Valentine Map

Another clever, sweet and creative idea from a husband to his wife. He said to me: "I met my wife in Savannah, at Forsyth Park, while in grad school at SCAD. I want give her this map for Valentines day (it is our 10 year anniversary) and I was wondering if you could add in a little red heart near the fountain in the park. Nothing too big, a subtle touch of red."

LOVE it.

You Warm My Winter

Winter Break time has allowed my mind wander some and go where it wants to go. Love - go figure. I've noticed Valentine's stuff at the grocery (some say they've seen Cadbury eggs at some shops - what?) so I know I am far behind the marketing machine. This is not marketing. It's from the heart. <3

I woke up with some ideas this morning and have designed this little sentiment into a special note card - for your Valentine or your sweetheart any old wintery time.

Envelopes are slate or natural, sealed with a big red heart printed on the back flap. You can get one HERE in my shop.

Eastport MAINE

Historic District  EASTPORT MAINE  Tides Museum, K. Sparenborg
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The Director of the Tides Museum & Institute of Art, reflecting on my This is Savannah Vol. 2 book, asked if I would consider making similar drawings for another town - in particular, a small water town on the northeast coast of Maine called Eastport. Dream job? Yes! 


Eastport boomed in the late 1800s with ship-building, sustained through the mid-1900s with sardine-canning, but slumbered as industry went quiet in the later 1900s.  With an eye toward preservation of the architectural fabric of Eastport's Water Street and an investment in the capacity of art to engender architectural appreciation and preservationist sentiment, I was asked to draw the streetscape at Eastport's heart to produce a Print for sale and museum exhibition. It is finally finished and a big box of prints is on their way to Maine!

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Virginia Tech College of Architecture: Visual Readings Exhibit, Lost Communities of Virginia

 Visual Readings: The Designer's Language

Cowgill Hall Lobby  --  November 17-18 2011

"On the occasion of recognizing the new book, Lost Communities of Virginia...a book sale and author signing features extensive displays of photography and hand sketches by Kirsten [Sparenborg] and many current architecture students at Virginia Tech.

Panel's of Kirsten's long history of sketches and photography are hung alongside the collective visual work by student residents of the Spring 2011 Semester at Virginia Tech's Center for European Studies and Architecture in Switzerland. Also included is recent student seminar work with analysis of three small town in Southwest Virginia: Shawsville, Snowville and Simmonsville.

This exhibit focuses on the core necessity that design education must cultivate an acute ability for visual literacy. Lost Communities of Virginia, and the ongoing work of our students to study, record and understand our towns, strengthens valuable research in making better human settlements.

Custon cabinet by my friend and former Architecture classmate, BJ Harris.

The best part was to speak to students and re-connect with Professors Egger (photo), Albright, Dunay, Clements, Braaten and Dean Davis.

Wedding in Pulaski Square

I've waited many months to tell the story of Melanie and Kenny. It's a good one. 

Pulaski Square  Savannah GA

Today is their wedding day. A year and a half ago, they lived in Savannah, just a few blocks from my apartment and a few doors down from my office. I must have walked past their door several times a day. But we never knew each other. They enjoyed walks down Barnard Street, through some of the city's loveliest squares. Their favorite was Pulaski. I think it has the best trees. 

I moved to a very small town near Washington DC. Shortly after, I received an order through my etsy shop for a Savannah postcard pack. I was surprised to see the shipping address was in the small town I was in! In fact, while the order was made, I'd been out for a jog and ran right past that house. Uncanny.

Melanie and I had moved from Savannah to this small town about the same time, living within a few blocks of each other again. This time, we made the connection! She sent the postcards to her beau, Kenny, who was stationed in Afghanistan to remind him of their good times in Savannah.

One of the postcards featured the block where they'd lived. Some months later, we used this image to design save-the-date postcards for the wedding of Melanie & Kenny. The wedding would take place in Pulaski Square.

Save-the-Date postcards by turn-of-the-centuries

Marvelous moments were captured and created by photographers Jade + Matthew who documented the whole wedding in splendid sequence. This image perfectly captures the vows exchanged under the boughs of Pulaski Square.

Photo by Jade + Matthew Take Pictures

www.jadeandmatthew.com

Later, Melanie commissioned me to make a special drawing of Pulaski Square, featuring their names and wedding date. What a fantastic idea! She kept it hidden for several months until today when she will present it to her new husband as a wedding gift. See the little heart of branches at the top?

I love this Savannah love story! It makes me so happy to have been a small part of it.

Dec. 2011: This special Pulaski Square image later made great note cards for wedding gift thank-yous.

SCAD Museum of Art OPENING

Approaching Savannah from South Carolina, SCAD Museum Lantern in the skyline; Talmadge Bridge over the Savannah River (l) Oglethorpe Ave. into the West Boundary (r)

Main Entrance in one of the elliptical arch openings of the old freight house, directly below tower (l) Approaching main entrance on Turner Ave. (r)

The brick wall of the freight house, collapsed over time, gives way to the concrete wall beneath (l) Glass "jewel-box" encases another arched opening, Light sculpture by Stephen Antonakos mounted within (r) 

Museum facade along Turner Street. New concrete wall rides above brick, housing second floor classrooms. Entrance lantern, right.

Entrance lantern (l) View from terrace behind tower, overlooking courtyard to railroad stack beyond, the other skyline element in the West Boundary (r)

Museum galleries, a procession of large spaces, punctuated by brick walls of the old freight house. 

Student Green, courtyard between the Museum and the School of Building Arts, louvered wall of the "soft" gallery" beyond (l) within the "Soft gallery", sculpture by Kendall Buster

From Terrace, views west (l) and east (r) of the courtyard

Courtyard, south gallery, lanterns

Museum Courtyard during a Savannah Film Festival event, 10/29/11

This week marks the public reOPENING of the SCAD Museum of Art. Art and people fill the spaces of a former 1856 Central of Georgia railroad shed, abandoned for decades. The rugged ruin of the brick shed contains a new structure of concrete and glass suited for display, protection and education that carefully emerges from the brick walls to accent the formal beauty and natural, elegant weathering of the old building and announce its new function as a museum of art. Inside, the fresh new walls cut away at key moments to reveal the historic brick structure. The ruin, the outer shell, and the new interior shell are aesthetically opposite but in a dynamic complementary relationship: the interior concrete shell stabilizes the ruin and the ruin, the historic brick shell, lends context, variety and memory to the crisp new museum.   


The museum is a testament to the capacity and tenacity of the Savannah College of Art & Design President Paula Wallace and her team to get things done and do them right, staying true to a vision that emerged in an initial design charrette with architect Christian Sottile and his team at Sottile & Sottile in 2008. The evolution of the museum design, from charrette to final master plan, from concepts about the museum's place in the city to the paving materials for the public realm, is compiled HERE. The veracity and validity of these images now, at building completion, and their frequent reminders throughout the project, are a testament to the architects' process which emphasizes the civic, humanistic, material and memorable qualities the museum must embody. The building must engage in a dialogue of formal and material contrasts and honor the public realm by designing the pedestrian experience. The fruition of these design concepts now stands on the west side of Savannah's historic downtown. Just look for the semi-transparent glass lantern that marks the entrance like a beacon.


601 Turner Boulevard, Savannah, Georgia.
http://www.scadmoa.org/

Architectural Evolution of the SCAD Museum of Art

More information:
http://architectsandartisans.com/index.php/2011/10/in-savannah-contrasting-old-and-new/
http://www.scad.edu/news/2011/museum-exhibitions.cfm#

Eyes on the Street PHILADELPHIA

Taking a cue from Jane Jacobs, PLAN PHILLY launched a new blog called Eyes On the Street about neighborhood planning issues - the interesting ones that people like to talk about!  Perfect name. They asked me to design the web header which I was very happy to do.