Mike Thompson

Architectural Staff

I have an uncle that was a steamfitter. He did a lot of work on nuclear power plants. He was younger than my other uncles, strong, drank beer, told dirty jokes, and drove cool cars. In short, I thought he was pretty cool. One Christmas he got me a little drafting set. It had a drawing board, triangles, a compass, a protractor, a T-square, some pencils, and a scale. I’d never seen anything like it. He told me architects used it to design buildings. That’s when I heard the “Boing!” I immediately drew this awful round house that could only come from a kid trying a compass for the first time. When I got back to school I read everything I could on architecture. The more I found out, the better it got. From then on, all I ever wanted to be was an architect.

If I can create a space where the light is so warm and glowing that sitting there you feel at rest and calm, where the view is forever framed in your mind, where the sound coming from a choir or an instrument is clear and crisp and the building and the architect are invisible to the experience. That would be beauty.