Preserving History While Innovating the Future: Trivers Architecture's 50-Year Anniversary

Arnold00:00:00

How do you create a work of lasting, positive consequence? For 50 years, Trivers Architecture has been doing that. We're going to talk more about that on St. Louis in June.Welcome to St. Louis in Tune and thank you for joining us for fresh perspectives on issues and events with experts, community leaders and everyday people who make a difference in shaping our society and world. I'm Arnold Stricker along with co host Mark Langston.

Mark00:00:37

Hi, Arnold.

Arnold00:00:38

How you doing, Mark?

Mark00:00:40

I'm, I'm, I'm doing well, thank you. I'm doing all right. How about yourself?

Arnold00:00:44

I'm doing well. I'm trying to design and build our show today. In a way.

Mark00:00:49

Build it. Okay.

Arnold00:00:50

Yes. That really amplifies the guests that we have on the program.

Mark00:00:54

I'm excited about it. We have three guests today.

Arnold00:00:57

Yes, we do, we do. We're glad that you've joined us today, folks. We want to thank our sponsor, Better Rate Mortgage for their support of the show.You can listen to previous shows@stlintune.com please help us continue to grow by leaving a review on our website, Apple Podcast or your preferred podcast platform.Our thought to ponder today, Mark, this is a really good one and you have to pay attention because you could get your brain wrapped around this and go, huh? The thing always happens that you really believe in and the belief in a thing makes it happen. I'll repeat that again.The thing always happens that you really believe in and the belief in a thing makes it happen.

Mark00:01:39

It's almost like visualizing a goal, isn't it?

Arnold00:01:42

Yes.

Mark00:01:42

Is that right?

Arnold00:01:43

If you don't have something in mind and you're really pursuing it and you really believe in it, then that actually will occur. I want to say self fulfilled prophecy. Who do you think said that?

Mark00:01:52

Let's see. Oprah Winfrey.

Arnold00:01:54

No, our guests will jump out of their seats. Frank Lloyd Wright.

Mark00:01:58

Oh, now you're talking.

Arnold00:02:01

And our guests are Joe Brinkman, Joel Fuoss, Amy Gilbertson. And they are from Trivers Architecture. And welcome all of you to St. Louis and Tim.

Mark00:02:11

Thank you.

Amy00:02:12

Thank you.

Arnold00:02:12

You guys have been going now for 50 years. July 1st you celebrated your 50th anniversary and you, I guess the firm had an early focus on historic renovation and adaptive reuse.And then you grew into ground up construction. So I guess my first question, and you guys just bounce back and forth, explain to people what adaptive review reuse is.I think they understand historic renovation, but what's adaptive reuse?

Mark00:02:43

They're all looking at each other.

Arnold00:02:44

Anybody? Let's draw strides from this.

Amy00:02:46

All Right. I can go first.Adaptive reuse is a way of describing taking a building that was built for one purpose and then using it for a different purpose that serves modern needs for whatever a community might be needing today.

Arnold00:03:02

That's the short version, very similar to. The building that you now occupy as an architectural firm. And so describe what I know as the Butler Brothers Building, which is now the Victoria.

Joel00:03:16

The Victor, as it's now known, was constructed in 1907, finished 1907, as the butler Brothers Wholesale Warehouse. We always talk about it as the Costco, the Amazon of the day, where goods were brought in from Union Station, were brought into the warehouse.Wholesalers could sell, pick up what they wanted to feature in their stores or buy there on the floor, and then it was shipped elsewhere in the country. Most, most, mostly west of St. Louis as that changed over over the years.And until 1957, it was then closed and used for other uses, but really remained. I didn't say vacant. I would say more stagnant. Stagnant, Hibernation maybe the word.For about 40 years until our client got ahold of it and asked us to look at it for different use.

Arnold00:04:09

So the firm got started by Andy Trevers, and that's when everything was moving out of the city. The city was becoming. I'll use the word stagnant. At the time, a lot of buildings were vacated on Garment Row and which are now.Many of them are now loft buildings, one that I live in. And so what was his goal at the time? He was like, we can't just let this architecture just fall.

Joe00:04:36

Yeah, I think that's probably accurate.He came to St. Louis to go to Washington University and was witnessing what was happening not just in St. Louis, but all over the country, with downtowns in some cases being abandoned and those buildings often not being repurposed and often being demolished. And so that sort of instilled the passion in him to do what he could to preserve those cultural resources and keep them for future generations.

Arnold00:05:04

That was really before a lot of what I would call historic renovation subsidies were going on. So it was pretty much just if somebody wanted to occupy that building or reuse that building, they would just have to fork over all the money.It wasn't like they were going to get any money from the state or the feds at that time.

Joe00:05:21

Correct.

Arnold00:05:22

So what did that develop into them as he was. Probably because you've worked at the firm probably the longest now. What is it, 20. 20 years?

Joe00:05:30

25 years as of yesterday.

Arnold00:05:32

Wow. Well, we should have a silver anniversary how did the. I don't want to say morph because you guys are still doing a lot of.A lot of historic kinds of things. That's matter of fact, mark some of the notable St. Louis projects. And I was really amazed right when I started reading the list.The Gateway Arch Museum. Oh, the Old Courthouse, which I haven't been. I want to go. I saw some of the pictures. Wow, this is crazy.The Post Building, Adam Aronson Fine Arts center out of Lamar Park. Sheldon Concert hall, art galleries, Tar Grove park restorations. The Old Post Office, numerous lofts. The Airport Copper roof restoration.Oh, yeah, just like what. So if you've seen it, folks, it's probably been Trivers Architecture. And you've wondered what in the world.So what makes Trivers Architecture set apart from other architectural firms in St. Louis or nationally?

Joel00:06:22

I would say the Andy Trivers roots and the historic work and the adaptive reuse, as Amy was speaking about earlier, opened the door into a very typology, different typologies that we could get involved with. A historic building can be turned into a numerous different things. Residential office, galleries, museums, hotels, you name it.So that allows us to do different types of work and allows us to explore that in different ways because it's housed in a historic or an existing building. So it allows us to be varied in the type of work that we're involved with.And it's led us to, as you mentioned, a myriad of different avenues that we can pursue.

Arnold00:07:06

What are the challenges of working with some of these older buildings? Obviously, other than infrastructure, of course, that's the main thing. There's a lot of exterior, interior go into that.So people really understand why some of these, what I would call subsidies, actually exist.

Amy00:07:23

Maybe I can start. I was going to add on to what Joel was saying too. In terms of our national reach with doing historic work.Missouri has had the tax credit program, I think, longer than any other state, or almost. It's one of the longest two.So Andy's passion for doing historic renovations and adaptive reuse, paired with Missouri's incentive program, has allowed our firm to do this work in many cases longer than a lot of firms throughout the rest of the country, as other states are picking up tax credit programs, and now they've got to comply with the guidelines that are associated with the tax credit programs. Our team knows those standards backwards and forwards. So our clients always want to modernize the buildings.And a lot of times there's a misconception that you can't change a building if it's historic, if it's on the national register. It has to be as it is. But you can definitely modernize it. And we know how to do that.So we know how to take our client's vision for what they want to do with a property, pair it with the guidelines, and come up with a strategy for an intervention that gets them where they need to be.

Arnold00:08:26

So when you're talking about modernize, what are most people, they're not thinking like, we're going to truly change the outside of the building. You're changing the functional use of it. And a lot of the. You obviously have to put fire alarm systems in and.

Amy00:08:40

Sure.

Arnold00:08:42

Except the victor didn't have a fire suppression system in it already. Sprinkler system.

Joel00:08:46

Yeah.

Arnold00:08:47

Which was really way ahead of its time.

Joel00:08:48

It was, it was, yeah.

Amy00:08:50

So modernization has to take into account whatever the character defining features of the building are often the envelope and what it looks like from the outside is part of that. But sometimes on the backside or side elevations that weren't as important, you can still make additions and things like that.But as we were getting into mid century buildings, we're also talking more about what it felt like to be in the building. So expansive, open spaces, natural light.So it's becoming less about the ornamentation and craftsmanship and starting to talk about what the feeling was. So it can be both.

Arnold00:09:26

In your process. When you talk to owners or people who want to develop a building, what's the. You talk about a balance being both. And expand on that a little bit.

Joe00:09:42

Go ahead.

Joel00:09:43

I think as Amy was talking about, there's always a trade off in what you're trying to accomplish for the success of a project. And we work with our clients to really understand what those goals are and what those needs are. And we like to look at it as not a compromise.We don't look at a historic structure as a, or an existing, any existing building as a limiting factor. We try to see the possibilities that lie within that. So we say, all right, here's what you. You've got. We don't see that as limitation.How do we build upon that and make that something that can be celebrated or become a character defining aspect of what that building can offer that particular client. So it's not. We don't look at it as just a trade off and say, this can be either nice or not, or it can be expensive or cheap.It's how do we get the most out of it for the budget that you have and to meet your needs.And a lot of times that takes Research, understanding, listening to really understand what a client's looking for, really understanding what a building can offer you and, and be able to work with all of those things. And I think to be successful you have to.You can't look at as a black and white either or it's an and proposition to take all of that stuff and to make the most out of it.

Arnold00:11:01

So let's put some legs on that. Let's. And let's use the victor as the example of that.So the owners, did they do an architectural search or did they say, hey, I want this group because I know what they've done, they got a history of this stuff. And then do they come, hey, this is my ideas of what I want.And I know you guys are listening to that, but I'm sure some of the cogs were turning like, wow, this building could be X, Y and Z if it got done.

Joe00:11:28

So their initial contact with us was by recommendation from several other people in St. Louis. They had already started talking to contractors, they had started talking to lenders and other people in town. And our name came up more than once.So they contacted us and that's where the conversation started. They had an idea of what their program was going to be, how many apartment units and so forth.But on that building, one of the biggest challenges was its size. It was too big, honestly. And that was one of the things that they saw as a limiting factor.But we would have to be here all day to talk about how we strategize that and work through it. And Joel was responsible for most of that. But that, that was the solution that had to be arrived at on that one.How do you take this enormous building and actually make it work for what they were trying to do with their apartment count and all of that?

Arnold00:12:18

Yeah. Which is some of the challenge of the. What I would call and Mark would call probably the old famous bar building.

Joe00:12:23

Railway Exchange.

Arnold00:12:24

Railway Exchange. It's a city block and it's just this massive amount of building. What do you do with something like that? It's almost too much.

Joe00:12:30

It is. Ye studied that with a couple different organizations and that is exactly the case. It's huge.And no one user in this market is ever going to use that entire building.So the solutions are going to have to be pairing up uses, maybe even having three or four different uses in that building before anybody's going to come up with a successful formula for that one.

Arnold00:12:54

Yeah, this Arnold Stricker with Mark Langston of St. Lucian Tomb. We're talking to Joe Brinkman Joel Foose and Amy Gilbertson of the architectural firm trivers trivers.com, folks. Trivers.com.and what's probably one of the most challenging projects you guys have ever done, or maybe you're still involved in it, or maybe you don't want to sit?

Joe00:13:15

I'd be happy to. It's also the project that brought me to the firm, and it's the Westin Hotel in the old couples district next to the ballpark here in St. Louis.

Mark00:13:25

Oh, yeah. Neat building.

Joe00:13:26

Yeah, yeah.I. I saw the construction fence going up around that, saw the Trivers sign and said this would be somebody I'd like to work for after having seen so many buildings get torn down. So I looked them up and it happened that they had an opening and I got hired there and ended up at the end of that managing that project.

Mark00:13:45

Wow, that's great.

Joe00:13:47

It was the combination of four distinct historic buildings and connecting all of those and figuring out all of the challenges and the foundations were really bad under one of them. So we had to fix all of that. By far, in my mind, the most challenging I've been involved with, but also the most rewarding in a lot of ways.

Arnold00:14:04

Absolutely. Joel.

Joel00:14:07

Oh, gosh. I think one of the fortunate aspects is that we get to work on a lot of different types of difficult projects.We talk about that maybe we don't really have an easy project that we endeavor on and we like it that way. Yeah, we do. It's hard work, but it's gratifying. I'm going to take a little bit different turn on this.I've had the fortunate aspect to be able to work on a lot of different great projects. One of those is a new construction project we did up in North City, the Flance Early Childhood Center.And while it wasn't challenge, it was challenging in its own way.But it was tearing down a mid 20th century high rise affordable housing project and building an early childhood center in what was the most impoverished neighborhood in the entire state of Missouri at the time. And 5% of a child's brain is developed before the age of early or 95% is developed before age 5.And so these kids were just losing out on these opportunities.And there was an opportunity there to design an early childhood center for 154 kids to change the trajectory of that neighborhood and the kids that grew up within it. And it's a little different aspect. I had young children at the time, and so that was just a different avenue of a type of project that would.It's a long term change. But we'd like to see us changing the city in that part of the neighborhood for the better.

Amy00:15:28

Amy all right, So I think I'm going to go to my first historic project at Trivers, which was the old post office in downtown St. Louis. So I came to Trivers because of their work in affordable housing. I was really interested in that.And then I got put on this project as an intern, and it completely changed the trajectory of my career because I fell in love with how you can modernize historic building. There were a lot of different stakeholders. Webster University went in there. I was working directly with Missouri Court of Appeals. We had a huge team.I got to go to all of the meetings where the client team was trying to persuade legislators and the public to get behind this project. And it was this really complicated deal. And I got to sit in all of those meetings and hear how they put it all together.And then I got to be the project architect for Missouri Court of Appeals. So the third and fourth floors were my baby for about three years.

Arnold00:16:24

Wow.

Amy00:16:24

And I just fell in love with all the details. And it was so exciting because we met all of the court's security needs and all of their programmatic requirements.And we only made one new opening in the third and fourth floors, which were the most historic portions of the building.So that challenge of figuring out what strategy works best and how can it work for the building and for the client and bringing all that together was a really great experience.

Arnold00:16:48

Mark. You can really see that, man. It's just this whole process of communication and listening is a huge. Which I don't want to label.I think this is in every kind of occupation where people, they don't really listen. They just, I'm going to do my thing. I know this is what you probably want because this is what I do or this is my boilerplate.So I'm just going to do it that way.Rather than sitting down and really getting people an understanding of where they're coming from and what they want and then offering some other solutions that might even make their thoughts even rise more.

Mark00:17:24

Is it harder to do new construction or rehab? I mean, I could see it's a 2. I love seeing an older building repurposed or rehabbed or that's my terms.But I know sometimes when I'm working on something, it's just tear it out. Just tear it all out and start better, because it's going to be a better and it's going to last longer. So it's got. That's got to be A challenge.But you were talking about working on foundations. That's a big undertaking, especially with a structure that's there. So is it more cost effective? I'm not advocating to tear things down.

Joel00:17:59

Please.

Mark00:18:00

But I'm just curious, is it when people go to this. I'm sorry, this is such a long question.

Arnold00:18:05

No, you're fine. Spit it out, Mark.

Mark00:18:08

But when people. I know, it's. I don't know. I just like seeing the older buildings redone. But sometimes it's just. Is it cost effective?

Joe00:18:16

I think you have to look at each project individually. There are new construction projects that I've been involved with that were incredibly complicated.There were also renovations that we did that were, quite honestly, pretty easy. The program fit and everything worked out okay, and we didn't have some of the massive challenges.Generally speaking, though, I do think it's a little bit more complicated to take on an adaptive reuse because you've got to deal with all of the sort of restoration aspects of it in addition to.And if you're trying, as Amy alluded to, to stay within the guidelines, if you're getting tax credits and you need to follow the guidelines that the federal government has established, then that adds a whole layer of complexity also, that can be really hard and sometimes almost impossible to navigate to put what you're trying to into that building.

Mark00:19:03

So it's a great commitment, I think, by whoever's working on this project.

Arnold00:19:07

My wife and I often talk about what you just said, Mark. Are all of these older buildings worth saving? We've got the Battery Building, the Streetcar Battery Building just up the street.A wonderful historic building. It would be really cool, redeveloped, but who's going to put money into that? And it's actually falling apart right now.

Joe00:19:26

There are some buildings that are probably beyond their useful life and in their location and so forth, they need to come down. That's not to say that we don't believe that every building has to be saved, but then you take buildings like.And this probably got me into this type of work in the first place.But when I literally witnessed the implosion of the Bouder Building and the Title guarantee building on 7th street downtown to make way for the Gateway Mall, which then ended up with a building on it anyway.When I watched those buildings come down that morning in, I think it was 1984, and then walked over to the site once the dust had settled and just witnessed that gaping hole in the city, and I thought, this is crazy. Like, how did anybody justify doing this?And I would have been 20 no, not even 20, maybe right at 20 years old when that happened, I never forgot that. And I still think about it all the time. When we look at these buildings lately the Wainwright's been in the news.And just imagine if those two buildings were still there on 7th street and you had the three of those standing there together. It would have been so much more. Oh, yeah, Wonderful.

Amy00:20:37

What? And I think you're talking about dollars too, but we should talk about value. So I have conversation.I'm having a conversation with a client now that it's a municipality and they are working on restoring their historic city hall. And it's hard work, but it's been part of their city forever and as long as they've been a city.

Joe00:20:58

And so before you got in the room.

Amy00:21:00

Right.

Arnold00:21:00

We're both graduates of that particular area. Yeah. So we're very familiar with that.

Amy00:21:04

And so part of the conversation, we're preparing to talk to the council and talk about the value and what does it say about the community if we invest in this building that's been sitting here versus build something new and be left with this building sitting empty, which is the same situation we had in University City. Their City hall annex and Trinity Library building were sitting empty for a long time with no planned use. And had they built new.We talked about this in a lot of the council meetings. Had they built new, those buildings would still be sitting there empty. When they're perfectly viable, they're gonna. There's the police headquarters.It's under construction now. The police will be in there. We've got a new accessible entry for the community. We've solved the wayfinding and the public parking.We've added all of this to the experience of coming to City hall. And we've created a use for these buildings that have been sitting there empty. So there's a lot of value there. That's more than dollars.

Mark00:21:58

Is the spotlight still on the roof up there? Is it still there?

Joe00:22:02

It is, yeah.

Mark00:22:02

Yeah. They should turn that on once in a while just for fun.

Joe00:22:07

They're working on the lift. That's the problem right now. It doesn't gotcha up anymore.

Mark00:22:12

So. I love that, Bill.

Arnold00:22:14

It's a great.

Mark00:22:15

Except the council chambers is very echoey. It's very. It's like very hollow. Sounds like you're in a bathroom.

Arnold00:22:21

Ways to get architectural acoustic engineers.

Mark00:22:23

Yes, that's handle some of that stuff.

Arnold00:22:25

Get them in here now especially they need to do that in restaurants, but that's another story. We're going to take a break and we'll be right back. This is Arnold Stricker with Mark Langston of St. Louis in Tune. Don't go away.This is Arnold Stricker of St. Louis in tune on behalf of the Dred Scott Heritage Foundation. In 1857, the Dred Scott decision was a major legal event and catalyst that contributed to the Civil War.The decision declared that Dred Scott could not be free because he was not a citizen.The 14th Amendment, also called the Dred Scott Amendment, granted citizenship to all born or naturalized here in our country and was intended to overturn the US Supreme Court decision on July 9, 1868.The Dred Scott Heritage foundation is requesting a commemorative stamp to be issued from the US Postal Service to recognize and remember the heritage of this amendment by issuing a stamp with the likeness of the man Dred Scott. But we need your support and the support of thousands of people who would like to see this happen.To achieve this goal, we ask you to download, sign and share the one page petition with others. To find the petition, please go to dredscottlives.org and click on the Dred Scott petition drive on the right side of the page.On behalf of the Dred Scott Heritage foundation, this has been Arnold Stricker of.St. Louis intune as strange as it may sound, at Better Rate Mortgage we love talking to people about mortgages. Everyone in St. Louis promises a better mortgage rate. But what you really need to turn that perfect house into your dream home is a better mortgage.At Better Rate Mortgage, we open the door to so much more. So where are you in the home buying process? Researching, maybe wondering how much you can afford?House hunting Get a pre approval from Better Rate Mortgage Ready to Buy. Our team is ready to make your mortgage process fast and easy.Whether you're purchasing your first home or taking cash out to make your dream home even dreamier, our door is open. Come on in and get started. Today we'll show you how.Call Sean directly at 314-375-3293 or online@betterratemortgage.com Remember, at Better Rate Mortgage a better rate is just the beginning. Betterratemortgage.com MLS ID 2401335 and equal housing.Lender welcome back to St. Louis in tune. This is Arnold Stricker with Mark Langston.We're talking to Joe Brinkman, Joel Fuoss, Amy Gilbertson of Trivers architecture firm trivers.com t r I v e r s trivers.com and I was prompting them with some questions. Mark during the Break.

Mark00:24:59

I have a crazy question before we go any further.

Joe00:25:01

Okay.

Mark00:25:02

My dad was an architect. He worked at Bank Building Corporation. But the big question always is, where'd you go to school? Did you go to Washington U or did you go to ku?That's what I was. Good for you. I'm glad to hear that.

Joe00:25:16

That is true for most architects in St. Louis. I did go to Washington University and so did Joel.

Mark00:25:21

Then my dad went to Wash U too.

Joel00:25:25

I have an undergrad from University of Illinois and then a master's from washu.

Mark00:25:29

Yeah, there's quite a competition between washu for some reason, I don't get it.

Joel00:25:35

But whatever that is.

Amy00:25:36

And I had a strange path from Illinois State University as a business major to Southern Illinois Cartmandale. I transferred into architecture, and then I went to University of Michigan for grad school.

Mark00:25:46

Well, good for you.I think it's interesting that there's such a great architectural school here in St. Louis and that a lot of the architects are working in St. Louis, doing stuff here. So I think that's neat. That's. That's all I had, arnold.

Arnold00:25:58

Yeah, good. St. Louis is known for great architecture.I know there's a lot of older cities that have wonderful architecture, but we just seem to have this unbelievable kind of of buildings that have all this wonderful brickwork, all this wonderful stone facade. What's one of your favorite buildings just to look at here in St. Louis?

Joe00:26:17

Oh, you rephrase that a little from what you said while we were taking a break to look at.

Arnold00:26:22

Okay, so give me the answer to both.

Joe00:26:26

For me, my favorite to look at is the Wainwright building.

Arnold00:26:28

Okay.

Joe00:26:29

It really understand what was going on there and look at that building from a distance and pay attention to the geometry and the way it's arranged and organized. It's incredible.And especially when you put it in the time that it was built, and then as you get closer to it and see the amount of detail on it and everything that's going on with the terracotta facade and all that, it's exquisite. It's just incredible.

Mark00:26:51

Not the first skyscraper in the country, is that.

Joe00:26:54

Arguably, yes.There are other people who will say other buildings and so forth, but it really was the first one where the exterior of it was not the structural element and the structure resides within that. So the exterior can be organized and thought of differently.

Mark00:27:10

And they had the heating and air conditioning at the top. You can see the holes, I think, in the facade of it. Is that to cool it off up there? Is that. Am I even close?

Joe00:27:19

Those are just ornamentation, as far as I know. And I don't think they had a function back then, but they may have. It doesn't exist now, but I'm not aware of that.I think those were always windows, the round ones, portholes that are at the top.

Mark00:27:31

Okay. I had heard it was air, not air conditioned, but heating or something, some kind of venting for. However they did their H Vac back then for that.

Joe00:27:40

Or didn't.

Mark00:27:41

Or didn't.

Arnold00:27:41

Yeah, well, there's another story about that.

Joel00:27:44

Oh, gosh, I don't know. I don't think I can narrow it down. This goes to maybe Mark's question about the historic, question about keeping buildings.And I just think the collection of historic structures we have here in St. Louis is a wonderful asset of the city that's honestly under leveraged. Joe mentioned tearing down the other buildings around the Wainwright.Fortunately, we still have the Wainwright, and there's others around it that we still have. But we've lost so much. But we have still so much, you know, around this neighborhood that's intact of homes and two families and four families.Just being around the historic fabric of the city. You go to other cities, they don't have it.And that is something that we need to leverage as a city and as a region to reach out to other areas and say, look at what we've got. This is something that's important, and people respond well to it. They look at that stuff.They look at that historic detailing and ornamentation and marvel at it. And it's beautiful. And we don't construct like that anymore, and nor should we, and we should be able to complement with that.But it is here, and we should really retain as much of that as what we've got. And just being surrounded by that in a city that has so much to offer is really a wonderful aspect of what we have here architecturally.

Arnold00:28:57

Amy.

Amy00:28:58

All right, I'm going to say one that maybe you wouldn't be thinking of, but Tower Grove park, their collection, I don't know if you know this. It's a National Historic Landmark park.It's in my neighborhood, so I've always been near it, and my kids have grown up there, learned to ride their bikes there. I run there with my friends regularly still.But they have the greatest collection of Victorian pavilions anywhere in the world, and we've been fortunate to start the restoration process for some of those. So when you said, what's your favorite one to look at? I love looking at those.And even though I've been Looking at them for 20 years now that we're working on them and restoring them, I'm seeing details I never saw before. And it. And just the purpose that they were built for, to create shade and respite for everyone. Poor people, wealthy people, the entire community.It's still the purpose that they're being used for today. So I just. I love being there, and I love getting. We're starting construction on four more this year. And getting.It's like getting to know a new friend. They have different materials. They were thought of differently. Each one is very unique. So that's been. I love looking at those.

Arnold00:30:04

Do you guys marvel when you go into an old building or you look at how the materials that they were using back then and how they accomplished all these things, or the vision that they had? You like, wow.

Joe00:30:15

The craftsmanship that you see in older.

Amy00:30:17

Buildings is an artistry.

Joe00:30:19

Unbelievable. And if you really start looking at it from our point of view, where we know how these things go together, and start to think, how did they do that?

Amy00:30:28

And even construction, when we look at old sets of drawings and it's. The design intent is there, and beautiful drawings and the ornamentation on the Wainwright, but it's like a half of an elevation.And then the contractor and the craftsman made it happen.

Arnold00:30:44

Wow.So, Joel, you mentioned something that I thought was very interesting, that we have this wonderful architecture here in the city, and we need to leverage it a little bit more. I want to piggyback that with the team that you have. The rest of the team back at Trevor's is how is it.And why is it important to have the diverse perspective that you guys have as an architectural firm? And how does that translate into leveraging how a city can leverage what it has? In other words, I'm trying to talk.We have all these different silos of people and groups that represent a variety of things out in our community, but it seems like we can never get them all together to focus in one direction, to really leverage what we have. So how do you guys. How do you guys leverage what.

Joe00:31:31

That's a tall order.

Arnold00:31:33

How do you guys leverage what you. Have within your office with the diverse group that you have?

Joe00:31:37

I would actually take that another step further and talk about our team in the bigger picture on projects where we've got lots of consultants that don't work for us engineers and all sorts of other consultants that help us navigate all of those things.

Mark00:31:54

Things.

Joe00:31:54

And that really is the whole team on some of these larger projects, the number of people involved in the design Process is probably close to a hundred, and so that's really the full team. But I appreciate the awareness of our team, and we do have a great team.And recruiting is arguably one of the probably top three things that we have to do as a firm to maintain the level that we are to stay competitive and to stay as. As good at the things that we do to maintain that skill. We have to recruit the best people all the time, and that's a challenge.But once you do have all those voices and people from different schools. We talked about that a little bit earlier. Different schools teach slightly differently, and having those different backgrounds helps.Also having interior designers in our office and architects, we. We go to school and we're learning very different things, and we really approach projects in a very different way, and that's important, too.So all of that does get blended together.

Joel00:32:57

I think it ought to continue with Joe's thought. There is the. As you mentioned earlier, Arnold, the listening aspect is critical.And I think no matter who it is, on our office, we really emphasize the fact of listening to what the client is saying, and not just what they're saying, but really what they're meaning to say behind that. And sometimes you have to dig a little deeper to understand, you know, what it is about that.And I think for us to solve complex problems, we have to ask hard questions sometimes and go a little deeper into what it is they're trying to say. And so if you.You have to create a culture of being comfortable with asking those questions and having people that are there that have the desire to have a vision of the future that's better than what we have of the present.And so by everything that Joe said of finding the right people to bring into the firm and the diverse backgrounds, and couple that with this thought and mentality to be able to make a positive difference, we really try to foster that culture within our office.

Amy00:34:01

Yeah, I think we know that diverse teams perform better. There's all kinds of research studies that prove that. And so we are intentionally trying to create a team with as much diversity as we can.Because added to Joe's list of people working on a project, our client team is also a huge. The primary stakeholder in any project. And they have their own consultants with their own backgrounds.And so the more we can offer our clients in terms of perspectives and backgrounds and viewpoints and all of that, it's only going to serve them better and allow us to communicate better with our clients, too.

Arnold00:34:37

I have a question about. Lead is a big thing. Has been a big thing in the architectural world for a while.Aspects for those people who really don't, I think they understand maybe a superficial view of sustainability. Give us some aspects, some attributes of sustainability in what you do on a daily basis and what you design. Yeah, you're all elite certified.

Joel00:35:05

Amy's been setting the. Just the aspect of reusing the existing buildings is really a wonderful starting point. And to mark.Sometimes you can't reuse it, sometimes you can and you have to move on from that. But there's 3 billion square feet of underutilized square footage in the United States.So we have housing shortages, we have misalignment of where that's used.So there isn't necessarily a huge rush to go out and build new square footage, especially when you're having a hard time in a slow growth region like we have here. So what can you do to reuse the resources that you have? And starting with the existing structure.You have existing structure, you have existing envelope that can be up to 35% of what you put into the building right off the bat. And that's a huge starting point. Then you add in new system upgrades and take a building that is even.We're looking at a building right now that was built in the late 90s and upgrading its H vac system. Just by repurposing that, changing out the lighting, we can save them hundreds of thousands of dollars a year in operational costs.Thinking just beyond tear down, redo, start over, it's how can we supplement, how can we make best of what we've got and how to interject new technologies, even existing buildings that we have old windows. I think a lot of things we do.Joe mentioned we do a lot of work with Wash U even retaining existing windows, but putting historic storm windows on those to reduce the energy or increase the energy performance. And the R value of those windows is something pretty simple and rather inexpensive that you can do.So it's just thinking about it a little bit different way than you would, you know, from an existing building.If you start with an existing building and a LEED Platinum building, it's going to take 10, 15 years for that lead platinum building just to equal the amount of resources that goes into that embodied carbon and everything that goes into an existing building to catch up to it.

Arnold00:36:57

Because is it the firm's goal or is it the architectural goal? Was it 2035 about carbon? Quote that for me because I know I don't have that correct. Carbon free or.

Joel00:37:07

Yeah. And essentially net zero by 2030 on carbon. We've got a Tough road to climb to get to that point as a collective society.

Joe00:37:17

Yeah, we signed on to that challenge officially stating that we would do everything we can to get ourselves there. But to Joel's point, it's it. That's a tall order. And a big part of any project's sustainable goals is what the owner wants.All too often we have, and I would say honestly, in my opinion, if there's ever misalignment between us and the clients, it's usually on that the first cost of those things can be higher. To take the steps that you need to do a building correctly the first time, that cost can be higher.But you have to understand the payoff and the value to that going forward. And if some clients have a plan to not hold a building as long or things like that, then that's going to be tough to convince them of.And also I think that in general the public has to get a little more educated about that and has to understand that these are important things. And right now that's not the case across the board.

Arnold00:38:14

That's true. So here's a big question.Looking historically, architecture has gone through a lot of different kind of design phases, which I think you probably would understand. Maybe I'm thinking there's Romanesque, there's Renaissance, there's mid century modern, blah, blah, blah, blah.But also some structural and foundation and maybe some theoretical basis and phases also. Where do you see architecture going in the future if you put your crystal ball hat on?

Joel00:38:48

One of the changes I feel like we're seeing is as we talked a little bit earlier about this listening aspect of architecture.For so long, architecture was this master builder come in and you dictate the design and this is what you're getting where the architect's the master thinker behind it all.And I think we're really seeing maybe a shift away from that mentality because as Amy was talking about, the diverse makeup of our team and our clients and that just doesn't, doesn't work for those solutions.There's very complex problems that need to be solved and not one person is going to be able to take that because they have of innate biases in their own way that they approach certain things. And so you need a lot of different voices at the table.And so I think the firms that are successful bringing those together are going to be the ones that really have to me the best aspect of in the future of architecture. Because the climate issue isn't going away. And so we've got to be able to deal with that.And those are going to be hard problems and we're going to need a lot of minds to put that to help solve that.

Amy00:39:56

I'd maybe go back to our both and comment on the form versus function.I'm just sitting here thinking about it, but I think there's renewed appreciation for artistry and things that are beautiful and things that make you feel good, that meet. But we also need our buildings to function and perform well and be good for the planet and be good for the people that are living in them.So I hope that the future is blending those two, figuring out how to create solutions that perform really well, but also make people feel good and are lovely to look at. Maybe we create a building that's your new favorite building toolkit, but yeah, I hope that it's both. Yeah.

Joe00:40:43

I had a very similar question in one of my final exams in school and I was struggling with how to write that answer. And the answer that I wrote was, the only thing I know for sure is it's going to continue to change. And I left it at that.And I got literally a letter from the professor saying that's the answer I've been looking for a long time. I don't know. I don't think any of us really know. I know it's going to change.I know that what we do is somewhat reactive to what's going on in the world and in society and we have to adapt if we're going to be successful, where society going to go. As Joel said, this climate change stuff isn't going away and society is going to need us to react to that.That's going to become an increasingly important part of what we do and that will change the way we put buildings together. There's no question about it.So I also think that there's going to be revolutionary change in the materials and things that we use to put buildings together. I worry that someday that is going to make what we do a lot adaptive, reuse close to impossible.But there's probably technology that's going to be developed to deal with those buildings too, that we don't even understand right now. I would say it's going to be a lot different than it is now. And I don't know what it's going to be.

Arnold00:42:01

You know what's interesting, Mark, is a lot of people do not consider architecture art, but it really is. It's. Oh yeah, it's a.Because what you just said made perfect sense to me in the realm of art and music and dance and because you're reacting to things around you in the environment and technological changes. And you have to incorporate those in what you do on an ongoing basis. And then something else comes in is how does that fit into this? Yeah, that.And I see artists have done that. I see musicians have done. The dancers have done that. Literary arts does that, you know, and it's just it.You can't just view like an old building as well.

Mark00:42:41

That's.

Arnold00:42:41

That was built in the 1890s because the inside might be totally modern. And you have to see how everything. The amalgamation of our culture and society has pushed architecture as an art forward even more.

Mark00:42:55

The architectural design of so many buildings is just beautiful. It's just. It is, it's an art, it's an artistic expression. I think of the architects.

Arnold00:43:05

Yeah.

Mark00:43:05

And like you say, what's going on around us in our day to day things. Yeah. There's so many buildings, so many things that you can talk about that just are so weird. On Kings highway, the new apartments or condos on.Right over there by the, by the Chase Park Plaza. That's artistic to me. It's different. It's not the same.

Joel00:43:26

Old Amy was talking about the joy and beauty in buildings and we as Joe was talking about the change in society and how what we're responding to, we have a decision to make. We live in the environment that we construct. This is not dictated to us.We have a decision to be able to create the environment that we want to live in.So if we, we talk about the craftsmanship and the artistry, at some point when we were doing these types of buildings a hundred years ago, there was a desire to do that, there was a passion, there was expectation that what we created for ourselves was beautiful and functional. And it's up to us to be able to still demand that and expect that out of the environment that we reside and we call home.

Arnold00:44:10

I think that's demand and expect that because we've kind of lowered the bar a little bit in our society as far as what we expect out of things because we've become a very throwaway society. And I think we need to raise that back a little bit. Get that back. Question I always ask artists, musicians or literary arts people or those who draw.You have somebody listening who is thinking about a career in architecture.What do you tell them to do to continue this, to build that feeling, that desire to do that, and what things should they do to enhance their chances in architectural school and beyond?

Amy00:44:51

First I would say travel, study other buildings, look at other architecture.But as someone who transferred into architecture, I would also say it's never too late, and you don't have to take the classes in high school or whatever. The career can be and should be for everyone. And we need everyone. So reach out. We get calls.We host a shadow day in the summer for high school students or early college students who want to see what architecture is like. It's pretty different than what portrayed on television. That's one of the things I love about it. Every day is different.And I also think there's a place for everyone. You can be a technical architect who maybe can't hand draw things beautifully.You can draw a beautiful detail, or you can be a conceptual architect who has a great big idea paired with someone else who knows how to execute the idea. So you don't have to have all of the things that go into architecture to be part of a really great team.So reach out to us, reach out to firms that you admire, reach out to. People love talking about their work, and they'll most often call you that.

Arnold00:45:55

Okay.

Joel00:45:57

I often say our superpower of our profession is to continue to see things not as they are, but as they could be.And so I think anybody who walks around this world and imagines a different world and imagines how something could be changed or different, I would say to follow that curiosity, because there's a lot of times we'll say, oh, my gosh, that could be that. And somebody say, I've never thought of it that way. And so I think there's some something to that curiosity and slowing down.I think Amy's point about travel is great because you start to see things in a different light. And I always say when you travel, you don't only necessarily learn about where you are, but where you're from.And I think it's a wonderful reflection if you just stop and look at a building. So often we're just taking a picture. We saw it, and we move on.But if you just sit there and study, understand the proportions and the makeup and the detailing and how the light works, and you just sit there and observe for a while, you have to take a moment and take it in and just not be in a rush. You start to see the world a little bit differently than maybe you did before. And if that's in you, then pursue it.

Joe00:47:05

Those are good answers, and I would have probably said parts of those. But I would also add to that.I think the most important thing that I learned very early on when I was still in school was through working for a construction company and actually witnessing construction every day. And seeing what happened and interacting with carpenters and plumbers and people just solving the problems of it.Because a lot of people today come out of architecture school not really understanding how a building actually goes together. And it is what we do. After all. We're drawing directions for them to do this stuff.And if you can be more informed about how it actually gets built, that would be my advice to young people.

Arnold00:47:48

I'm sure there's contractors that have come back to you and said, thanks for that detail. That really saved me thinking about this. Or I was able to put that together a lot quicker than if I hadn't had that.

Joe00:47:58

Oh, yeah, yeah. And really when they're questioning us, it's because they have to. They've got to get it done. They have to make it work.And if we haven't given them enough information, they're stuck. And that's an important part of it. But also, I think you do a better job of it when you know how it really goes together.Because then you can really achieve your goal in a way that's achievable by the contractor. If you give them something that you think looks the way you want but is going to be really hard to build, that's not going to be successful.It's being able to actually execute the idea and the vision in a way that's practical and can get done.

Mark00:48:35

Is knowing math important to being an architect? Is that that's something I should be studying. I hate calculus.

Amy00:48:44

I think it's more the ability to solve problems analytically, which sometimes does involve math. But perhaps you could go at it a different way. I love math.

Arnold00:48:55

But Google.

Joe00:48:56

Well, we all have tools that do it for us now. Complex geometry. We don't work it out by doing equations on the notebook anymore. It's all done in our computers.

Mark00:49:05

And so you don't have a slide rule anymore?

Joe00:49:07

Yeah, no, don't use that slide, actually. But I don't use it, Mark.

Joel00:49:12

The worst grades I got in college were in calculus.

Mark00:49:16

Good to hear.

Amy00:49:17

And it takes the team, right?

Joel00:49:18

That's right.

Amy00:49:19

Do the math.

Arnold00:49:19

That's like how CAD has changed. What you guys do is just crazy.

Joel00:49:24

And it's gone from hand drawing, even in our time span of hand drawing to cad. Now it's three dimensional building and we're creating a three dimensional model. Crazy as we draw.

Mark00:49:35

It's unbelievable.

Arnold00:49:36

And then you can, you can put the people in the building and people see what's up.

Joel00:49:40

Yeah. Right now we use VR and we're able to put our clients in the building so they can see it. And they're like, oh, this is what it's like.And they're like, oh, yeah, this, as you try to describe it and explain it, and sometimes you just can't see it. People can't read plans like we can, so it's important for them to experience it.And if they can do that early in the design process, we hope they're going to be as satisfied in the end.

Mark00:50:02

Some people are very visual. They're very visual.

Arnold00:50:04

Yeah. Trying to translate a 2D design into a 3D in your head is that's what these folks do?

Mark00:50:11

Yep.

Arnold00:50:14

It's really been an honor to have you guys in and to help celebrate the 50th anniversary of Trivers and congratulations to what you guys have done and what you're going to be doing, what you're working on and those projects that haven't even dropped in the lap yet. Kudos for all the great work that you've done and helping sustain our community and keep it pressing forward.So thank you very much for coming in and talking about.

Joe00:50:37

Thank you for having us.

Mark00:50:39

Yeah.

Arnold00:50:40

Okay, Mark, that's all for the show today. We. We.

Mark00:50:44

That's all you got?

Arnold00:50:45

Bucked up. I've got more, but I really have a great joke. I know I have some mental floss and I have some other things, but if. Do you have some days of the.

Mark00:50:53

Day or just a couple. This is for Joel International Youth Day, because Joel did the. The Early Childhood Center. So it's National Youth Day. Milkman Day.Did you ever have a milkman come to your.

Arnold00:51:04

Yes.

Mark00:51:04

In your neighborhood?

Arnold00:51:05

Yes, I did.

Mark00:51:05

And we used to go out and ask for ice because they'd have big blocks of ice. So they'd chip the ice off and they'd give them to the kids in the neighborhood. And how my teeth are still good, I have no idea.But they used to do that. That's right. Oh, here's a good one. Middle Child Day.

Arnold00:51:19

Oh, I'll celebrate that.

Mark00:51:22

We got a couple hands raised. I know. Let's see.

Arnold00:51:26

Stable ones.

Mark00:51:27

I know. It's Mother's Day in Thailand and your favorite, National Gooey Buttercake day.

Arnold00:51:34

That's the St. Louis thing.

Mark00:51:35

Yes, it is. All right.

Arnold00:51:37

I thought this is some mental floss. There are some playgrounds around the United States that have some very integrative, innovative playgrounds.One is in Brooklyn, the Domino park playground. It sits on the side of the old Domino Sugar Refinery and was. They used the.The manufacturing place there to help give the kids a de facto journey through the sugar production process. There's the city museum here in St. Louis. Very well known, very popular. 30 total slides, three on the roof, a five story one.You got a bus and a plane and a Ferris wheel on top. There's another one in Greensboro, Alabama. It's called Lions Park Playscape.It's constructed entirely out of 55 gallon galvanized drums, 3,000 of them. And they used to hold mint oil and so they create a maze. Then there's the Little Debbie park in Collegedale, Tennessee. Little Debbie Park.It's very sweet park and with play structures modeled after Nutty Buddies, Cosmic Brownies and oatmeal cream pies. The Chattanooga area park sits on land donated by the McKee Foods, the company that makes Little Debbies. And there's a playground.It's a civic pride for the city and the company's employees. So just some interesting kinds of things there.

Mark00:52:58

I love it. Okay, great.

Arnold00:53:01

We won't do a joke today. Mark.

Mark00:53:03

If you have just moments, you can probably sneak one in if it's really bad.

Arnold00:53:07

Okay.

Mark00:53:08

Which is not hard for you if it's really bad.

Arnold00:53:10

I know. Here's one. It's so hot.

Mark00:53:14

Yeah. How hot is it?

Arnold00:53:15

Farmers are feeding their chickens crushed ice to keep them from laying hard boiled eggs.

Mark00:53:25

Oh, come on. You're almost done here. You got 30 seconds.

Arnold00:53:29

My whole life, I never read a warning label telling me not to eat laundry detergent or put glue in my hair. Somehow I just knew.

Mark00:53:39

I'm with you on that one. I know it. Do you really have to tell people that?

Arnold00:53:43

Yep, you do. Well, that's all for this hour, folks. Thanks for listening.If you've enjoyed this episode, you can listen to additional shows@sdtlTune.com Consider leaving a review on our website, Apple Podcasts, Podchaser, or your preferred podcast platform. Your feedback helps us reach more listeners and continue to grow.I want to thank Bob Berthisel for our theme music, our sponsor, Better Rate Mortgage. Our guests From Trivers Architecture, trivers.com and co host Mark Langston. And we thank you for being a.Part of our community of curious minds. St. Louis Intune is a production of Motif Media Group and the US Radio Network.Remember to keep Seeking, keep learning, walk Worthy, and Let yout light shine for St. Louis in tune. I'm Arnold Stricker.

Mark00:54:41

Sam.