Starting to Look at the Landscape /  by Michael Cobb

The exterior shades and the galvanized stair are in place on the Diaz Farm Family Unit.  This will be the first Agriboard building in California. Landscape architect Michael Lucas has started designing the area surrounding the building.  He and Manny Diaz walked the project on Tuesday.  Michael has designed other areas around the property and it will be great to have things tie together.

Maidman Residence Panel Installation Complete /  by Michael Cobb



After a couple days of structural preparation, the roof panels went on in one hour and twenty minutes.  Thanks for the accurate panel package Agriboard.  We will be uploading a movie of the roof panel installation soon.  Chapman construction has a great technique for making short work of this.

We tried to come as close to the existing tree canopies as possible while still allowing enough roof-top sun exposure for a future rooftop BIPV (building integrated photovoltaic) system.  Arborist John Meserve was a big help managing the canopy and root health.  Insofar as it is possible, it would be great to have this residence remain somewhat nestled in the trees that surround this clearing.

Placing the Last Maidman Residence Wall Panel /  by Michael Cobb



The last wall panel was put in place on the Maidman residence yesterday.  After placing the continuous top plate and installing a wedge pieces above this, the roof panels will be put in place.   If you would like to watch this video in full screen click on the YouTube link in the lower right hand corner of the video and you should be taken to youtube where you have full YouTube functionality.

Wrestling with Rain and Panels /  by Michael Cobb

Chapman Construction has been contending with a wet fall in getting the Agriboard panels up on the Maidman Residence.  This shot was taken a couple days ago.  The second floor roof should be on as soon as the weather breaks.   Weather forecast:  Rain for the next nine days.  Good luck out there guys!

Diaz Barn Refurbishing /  by Michael Cobb

The Diaz Barn isn't quite complete but these two photos give a sense of the change.  The new painted corrugated siding is the same profile as the adjacent Agriboard structure.  The existing eaves were in marginal condition and cutting them back eliminated the expense of repairing in kind and allowed us to share the eave treatment utilized on the main body of the Agriboard Residence.  New Sierra Pacific windows and doors were also installed on both structures.

Siding and Railing getting put in place /  by Michael Cobb

The tower stair railing is getting craned on at the Diaz Residence.  We are still waiting to go out to the galvanizers.  The siding is almost complete as well.  For waterproofing reasons the siding can't be finalized until after the beams and stair come back from the galvanizers.

Dry Fitting the Diaz Tower Stair /  by Michael Cobb

The stair treads have arrived from the midwest so the tower stair at the Diaz Farm Family Unit can be drive fit at long last.  After this dryfitting, the stair will be disassembled and hot dip galvanized (a procedure that should take two weeks).  The smaller members one sees in this shot are simply tack welded struts required for the initial assembly.

Panel Installation Starts on Maidman Residence /  by Michael Cobb




All the panels for the first floor of the Maidman Residence went in last week.  On Friday, the panels were craned into place at a rate of about one every half hour.  The electrical conduits and threaded anchor rods were installed before the panels were craned into place (see additional images below).


After panel placement, the crew of Chapman Construction connected the threaded rods to the foundation anchors with couplers.  This connection was accomplished through access ports in the panel that came preinstalled from the Agriboard plant.  This was an improvement from our last installation. A big thank you to Stan Chapman and Agriboard for a set of panels that have gone in with few issues thus far!

Installation of Conduit and Threaded Rod Before Craning


Craning Panel Into Place

Attaching Coupler Through Panel Port



The Maidman Residence Breaks Ground /  by Michael Cobb

Chapman Construction has been busy over the last month getting the foundation and earthwork of the Maidman Residence prepped for the Agriboard panels.  The panels are here and the foundation work is moving ahead steadily.  Tomorrow the central stairwell will be cast in concrete.  This central stair wraps around a wood stove on the first floor and will be a prominent feature in the residence when it is complete.  This project will be the second agriboard building in California after the execution of the Diaz Farm Family Unit in Cloverdale.

Installation of the Tower Roof /  by Michael Cobb


Shook and Waller has installed the roof and Kauth bros. will be installing the stairs in the coming weeks.  The stair will be dry fitted and taken down for galvanizing before the final installation.

Framing The Lookout /  by Michael Cobb

The steel beams that support the exterior stair were installed this week by Kauth Brothers.  This offered the first views from the tower elevation.  Looking forward to seeing the stairs and the wall go up.

Agriboard Install Complete /  by Michael Cobb



The last Agriboard panels went up today.  Fitting these panels into the trapezoidal tower frame was the trickiest part of the Agriboard installation.  Since all the panels are installed in "keyways," the panels couldn't go in as a single panel and instead were put in as a group of three per face (see below).  The next step will be two-fold:  Installation of the lookout and the access stair.


Installation of the Steel /  by Michael Cobb

Kauth Brothers (Steel Fabricators) and Shook and Waller (Carpenters) are installing the tower.  The main tower supports are steel.  The floor systems are predominantly wood.  The exterior stairway that will eventually wrap around the outside of the tower will be steel again for waterproofing reasons.  This combination of building systems requires the two subs work closely together.

Addressing Openings /  by Michael Cobb

The windows are going in for the main body of the Agriboard Structure while the shop drawings for the tower are put in order.  This image shows the deep visor for the west facing view of the Vineyard.  Over the tripartite folding door there will be a large exterior retractable shade as an additional protection against low afternoon sun.

California and Architecture /  by Michael Cobb

There are aspects of our far western life that seem at odds with the conventional understanding of architecture. If ever there was a profession that valued permanence, certainly architecture would fit this bill. Most people agree it is the good architect that can design a building to last.  On top of this there is the ongoing green movement with its emphasis on sustainability.  Sustainability would appear to be accomplished by manifesting permanence.  Something that doesn't require maintenance ought to incline toward sustainability.

But on a recent walk out near the back of Lake Sonoma I found something that struck me very differently.  I ran across old Skagg's Spring road.  This is the road that use to take people out to the coast before the dam was built.  The road simply disappears into the lake now and half submerged trees still stand ghostlike in the water from a time before the lake's construction.  I was struck again by a California truism:  It is hard to love the identity of California and the larger far west without making your peace with its impermanence. This idea is something wholly apart from specific architectural concerns and it can be hard to convince clients and architects alike that impermanence happens here the same way earthquakes do.  It is neither a virtue or a vice. It simply exists.

Because of this abiding California characteristic, building well crafted objects with less embodied energy is frequently the more responsible thing do for the environment. The early Californian poet, Robinson Jeffers, captured the beauty of this idea with his poem Apology for Bad Dreams when he wrote about a "cabin under spared trees."

The vast majority of California institutions have been transient. Our legacy of ghost towns, gold rushes, tech sector bubbles and earthquakes all conspire to paint a legacy of flux that implies a strategy of flexibility and improvisation for the people that, unlike their institutions, wish to abide here in the far west.

Isn't a plausible approach to development in California to build well crafted "tents" that represent a modicum of embodied energy and require the kind of preventative maintenance one associates with ships and gardens alike?  In this way we'd expend energy equal to the vitality of the inhabitation and energy would not be squandered on groundless notions of permanence. 

The fact that any "lifestyle" we currently enjoy in California might be slated for impermanence or more relevantly the duration our own life, should only focus our attention more on the things that we - as the serenity prayer says - "can change".  The time has come that we make a distinction between building well and building things to last. The former should be closer to our mark. For all the disparaging remarks the design community makes about the irresponsibility of flimsy structures we should keep in mind that in the west, one can equally make a case for the waste associated with buildings with allusions of permanence and grandeur.  The goal should be to shelter and nurture the people directly within sight of the project.

In the west there has been an enduring cocktail of hubris and decay.  Anyone who has witnessed California development for any duration knows that permanence and immortality are not only illusory, but also an unworthy aspiration.  Like anything heroic, you can not pursue it.  It is something that is encountered on the way to more pedestrian and more humanitarian goals.  If anything, this is precisely what defines our environmental crisis; the simple and consistent disregard for community resources while pursuing spectacular undertakings that promise a selective and isolated improvement in our environment.

It is not the first time the health of the collective environment was jeopardized by our individual desires for permanence and immortality.  But here in the far west of American democracy, it ought to be something we can put to rest at last.


Applying The Straps /  by Michael Cobb

There are a number of sheet metal clips and straps applied to the panelized shell that address the usual seismic concerns.  Additionally there are clips and straps installed to address issues related explicitly to Agriboard.  For permit approval, we were prohibited from relying on the structural adhesive in the panel assemblies for seismic performance.   Metal straps and clips addressed these issues instead.

The Tower is Next /  by Michael Cobb

The roof panels were going up at the last visit.  The next phase will be the tower.  Kauth Bros. will be doing the steel for the tower element which utilizes a mixture of steel and Agriboard structural elements.  The residence is located near the Russian River in the flats of the Russian River Valley and this tower will provide extensive views of the region.

Adapted for California /  by Michael Cobb

The panels are attached to the foundation by threaded rods that run through the central straw core of the panel.  The threaded rods are fastened at the top of the panels with plate washers.   Steve Pestell, of Rogina Pestell Structural Engineers, implemented this anchoring strategy as part of a wider effort to adapt Agriboard to California's seismic environment.  The goal was to accomplish this task in an efficient manner that would minimize the redesign of the Agriboard panel while still meeting California approval guidelines.  The panels typically come from the plant with electrical chases that run vertically within the straw core and this anchoring method required minimal change to the production method.