Maine Architect Scott Simons on Design Excellence and Team Building

Today I have with me a longtime friend and also a very important figure in my life, and you'll understand why in a moment. This is Architect Scott Simons. Nice to see you today. Good to see you, Lisa. So you're important for kind of a major reason. We, we are actually sitting in a studio that you created, that you designed, it's part of a house that you designed and built for yourself and mm-hmm. , it's a space that you lived in for many years before we came along and bought it and now live in, right. Well, when I pulled it in the driveway, it was a little awkward. It felt a little awkward, but then it's such, such a wonderful site, you know, right on the water, and, um, feels great to be here. It's really nice to be in this room, which was a treatment room originally, circular room. So when you were designing this house, um, I know it was a personal project, but I, I know that your architecture firm also was looking a little different back then. It was, it was basically more about Scott Simon's at that point, and now it's really about the group that has become Right. A different entity. And you even have a new title, a new name to your group. Yeah. Yeah. It's not Scott Simon's Architects anymore, it's Simon's Architects, because we have a partnership group now, and we have a lot of people that have been in the studio for a long time that are, you know, developing new business themselves and developing different types of projects. So we ha we really, uh, do very little residential work anymore. We do some, usually one a year, but we are involved in a lot of larger scale cultural and business projects. Um, so the studios change. It's much more mature. We have a lot of senior people that have tremendous experience and tremendous technical abilities, and so we're working on much more complex buildings, and they take a lot of attention. So it's really, it's hard to shift to residential project, although we do occasionally, especially for, um, people that we've known for a long time. But, um, but it's much more of what we call commercial or cultural studio. Now, The fact that we now live, me personally and my husband now live in a place that you designed and created and lived in yourself, then makes it even more special since you're not doing residential work, even as a firm anymore. Yeah. It's limited quantity, or something like that, you know? Yeah. There aren't too many more of these coming along. Yeah. It's also an interesting, I mean, this particular design is very interesting because, um, it's known really by many people who, there's a hill that's right by the house, as I know you well know, and many people, they bike out here, they walk out here, they walk a dogs up the hill, they run out here. And anyone, if I, if they say, oh, I love Littlejohn. Where, where do, where do you live? I'll say, well, we live in the set of three houses on the hill. And they're like, oh, I know exactly where that is. And it's a very distinctive design. Yeah. It's not shingle style. Not shingle style, Yeah. No, it's quite different. But, um, yeah, it was very controversial at the time there. People either loved it or hated it, and it was kind of fun. People would stop at the end of the driveway and look and just try and size it up. And I would come out and say, what do you think? And they would either say, I love it or I hate it. And there was nothing, I didn't hear anybody say anything like, oh, it's okay. It was usually, they either loved it or they hate it. And it was, it was a little controversial at the time, Even building on Littlejohn, anything on Littlejohn, because it's a little tiny island with little tiny lots, um, I think is, it traditionally has been quite challenging. So I would imagine that if here you are coming along and you're gonna build on Littlejohn, and I think you're building on a site of a former camp, I'm, I, I believe, Right? It was A camp. It was a camp, and you, I believe you had to ask for some special considerations. So you're already starting, like right outta the gate, with a few things against you, and then you create this really wonderful but striking design that's unlike anything else on the island . So I, I just wanna kind of explore that mindset a little bit. I mean, were, were you just feeling like, well, this is what we want and this is what we're gonna do, and we're just gonna keep pushing forward and, you know, we respect where other people are coming from, but this is, this is our life. Well, I think it's big. It is. That question is bigger than this house. So I, um, when I moved to Portland, most of the commercial buildings that were being built were red brick. And, uh, so I, you know, I'd spent time in New York City be before I came here, and there aren't any red brick or very few red brick buildings except the old townhouses. But, so I didn't have that, uh, imprint that everything had to be red brick. And so I kind of challenged that, this going way back, even before Scott Simon's architects was formed, I was like, what? Why is everybody just automatically make the buildings red brick? So, uh, we started doing buildings with much more glass and everything, and, and it was, people were, you know, many people were saying finally, you know, somebody's breaking the tradition. So as a young architect in town, um, I was willing to challenge the status quo. And so that just, that just played out in other projects that I did too, residential projects as well. I always was trying to see if we could do it a little differently. And I wasn't trying to be controversial per se. I was just trying to say, I'm a creative person. This is what I do. This is how I see it, and this is what I think is the right thing to do. So I wasn't trying to, you know, in this particular house, I wasn't ever trying to do a shingle style house or a house that blended in. I was trying to blend the scale and the, you know, the sighting of the house and all of those pieces so that it wouldn't be overwhelming. There are houses that have been built on the island here that are huge, that are like McMansions, and nobody says anything about 'em. Nobody complains about 'em because they have shingles or they have gable roofs or something like that. But boy, heck, if you, if you don't do a gable roof in shingles, a lot of it's, it's hard for people to understand. And I, I, I get that. I mean, I also feel that part of my job as a creative person is to push the limits and to educate and to just do, do things the way I see them reflect those in the design and in the way I approach life. You know, some of the spaces inside these, your house are quite beautiful and quite different than what, and then there are other rooms that are quite similar. You know, the bedrooms are very simple, bed rectangular bedrooms with windows, you know, but there are other spaces that move and, you know, flow and things like that. And inside, outside, and those are all concepts that everybody would appreciate. Even though they might not like the roof line, they probably would like the, the interior layout of the rooms, cuz it takes advantage of the views and the orientation and the way the sun moves. And that's not just with residential projects. We do that with all projects. We, I see the sun, I, I see where it's coming from. I see where the wind is coming from. It's, we all do all, all, all the people in my studio and in other good studios, they all think about that. And then the form, we, we just let it evolve. We don't start with an idea about a form, what it's supposed to look like. We let it grow out of the what's trying we're trying to do to make the building help people do their jobs or do whate or to live or whatever. I I do remember when you and I, uh, spoke last on air, because I've interviewed you previously. I remember our conversation about the light and about how the light changes with the seasons and how that's something that even as you're designing it, you understand is still going to shift once something is built, because there's still no real way to know exactly how the sun is going to hit, but you're doing kind of your best guess. Right. And that was such a fascinating concept for me, because it's this sense that you are actually almost creating something that is living to co-evolve with truly things that are living mm-hmm. on the outside trees and right grass. And I can't, the sun, I don't think it's living per se, but it is, it is part of the living environment. But I wonder how many people know that or understand that that's part of design and architecture More than you might think. I think it's an intuitive knowing. They might not be able to articulate it. I mean, my, my job is to articulate it with words and withdrawings and, and then to build it. But I think everyone knows what it's like to sit in the sun and feel the warmth of the sun or to watch something grow in a garden or to, you know, see a natural material that's not, you know, that's, that has a clear finish, a piece of wood that ha or a door, you know, the doors in your house, for example, are just beautiful. They're natural wood. Um, I think everyone intuitively can relate to that. I, I'll give an example, a recent example of, um, much to the surprise of everyone involved in the Portland Museum of Art Competition. There were over 2000 people that commented on the four different designs. And those four designs all had very strong direction. And, uh, the, um, attitude about natural daylight. So, you know, in galleries you can't have any direct sunlight. Uh, it will destroy the paintings or the drawings or the, or the prints or whatever. So there's a great attention to northern diffuse light and even protecting against, you know, the late afternoon sun on the June 20th or something that might come in at a slight angle. There's tremendous attention paid to that. And so when those four competition entries were presented there, all of the architects spoke to about the light, the quality of light, and you could see them in the videos as they moved through the space and everything. And over 2000 people wrote comments in about that. And of course they had a jury and a competition, uh, jury. And so many of them wrote about the quality of the light and how nice and the windows and, you know, what you could see through and all these sorts of things. Again, not, you know, many of them were architects, but many of them weren't architects. It's just people in the community that were reacting to the presentations. So it's a good example of how we all relate to the quality of light. And, you know, we live in a northern place, it's dark here. We're in the dark season right now. Right. And days are short summer, the days are long. Like everybody, nobody goes on vacation in the summer in Maine, no Mainers go on vacation. We all want to be here for that reason, to enjoy that those long days. Yeah. I think you're raising something. And I, and, and when I said I wonder how many people know that I think I, I meant, I wonder how many people know that architecture takes into consideration light when engaging in the design process. But I absolutely agree with you that there is an intuitive sense. It, it's like watching your dog lie on the patio in the sun or watching your cat, you know? Mm-hmm. be in the one little patch of sunlight in front of the door, . Right. I mean, we're, we're not that different. I think you're, you're right. There's something that's, I mean, we're, we're as elemental as the dogs and the cats and all the other critters we, we kind of gravitate towards mm-hmm. that, that light and that warmth. And I, and I think there is something interesting about why you're saying that. It, you're, you're, you're a designer, but you're also someone who needs to articulate something that we feel intuitively mm-hmm. . And it's like there's a translation that's occurring and there's even what you're telling me, uh, what I feel is the sense that you almost need to stain your ground because you're, you're trying to help put forth something that's very important and that maybe other people aren't quite yet in a place to understand, because that's just not what their cognitive framework looks like at, at the time that you start having the conversation. Exactly. Exactly. I so did you get back to the, the original question? You're right. I don't think, uh, in general people understand that that's, that's one of the primary roles of architects is to pay attention to those natural phenomena. And it is a part of, uh, architect's job is to communicate that and to explain that because it is, is a fundamental principle. Air and sunlight are free. Bricks and mortar are expensive. So take advantage of things that don't cost you anything. Why would you not pay attention to the light it's there? You know, you either choose to include it or exclude it strategically. And it makes a difference in terms of the quality of space and quality of, of everything it happened inside. You were mentioning to me before we started talking on the air about, um, this, this shift in your life, this, this new way of looking at how you approach future plans, how you approach kind of your present situation, um, and in the parallel with the work that you do, where at one point you were the person who was, you know, doing the design, you know, doing that kind of showing up and taking care of the day-to-day work. And now you have a very different role. Um, I guess talk to me a little bit about that. Cause I, I can actually relate to it both personally and professionally mm-hmm. , but I wanna hear more about it from you. Well, I have, uh, I have a group of architects and, um, interns that work with me. Uh, there's 15 of us now, and our studio is incredibly busy and incredibly active and engaged in all kinds of larger scale projects than we were when I first talked to you years ago. And it's very exciting. But it's a very different studio. It's not called Scott Simon's Architects anymore, it's called Simon's Architects. Cuz I have a partnership and I have, I have four partners and they're all engaged in every aspect of the business every day. So my role has shifted a little bit from being the director of everything to being essentially a conductor of an orchestra. And, and I, my, I spend a lot of time working on details of the business, coaching, working with the other partners, just reviewing things. I do, I still do initiate projects myself, and I still am involved in a number of many, many projects, but the partners are very actively engaged in growing their presence and their voices and their authentic, uh, selves through the business as well. So my role has shifted and it's been great, and I, I, uh, resisted it for, for years. I still wanted to be the guy that generated the design idea. And then I realized, well, I'm not as good as at that as I was about being fast and generating and work, being able to work constantly all the time. I, I don't have the stamina. I have a different kind of a stamina I should say. It's not that I don't have stamina, it's that I don't have that more youthful type of stamina, which is very focused and everything. And, um, we were talking about it earlier that I, I read this thing about Bob Dylan. They asked him, when you wrote all those songs, you know, back in the sixties, where did that come from? And he said it, they just came to me. I don't know where they came from. They just came to me and I just wrote them down and I figured 'em out and sang them. And they said, can you do that anymore? And he said, no, I can't do that anymore, but I can do other things that I couldn't do back then. And that's how I feel now. I've sort of been looking at this sort of trying to figure out, because a lot of architects will start to taper off at my age. I'm 68, so they will taper off and then you become a little less engaged in the work. And, um, gradually, you know, you stopped doing the work and I actually love the work. And my father worked until he was 90, uh, and was pretty active. And, you know, he worked less, but he still was very involved and it was very good for him mentally. And it was good for him to get out of the house. He would put a tie on, go down to the office and, and work on a few things. And, um, and that's my model. My model is not to retire at age of 60 or 65. I missed those. I went flying right by those I didn't even realize I was 68 until recently. Um, finally dawned on me that I'm in the last third, you know, I call it the last third. And, um, but I also, I, people say, when are you retiring? And I can't answer the question because the question seems weird to me. It seems bizarre. Like, what do you mean? Why would I stop doing something that I like to do that I'm still pretty good at? Mean if I didn't enjoy it and I wasn't, if I didn't think I was adding any value, I would stop doing it. But I still feel like, especially with the mature maturing of the studio where there's, there's a lot of help needed and I have a lot of experience and I can be very helpful in a lot of ways. So, um, it's, it's great for me, but it's a different role than when I was younger and I wanted to be the guy. You know, now I'm not, I want to back off and let them be, I want my partners to succeed. I want them, I want to help them succeed. I, I love that analogy. The, the conductor analogy. Uh, we had recently interviewed Dr. Emily Isaacson, who is herself a conductor. And it, the this idea that, you know, she's bringing forth sort of bringing the music up or causing it to be quieter and enabling people to hear one another so that they can actually interact in a way that moves the music forward. And you are describing this as more of a design and architectural, um, conducting. And, and I think that that's actually a very critical thing, that it's, it's not just each of us as individuals and our individual pieces that we bring to mm-hmm. , our personal and professional lives. It's how those pieces interact with one another and how those pieces are, um, given the space to grow or given the time to be quiet. That's it. Exactly. I think the, um, you know, I spent years trying to develop a culture of excellent design excellence we call it, where, uh, it didn't matter what the project was, we were gonna do the best we could with what we had to work with the budget and the client and try and push, like, you know, going back to what I was saying earlier is I was the guy who was pushing, pushing, pushing. And we did, and we developed a, a culture of excellence where projects that we didn't think we were, we're maybe our best projects were getting recognized for design excellence. Uh, we've been very fortunate in that regard. The, the studio has been recognized over and over again for its work all, all across New England. And so, um, that, that's because we built a good culture and everybody was willing to participate in the development and the growth of that culture. So that within that, the partners and the interns and the younger architects, there's a place for them to where they can work with other like-minded people that are all interested in doing beautiful buildings that will stand the test of time. And they look different. You know, the Portland public Library doesn't look the same as the Wafl lower school building, doesn't look the same as the ferry terminal. Doesn't look the same as the mean public broadcasting that we're gonna be building soon. And they all have a slightly different character to them that's responsive to that particular client's needs. And, and, uh, but they all have excellence. And they all have been well thought out carefully, thought out, carefully detailed, so that they will hold up and they'll stay on the test of time. And that's really kind of my role now, is to remind everybody what that is. And young people come in to help them get used to the idea that they're part of a team. They're not going to, they're gonna work together and be better than they would be on their own. Scott, what was your father's work? He was a lawyer who became a judge, uh, in the state court system. And he ended up in Albany, uh, and then had to retire at age 70, mandatory retirement for the state, uh, appeals court of appeals judges. And, uh, so then he, uh, with his best friends, in town, he opened a law practice with them, joined their practice essentially, and was kind of of council and continued to do a lot because he was involved in a lot of law making, uh, for the state, state laws and things like that. He was, had some pretty ni pretty nice, uh, consulting gigs the first 10 years after he retired. But he started working with the United Nation, uh, which was just about 10 miles away from where he lived in Rome, New York, upstate New York, and helped them rewrite their, uh, legal system. They had a tribal council type of a system, and they had done quite well with, um, investments and with, uh, their casinos and things like that. And their, their, their world got more complex than they needed to have a, a hybrid between a, a, um, an American type legal system and a native type legal system. And he, and another colleague of his from the court who had also retired at age 70, got together and worked for the tribe for 20 years. Uh, and they put, they wrote this code, which is used, has been adopted by many tribes, other native tribes in the country. So he was, and he said at the, uh, when he finally retired from that, at age 90, they, you know, they treated him like, uh, an elder. The natives the tribe was so respectful of my father, he felt like he'd kind of been kicked out of the court at age 70 because they had this mandatory retirement and they got another person coming in. It was like, what? You know, what happened? And then the tribe was so appreciative of everything that he and his friend Stu had done, and they would give them these little feathers. So each feather was in recognition of five years of service to the tribe. So he ended up with four feathers, and it, he said it was one of his most prized possessions. He said that he had such a good feeling about that, and that really fed him for a long, long time. So in hearing what you're currently doing and what your father was doing, it seems that this, this role of this, we'll, we'll say the final third, although the final, I guess that that has a, a little bit of a tone to it that I don't really love, but , um, maybe one of the thirds, the, the next third, let's say the next third, the next Third, the next third. You never know, right? Yeah,