- FAMILIAR GROUND -

As the team at Robert A. M. Stern Architects tested the program, developed the plan, explored massing and materials, I would render their ever-evolving concepts. Their design direction gradually evolved from one of Gothic stone to that of Georgian red brick, carrying with it the spirit of James Gamble Rogers’ earlier work on the campus.

Using pencil, working in black-and-white, we wanted to reference the wonderful series of drawings that Otto Eggers did for John Russell Pope’s master plan at Yale nearly a hundred years earlier. Pencil is an avuncular medium, approachable, familiar, and could suggest variations in materials without having to determine them specifically, and avoiding questions of coloration, which would be a distraction at that early point in the process. Their size, about 11x17, meant we could do them somewhat quickly, despite the formal hand.

A last round of images ultimately received color added digitally, and the project, the largest ever at Yale, was approved by the trustees unanimously. It opened as the Pauli Murray College and Benjamin Franklin College, Yale University, in 2017