Atelier ~ Mark Downing

Antique Japanese Gates

2011-06-12T12:35:00.000-07:00

The Portland Japanese Garden is one of the most wonderful gardens in a city of wonderful gardens. The Japanese garden, of course is very special in its devotion to authenticity of plantings and the built environment.

The Garden asked me to rebuild their antique entry gates. These are original from Japan apparently they were the entry to a samuri's home garden two hundred years ago.

When I came to be involved in the project the gates were showing alot of age, they were sagging with the large corner joints gapeing open. Some of the massive door frames were dry rotted.

Nonetheless they radiated power and greatness. Each door is basically an outer frame that is about 3 inches thick and 8 inches wide housing a panel that is a single piece of wood over 4 feet wide and about 6 feet tall.

I'm going to repeat myself. a single piece of wood 4 feet wide and 6 feet tall.

The tree it came from 200 years ago must have been about 8 feet wide.

When I got these doors into my shop I slowly removed the damaged wood and exposed very complex joinery that was cut by a master craftsman two hundred years ago.
That is humbling and intimidating.
I'll let the photographs tell the story..........

This last picture is of a prototype joint in the header over the doors.

Nice fit.

Doors

2011-03-30T09:07:00.000-07:00

Create your own video slideshow at animoto.com.

Newel Post and Handrail

2011-03-13T11:01:00.000-07:00

The artists studio I built a few years ago needed a new handrail and newel post.

Patricia had been given a large irregular billet of western maple. We both went at it with aggressive power tools. I used a small chainsaw to do the rough forming and Patricia used a power woodcarving chisel.

Patricia pulled an antique glass fishing net float out of deep storage and we incorporated at the top of the newel.

The handrail and guardrail are made of 1 1/2" diameter copper plumbing pipe. the connections and transitions I formed out of scraps from the original billet.

Downstairs, we kept with the organic style and put up coat hooks and a small rail.

My Own Fireplace Project

2011-03-11T12:11:00.000-08:00

A couple posts ago I wrote about my own fireplace remodel. I have now finished the work outside.

It took a long time to get to this point.

The old chimney was tipping away from the house severely. All of the stucco on this, the south side of the house had long ago failed.

The domino effect was in full swing in this project. I had anticipated most of the scope of the project. Out came the old chimney down to and including the minimal foundation. the failed stucco mostly fell off of its own accord. I stripped the lath off to expose and examine the sheathing. Everything looked pretty sound.

The block and brickwork all went up pretty quickly. Building the chimney on a new foundation took about a week in all.

While the masons worked on that I installed diagonal strapping over the old sheathing as part of my siesmic upgrade.

After a new electric panel base I was only too happy to cover everything back up and stucco. I didn' like how the stucco wall terminated along its bottom edge so I designed a skirt that I intend to carry around the house as I remodel it. In the bottom left corner of this photo you can see the 5"steel "U" channel (in grey) that is epoxy bolted into the concrete wall and attaches to that diagonal steel strap I showed earlier.

The chimney pot is a flower pot we've had around. I cut the bottom out of it and stuck it on top of the chimney.

The herringbone tile is cheap Home Depot carrera 1' x 1' floor tiles that I sawed into small rectangles and set as herringbone. I'm quite pleased with how it turned out.

The bracket is forged iron, I had Arnon Kartmazov make for me a long time ago. I plan to hang a future lantern from it.

We found the chicken at Pratt and Larsen seconds and couldn't resist bringing it home.

Carriage House - Bed and Breakfast

2010-11-12T17:23:00.000-08:00

I recently revisited a project I did some years ago.

It's so very beautiful.

Originally a large eastern Washington wheat farm, the property has been converted into a winery and bed and breakfast.

This is the equipment storage barn. In its past life it was a simple open faced gable roofed barn.

I enclosed it with panels to look like doors and we developed the entire center entry with stonework, arched opening, cupola, 9' high oak doors opening into barrel storage facilities, Europeon chandelier, and arched glass doors on the back side.

The door hardware is custom forged by my good friend Arnon Kartmazov at Bridgetown Forge .

We built an addition on one end of the building........

........and created a lovely B&B accomodation.

LONGREACH

2010-09-02T11:20:00.000-07:00

My wife Fern, and I, have named our home "Longreach".

The name has double meaning for us.
In the world of sailing, a reach is a powerful exhilarating sail where the boat often seems to rise out of the water and fly.
Also, this home has been a long time in coming into our lives, a long reach.

The fireplace original to the house had long ago failed. It had significant cracks and was leaning decidedly toward the neighbor's house. A year ago we decided to tear it down and build a new one. This project tripped an array of dominoes throughout the house that coincidentally needed attention. Its always amazing how much extra work is involved in creating an elegant, graceful, seemingly simple product.

The firebox interior is a herringbone of firebrick "splits". bricks that are half the thickness of regular bricks. They create a much finer look inside the firebox.

The fireplace itself is a modified Rumford design. The throat of the fireplace is much more streamlined and the back and sides are angled to reflect heat more efficiently. I found Jim Buckley of The Buckley Rumford Company to be an astonishing resource in building this. I would highly recommend that before anyone designs a fireplace that they contact him first for technical advice.

The facade is five large 2' x 2' travertine tile cut to fit around the lintel. The lintel and bases are a dense hard dark green stone we found in the remnants yard at The Stone Center. I hand drew the lettering in Autocad and asked Peter Andrusko to carve it for me. Peter is an amazing craftsman. He is a professional stone carver with a studio in Oregon City. He is very well known and thought of in the world of custom stone carving and big commercial projects. Among his many commissions, he has worked for Maya Lin.

The hearth is Carerra Marble scraps I cut into tiles and laid as a herringbone in a green marble border.

The antelope is "Stanley" he's been with me a long time. I "bagged him" in a pawn shop in Bend, Oregon.

Kitchen Cabinetry

2010-04-14T08:14:00.000-07:00

I generally don't get involved with kitchen cabinet production but this project called to me.

A client saw an antique European butchershop work cabinet in a magazine and was struck by its suitability and beauty as an island cabinet for his kitchen. He sent me these pictures of it, cut from a magazine.

The cabinet is nine feet long and four feet wide. The top is a central piece of honed Cararra marble flanked by two pieces of eastern maple butcher block six inches thick.

It is built of eastern ash.

My client wanted to indent one side so that people could sit at it while visiting with the cook. We both wanted it to look totally authentic. I constructed all doors and exterior panels with true mortice and tenon joinery that was pinned together with oak dowels visible in the corners of all doors and side panels.

The hinges are Europeon, each solid brass measuring six inches tall. Each leaf of the hinge is buried in the door frame or the face of the cabinet and secured with one small brass pin.

The cabinet door knob is a modified entry doorknob purchased from a local antique store. Decorative brass medallions decorate the centers of all the panels and are arrayed around the top. Two of them serve to cover the electric outlets.

Furthermore the owner had a cow's head cast in bronze to punctuate the end panels.

One of the many benefits of my work is that I get to meet and collaborate with truly great craftspeople. Bobby Bigger is such a person. He did all of the lathe work creating the pilasters. His work is stunning. He is a national treasure.

Inside the interior is painted yellow ochre which is very traditional. It brightens up the interior and looks terrific.

The drawers are hung on modern undermount full extension hardware by Blume. I hand dovetailed the drawers.

The finish was done by Rosemont Design, another group of great crafts people.

This was such great fun to build.

A Bay Window

2009-08-13T09:50:00.000-07:00

I have always deeply enjoyed the work of Edwin Lutyns and CFA Voysey.

Recently I was asked to design a bay window for a hipped roof stucco ranch.

My client wanted to create a very special, whimsical feel to her office retreat.

Hearing this. I took the opportunity to go immediately to Edwin Lutyens design of "Goddards". The result was delightful.

These were the pictures I was working from as I changed what was made of brick and stone to beautiful douglas fir.

Exterior....

Interior...

The interior walls of the bay were extended to create the end panels of bookcases These again were douglas fir. I carved a large trillium in the upper left and right hand panel.

... a lot of fun.

Here's what it looks like installed.

A view from outside (not yet fully painted).

A Remote Spirit Lodge

2009-04-07T07:18:00.000-07:00

Some years ago I became involved in a joint venture between Ecotrust and the Haisla First Nation in an unusual venture to preserve a quarter million acres of virgin Pacific Northwest rainforest. This adjoined an existing three quarters of a million acres of preserve that would be returned to the protection and management of the Haisla First Nation.

They wanted to build a structure on a remote bench of land that was the gateway to that wilderness.

The geography of that area is snow capped, mountainous, deeply incised by profound indigo salt water fjords. These fjords penetrate a hundred miles into the mountain system. Mountains rise sheer from the deep waterways dripping boisterous waterfalls, cloaked in mossy spruce and cedars and dramatic ice polished granite faces hundreds of feet tall.

The topography is vertical.

At the mouth of the Kowesas River valley is a small unusually flat rock shelf. This was to be a staging area and entry for logging operations in that valley.

Ecotrust approached me to talk about the feasibility of building a small cabin on that shelf. There the Haisla could use to lay claim to their ancestral homeland and possibly thwart logging development.

I responded that I would be delighted to be involved in such a project and that I would like the structure to be something that would be a statement of the deep spirit of the Haisla Nation.

And so I began three of the most wonderful and difficult summers of my life.

Logistics were a significant hurdle. The Kowesas River Valley was a three hour jet boat ride from the end of the road. The only other access was float plane. That was how I arrived at the beginning of the season with my plane load of tools.

The first summer we established a construction camp. There was already a trapper’s cabin there that three or four of us shared with a city of mice and a pine martin with a lot of attitude.

Two Haisla men, Frank and John, became the mill men. They got into a jet boat early every morning with chainsaws, raingear, my cutting list, and peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. They went to nearby river bars and milled all log posts, spectacular beams, other lumber supplies. They returned at the end of the day with my next days construction supplies in tow.

Back in camp, we had a cook, George, who kept our bellies full and our morale high. He also lent his back to the construction. We had a supply boat arrive every two weeks and it brought food, fuel, mail, volunteers, and clean laundry.

This is what we got built in the first three months.

The foundation is 15 laid granite columns and one existing boulder.

The posts are whole logs averaging two feet in diameter, cut to fit the irregular stone bases. A steel rod pins the center of the post to the foundation.

The tidal range there averaged fifteen feet and that diurnal lift was crucial to our ability to move huge logs and beams. We also had a large supply of winches, come-alongs, snatch blocks, and line.

The posts are cut halfway up in an unusual joint that allows the floor beams to pass through them with a “Lincoln Log” type joint. The upper half of the post is replaced, straddling the joint.

The structure is traditional mortise and tenon construction pinned with 1” oak pins. No bolts, no nails.

The exterior walls are slabs of clear old growth Red Cedar 2” thick, averaging 2 feet wide and 9 feet tall placed in a slot in the bottom sill and stopped to the underside the overhead beam. We battened between the slabs.

The roof was raftered on two foot centers with rafters 4”x20” then sheathed with 1 by cedar, two inch rigid insulation and steel roofing.

We anticipated a 12’ snow load.

All doors and windows and furniture were built there.

The Kowesas lodge was a significant life event for many of us who worked on it. It was a monument to the efforts of the Haisla. We built something together that was so much bigger than what any of us could do on our own, both physically and spiritually.

It is always spiritually renewing to create such beauty. For many it was one of the few experiences of that they had.

The Haisla Nation declared that this wilderness area would be alcohol and drug free and so for many who lived and worked there it was a very important opportunity to enjoy long term sobriety while living in an extremely beautiful and creative place.

Upon completion the Haisla celebrated with a massive feast, a three day salmon barbecue, with ceremonies and traditional dancing, chanting, carved masks, button blankets and magical carved rattles late into the night.

The Lodge still stands.

The Kowesas valley remains wild, rich in wolf packs, grizzly bears, and big beautiful trees.

An Art Studio For Patricia

2008-12-17T11:58:00.000-08:00

Patricia is an artist in many media although glass & fiber occupy her primarily. She is a constant creative delightful person. When we first met she told me she wanted to recreate her longtime home into an artspace inspired by spirit and whimsy. The original house had become, for her, profoundly dreary - a northwest ranch style built in the mid seventies.

Working together, we designed an upstairs studio with a second floor porch large enough for her to comfortably install her harness loom, all sheltered by a large dramatic sweeping new roof.

On the south we designed and built a large array of arched topped windows.

At a later date Patricia plans to create glass panels that fit into these frames.

The doors onto the porch and the porch ceiling itself also have the same characteristic re curving form. In clear vertical grain fir they are stunning. Seen from the outside the upstairs windows were combined with the lower level studio window array to create a single effect.

Downstairs the garage got a new array of windows on the south wall, and an entry area that allows for a stairway up to the studio and a newer all glass overhead door. The garage turned studio will be used for wet work like felting.

Patricia teaches quite a lot and so these studios were designed to be accessible without entry into her home.

On the outside, seen from the west, the upstairs covered porch roof sweeps down to a gracefully curved termination. The trellis for the living room gives the roof line one last bounce.

Here are a few more views of this project:

Inside and Outside

2006-03-23T20:17:00.000-08:00

Originally this was the central machinery barn and horse stable for the farm. I dramatically redesigned the center section creating two large wine barrel storage rooms on each side of this spectacular atrium. The chandelier and round window are from a trip to Europe. The 10' high doors on the left and also unseen to the right are quartersawn white oak hung on custom forged bronze hinges.

Table, Cabinets

2006-03-23T20:14:00.000-08:00

The table shown above was designed around a single plank of honduras mahogany. Its lower structure is quartersawn white oak. It is entirely traditionally constructed with mortices and tenons. At the far end is a small sink.

The cabinets below are from a kitchen I designed and built. They are southern longleaf yellow pine with a complex multiple glaze finish. The wall paneling in the background is of the same material. The countertop is of carrera marble.

Winery Entry

2006-03-21T20:12:00.000-08:00

This entire entryway is new to this barn. The timberframe work was constructed of fir beams salvaged from an old drydock in Astoria. The cant of the entryway roof matches the barn's roof. The columns and wall behind are stucco. The door, 9' high , 4' wide, and 3" thick, is of quartersawn white oak. This is the same material the hundreds of french wine barrels behind it are made of.

I designed the handrail below as a part of the overall interior design. My good friend and blacksmith, Arnon Kartmazov forged it. The railing is bronze and the ballusters are stainless steel.