My mother bought me an M.C. Escher puzzle when I was seven and the image is still stuck in my head connecting my thoughts. Fascination with William Morris and the fabric designs of his Arts & Crafts period later motivated me to think about repeatable patterns and tessellation. I first started playing with creating patterns by joining triangles as I was both obsessed with them and fascinated with Buckminster Fuller's career, and had taken courses on Tensegrity Towers and Geodesic Domes. Everything I did in the 80's started with a triangle. 

I suppose I've had an obsession with the pencil my whole life. As far as I'm concerned, all ideas seep from the tip of a pencil. In 1983, my pencil fever spiked, and a voice inside me said I HAD TO BUILD a GIANT PENCIL. Perhaps an appreciation for Claus Oldenburg contributed, but I realized that as this was my last year in Architecture School, and a Giant Pencil NEEDED to be built and then suspended from the rafters of the Centrum (the large indoor courtyard) of the School of Architecture at the University of Arizona in Tucson.

In 2019, we were contacted by Bengal Engineering asking if we'd like to join their team as architectural consultant for a new Santa Barbara Public Works project.

It all begins with an idea.

When I was offered the task of remodeling a dark 1960s home on Santa Barbara's Riviera, it raised red flags. Designing on the Riviera is never easy as neighbors tend to be extra sensitive about any changes to properties near them. But the clients are good friends and one of them is the world's greatest art teacher, so I ignored the flags and said yes. 

By the time I got accepted to the University of Arizona's College of Architecture, neon signs were a part of my family’s DNA. Vacations amounted to taking photos of neon signs (Ektachrome 100, aperture wide open). To take it one step further, the motel or restaurant with the best neon sign would be the establishment we would choose, while we boycotted any business with a Mansard roof. We have slide carousels full of beautiful neon signs from all over the West. Many of those signs are now gone.