I came across this purely by accident. It is the Live Oak Friends Meeting House in Houston and it was designed in a collaborative fashion by the artist James Turrelll. The exterior of this Quaker church seems to be deliberately banal so as to make the interior experience all the more surprising and wonderful. Turrell said that he "wanted to feel light physically" and he accomplished this by putting a retractable section of roof in the middle of the ceiling. The detailing at the edge of the roof opening is remarkably crisp, and in this brilliant photograph, composed so as to appear impossibly two-dimensional.
I don't know who made the decisions about the flooring and furniture, but they are well considered. The wood flooring and trim, combined with the traditional pews, creates an earthly warmth. A contemporary architect probably would have had a lot more cold white finishes and some ghastly uncomfortable looking chairs.
Towers of Ilium enjoys introducing our broad readership to new things.
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