To Frank
Thoughts from an architect on the death of a client
The poetry of the place:
The House breathes + grieves the soul for whom it was designed.
Windows set to see the bend in the field, the horses in the barn, and to catch much light; frames dancing, for sitting, standing, bathing, gliding from room to room.
Space arranged to connect and gather, and to offer hospitality and welcome and embrace.
Counters low so she could sit and bake and laugh with generations.
Reclaimed hewn and cracked beams, vaults holding light and love, hearth fire, and tomorrows.
Sweeping porches to gather, to rest, to remember.
The pantry window to see a friend approach through her kitchen garden.
A keeping room holding a stone hearth and a fire, and the desk you made.
Beyond function or detail, this farmhouse - hidden in a meadow, recollects and re-presents the granular moments of a lifetime.
The sketch of Hidden Meadow farm for Frank and Gert
Processing the death of my client Frank:
Practically, this place holds all you asked for: an accessible plan for your wife with neuropathy in her feet, an accommodating room for your mother who passed during construction, and guestrooms for many grandkids with bunks and outlets for their devices. Rooms to play, to move, to feast, to rest. Each decision circles back to hospitality, family, food, and laughter. But in knowing you, it became more, holding the artful way you embraced the everyday.
My first thought when I heard you had passed was, I can’t do this. You had just a few months together in the meadow.
My labor was heartfelt, a calling to listen and guide, to perform the slow deep work of crafting a vessel to fit and mold to you both. And now, in grief, the homeward pine of a fractured future there.
After attending this ache, in prayer and pondering, my soul shifts toward the actuality of your farmhouse and the meadow that held it: perhaps this was seamlessly timed, an intentional and artfully-carved place that breathes; a love letter for a life, for a wife, for a widow.
The memory of you Frank is rooted in every inch of this house, and in the sway of this pine grove and the wild grasses, in the breaking light. I pray the edges and the emptiness, the tangible and the intangibles will feel like an embrace and a promise.
Architecture was a tool to honor your life and your legacy. Tracing your patterns and priorities, holding story. The Spirit informed a slow, deep work representing your distinctiveness in your lace of togetherness. And then, the profound joy of crafting your vessel: to hold all that you hold dear. A palette of sun, of shadow, textures, longing, thresholds and frames; this generative work became a home… and a place was claimed for you and yours. If the house is a love letter, I’m solely the pen. You Frank and your love for your wife are the guiding hand, and this risein the meadow, the parchment.
May God continue to bestow blessing upon blessing to the generations who abide within your walls.
Always, Nicole
On the porch with Frank + Gert
