The American suburbs are rich with scalar contrasts. Big box stores face small shops and detached homes commonly look onto malls. Rather than to understand this vernacular merely as fast and cheap, this project appreciates it as an American attitude towards scale. Big box stores exhibit a surprising amount of architectural imagination. Look closely, and one can see the vestiges of architectural elements in their cladding. Roofs are frequently flattened into false fronts, paneling systems, or even layers of paint faades allude to domestic proportions to break up the monotony of vast scales. The effect is a building type that tries to hide its bigness.

Studio Gallery is an 1800 sq. ft. building that tries to hide its smallness. The exterior is clad in a cement board, rendering the light frame construction into a monolithic form. Its massing has a long proportion. Apertures on the north side bring daylight into what appears on the south side as a closed box. And on the interior, two suspended walls divide a shed-like room to carry natural light deep into the gallery.

Location: Virginia

Program: Painting studio and gallery

Client: 70-something artist

Date: 2019 -

Structural: Lynch Mykins

Team: Jacqueline Wong, Taylor Halamka, Toshiko Niimi, Mark Bavoso, Toby Chan

Publications: Fulfilled: Architecture, Excess, and Desire