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Asia Pacific Design Library

2015 UQ Architecture Series with Michael Rayner, Cox Rayner

By Administrator | 20 April 2015

In the lead-up to the sixth lecture in the 2015 UQ Architecture Lecture Series, April 21, we spoke to speaker Michael Rayner, principle director of Cox Rayner.

Background

I was raised in Cammeray in Sydney in a street of twelve homes facing the bush. All but one were inhabited by architects – my dad was a woolbroker. I was seduced by watching the architect parents burning midnight oil, bent over freestanding drawing boards. It all seemed so romantic. Interestingly, none of the architect’s kids ended up doing architecture!

Normal Work Day

I start about 8am and work til 7pm on average. Mostly these days I review the design work of many talented architects in our practice, sometimes by discussion only, sometimes by sketching with them. I do a lot of writing reports and stuff and attend say three meetings a day with clients or authorities. I’m not good at doing lunch.

Daily Office Rituals

I keep a fairly large library in my alcove, and often just skim through architectural books, not so much for ideas but to tune my head away from problems to design consciousness. This is useful because the average day is littered with issues that have little to do with design, and it is often difficult to relax sufficiently for design focus.

Principles

I have four key sources of design rigour, rather than principles. They sound simple – structure, craft, art, nature – but they inform all that I do. I’m interested in structure per se. Craft is about consciousness of what things are made of and how they are made. Art is about reciprocation between art and architecture. Nature concerns both sources of inspiration from organisms and how architecture and nature interact.

Where to go for Design Inspiration

Sometimes books if a particular work comes to mind. Mostly just by clearing my head – kayaking on the river on mornings and weekends, or walking the dog.

Designers I Admire

The whole bodies of work by Alvar Aalto, Carlo Scarpa, Enric Miralles and John Lautner are inspirational to me. In Australia, John Wardle’s work is exemplary. But I keep a pictorial file of particular projects I love and which I have a synergy with my thinking. An example is a beautiful house called Casa Gomis in Barcelona by Antonio Bonet Castellana dome in the 1950s. Importantly, my file has as much art as architecture in it.

Top 6 Favourite Design Books

  • Studies in Organic: Kengo Kuma and Associates (2009)
  • Alvar Aalto: Through the Eyes of Shigeru Ban (2007)
  • Between Heaven and Earth: The Architecture of John Lautner (2011)
  • Carlo Scarpa by Robert McCarter (Phaidon 2013)
  • Sensing Spaces: Architecture Reimagined (Royal Academy of Arts 2014)
  • Thinking Architecture: Peter Zumthor (Birkhauser 2006)

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