David E. Sellers
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David E. Sellers (born David Edward Sellers, September 7, 1938) is an American architect based in Vermont known for using an improvisational approach to modern architecture which eventually led to what is known as design/build.[1]
His work focuses on designing and building with nature, with special emphasis on custom craftsmanship and a preference for sustainability. His work in town and community planning has received national recognition for pedestrian and human-scaled settlement patterns.
Education
Sellers received his Bachelor of Arts from Yale University in 1960. He received his Masters in Architecture at the Yale School of Architecture in 1965, studying under dean Paul Rudolph, and noted architects James Stirling, Shadrach Woods and Henning Larson. Louis Kahn who served as a design critic and professor of architecture at Yale School of Architecture from 1947 to 1957 was also an influence. The Yale Building Project was initiated during his time doing graduate work. "The design-build culture was largely initiated by two members of the class of 1965, David E. Sellers and Peter Gluck. [2] The two friends helped one another on building projects, one for Sellers' brother, and one for Gluck's parents. In 1963, Sellers and Gluck built a vacation house for Gluck's parents in Westhampton, New York. A cedar-clad house which was supported on telephone poles took two summers to build and was featured in a 1967 article in Progressive Architecture which described the young Sellers as "plunging headlong into architecture--designing, building and developing." [3]
Career
Early Work
Shortly after Yale, Sellers and his friend, William Reineke purchased a piece of land near Warren, Vermont, known by the name Prickly Mountain, while Peter Gluck embaked on projects elsewhere. From these beginnings a new way of making architecture developed, resulting in structures unmoored from architectural tradition. The design-build architectural movement in Vermont was begun.[4]
The three young architects were motivated by the idea that they could control the economics and construction of their buildings, as well as the design. At the time, Sellers was quoted as saying: "The architect is irresponsible today in...that he thinking..he has to sit in his office and wait for some client to come up and say, all right build me that. But I think the architect has got to change his whole scope if he's going to survive as an integral part of our future society. I think he's got to play the role of the entrepreneur as well." [5]
Starting, in 1974, Sellers experimented in the integration of sustainable energy and waste systems into homes by featuring various green technologies. These included passive and active solar, wood backup, super-insulation, water storage for recirculating heat, composting toilets, windmills, solar aquatic waste treatment, bio-shelter and earth shelter. Two of these experiments led to inventions that were used to start successful businesses. Namely, the Vermont Iron Stove Company, and Northwind Power.
Sellers' company designed high efficiency combustion techniques. The company has developed other innovations in .
Co-founder, Northern Power Co. to develop wind power technology. Co-founder, Vermont Iron Stove Co. to market high efficiency combustion techniques. Designed five residences featuring passive and active solar, wood backup, super-insulation, water storage for re-circulating heat, composting toilets, and/or windmills
Community Design
- Representing US at International Design conference in East Berlin, team leader for design strategies of new development in the medieval section of Berlin.
- Prickly Mountain Project (with Bill Rienecke). Ten units with solar, wind, wood-fired heat. (Published in Progressive Architecture, Global Architecture, Life Magazine, Fortune, the New York Times, Yale Alumni Magazine).
- Undertook Burlington Urban Design Study with Mayor (now Congressman) Bernie Sanders and the National Endowment. 200-year vision for Burlington, Vermont, and Chittenden County. (Winner, Progressive Architecture Design Award).
In the area of community design, David’s work has ranged from design strategies for new development in the medieval section of Berlin to the development of a solar power western village in wild landscape in harmony with wildlife. His Gesundheit Institute in West Virginia is a 425-acre community eco-village, with a health oriented focus.
His Burlington Urban Design Study, with the support of then-mayor now U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders, is a 200 year plan for the city – and this is just the beginning.
He has developed advanced concepts for “Pedestrian Villages” of the future, solar cities and, with students from Norwich University, a “Sprawl Free Vermont” on a 50-mile wide zone across the entire state along existing Amtrak lines.
Awards
- Competition winner, Green Mt. Valley School Gymnasium featuring Passive Solar design
- Competition winner, completion of St. John the Divine Cathedral of NYC: Bio-shelter
- Competition winner, Carmenet Winery, Sonoma, CA: Earth-sheltered, tunneled-in-rock design
- Three AIA Awards of Excellence in 1999
- He was selected as one of the top 100 architects in the world by Architectural Digest and, with such environmental innovators and visionaries as Bill McKibben of 350.org and Bill McDonough, is on the Board of Advisors of Yestermorrow Design/Build School, which grew out of the Goddard College Design/Build program which David founded. Most recently (in April, 2011) he founded the Madsonian Museum of Industrial Design, “to celebrate the great designs and encourage a civil society to understand that the future of a material world depends on permanence, and that depends on artistic infusement into everything we do”.
References
- ^ Architectural Improvisation: A History of Vermont's Design/Build Movement 1964-1977, University Press of New England, 2008.
- ^ Hayes, Richard W.(2007). The Yale Building Project: The First 40 Years. Yale University Press. ISBN 978-0-300-12316-6.
- ^ [No Author], "Light and Air Houses" in Progressive Architecture, July 1967, Vol. XLVIII, No. 7, pp. 106-115.
- ^ Architectural Improvisation: A History of Vermont's Design/Build Movement 1964-1977, University Press of New England, 2008.
- ^ C.Ray Smith, "Architecture Swings Like a Pendulum Do" Progressive Architecture, May 1966, 150