Building With Words and Writing With Brick

Above anything else that I am, I am a storyteller. I am prone to devoting myself to the worlds in my head, as most storytellers are. Like all writers, I tend to commit my stories to words—language is my primary medium. But it isn’t my only.

This is why I am enthralled by architecture: I see buildings as another medium for storytelling. But, unlike books or paintings, buildings don’t stop becoming something once they’ve been built. Once started, they continue to tell themselves. 

They are a vehicle for my stories—they often help propel them in new directions I wouldn’t have otherwise deemed possible. My buildings are as much a part of The Knowers as my books. 

Skylar's House - Final

Enter Me, sophomore year. The Knowers is going through major overhaul. The Eminence isn’t born yet. I think I want to be a marine biologist, I have no idea how to draw, I have to take Scripture studies for my Catholic school’s religious curriculum. 

Yes, the Bible can be very interesting, but this specific class was more tedious than a Ted Talk on cardboard. For general notes and things, I had this fraying notebook, covered in cartoon owls, the wire binding bent so askew that it snagged at least three of my sweaters. Instead of religion notes, it mostly held doodles and fragmented story ideas and fun Bible names (hence Jacob, Thomas, and Daniel). 

One day, I began to wonder what Skylar’s house looked like. It was a Victorian, surely. Those were always my favorite. It would be partially octagonal, maybe a wraparound porch. Skylar’s room would have a lot of dimension, naturally, while Evan, her brother, would have a much more straightforward space. 

I decided to sketch it out a bit, like a floor plan.

Here, in the middle of class, I synthesized my first character-space relationship.

First drawing of Skylar's house

Architects are granted the unique ability to mold catalysts for lives. They write the first few chapters, not the whole book, so the rest of the story can write itself. Because of this, they become master storytellers that just happen to enjoy leaving their stories unfinished. They start them and watch what happens next, forgoing all control of the ending, enthralled by the promise of uncertainty. The allure is the canvas that’s only half-painted.

A story’s not as intriguing if you know what comes next, anyway.

*** skylar’s final house

I quickly bought a notebook with graph paper inside, rather than college-ruled lines. It would be easier to make my houses if I had a little more guidance. 

After I finished Skylar’s, I started Jacob’s. His house would be a little more refined than Skylar’s. A little less whimsical but no less intricate. He would need a balcony so he could see things from every angle, of course, and a window seat built for daydreaming.

He’d like that, wouldn’t he?

Plots don’t exist without conflict. Conflict can’t exist without characters. And characters, I stoutly believe, are absolutely nothing without setting.

First attempt at Jacob's house; exterior final

Jacob's House - Final

I guess I didn’t really meet Jacob until then. Yes, he was impetuous and sarcastic and had a heart the size of the moon, but what drove him? Why did he tick? He was a genius, yes, but why?

It’s a little selfish, but I used Jacob to discover what architecture was and what it had yet to become. I blamed him for my research. I told myself he needed to know how the Hirschhorn Museum in Washington, D.C. stood. He could look at a building and know when it was built and what style it was, so I had to, too. 

The lines eventually stopped being so distinguished between character and setting. For everyone, not just for Jacob. For Skylar and Hallie and Lexie and Harlow and Hunter and Orion and Alex though he didn’t really exist yet. Where they spent their time became part of them, as it becomes part of all of us.

Skylar's street

Stories, like energy, can be converted from one form to another. What can’t be told in writing may be expressed better in melody. A painting captures things that poetry misses. Photographers catch things that fashion designers overlook, and vice versa. Everyone wants to tell the story in their head, be it an epic or a stanza, and everyone has a different way of telling it. 

Media don’t exist in a vacuum—stories can coexist in multiple forms. My novels and my buildings aren’t iterations of each other; they are interdependent. They are different chapters of the same book, the melody and the bass line of the same song. One doesn’t supplement the other, just like two sculptures in the same installation are part of the same larger work.

First attempt at the island school

Island School - Final

People who know I write tend to ask me why I’m going to school for architecture and not writing. My answer is this:

Architecture is writing in material. Writing is building with words. I see very little difference between the two. My major would be storytelling either way.