construction. In short, I hope to reflect the spirit of the work of the archi-
tects and unfold their architectural ideas through deliberate compositional
strategies, reinforcing a correspondence of form and content.
Clark and Menefee have recently closed their office and are currently pursu-
ing individual practices.
Richard Jensen, August 1999

W R I T I N G S
W.G. Clark
left
Byrd Mill, Louisa, Virginia
10
11
R E P L A C E M E N T
Architecture, whether as a town or a building, is the reconciliation of our-
selves with the natural land. At the necessary juncture of culture and place,
architecture seeks not only the minimal ruin of landscape but something
more difficult: a replacement of what was lost with something that atones for
the loss. In the best architecture this replacement is through an intensifica-
tion of the place, where it emerges no worse for human intervention, where
culture’s shaping of the land to specific use results in a heightening of
beauty and presence. In these places we seem worthy of existence.
We don’t know why we are here on this Earth. We do know from the most
primitive to the most sophisticated among us, that our presence here is prob-
ably harmful, an imposition. This knowledge causes us to want to assuage the
fouling and killing aspects of our existence in order to simply be at some ease
with our occupation. We want to belong rather than only use. Sick at killing
the cow, yet having to eat, we make rules of propriety and economy governing
the slaughter: we must eat the whole cow; we may not kill extra cows; we may
never take pleasure in the kill. In a bare existence, economy is necessary for
survival. But it is also, in any existence, an ethical act that regrets the taking,
imposing itself as a respectful, if insufficient, act of atonement.
In settlement, we are only comforted when we see evidence of the neces-
sity to occupy. We are pleased by a settlement based on cultivation where,
at least to our minds, we offer the economy of cultivation as an assuage-
ment of the inevitable destructive result of habitation. We are also pleased
by deference to the landscape, in the places we refuse to occupy, the
places we save from ourselves. We vacation in those places, where we
have either left the Earth alone or have engaged it in a way that is satisfy-
ing, where there are the fewest needless and senseless acts to represent
our being. In our towns and in our isolated buildings we search for this def-
erence and economy. We want civilization to be a good thing. We want our
habitats and artifacts to become part of the place and to substantiate our
wish to belong. We want our things, like those of the civilizations we
admire, to form an allegiance with the land so strong that our existence is
seen as an act of adoration, not an act of ruin. We are only happy where
this occurs, where we have managed to make something to replace what
we have taken. Always, we must start from that initial, crucial, puzzling
recognition: that we are seeking justification through deference—and failing
that, through economy and respectful use. That is why farms, barns and
silos always seem appropriate and beautiful. That is why we like pig pens