In 2011 I put a proposal together for the Rome Prize Fellowship- a year long residence at the American Academy in Rome, that provides an opportunity for people in their mid careers to refine and expand their professional, artistic or scholarly aptitudes. My proposal would allow me to study the relationship between site and placemaking… using drawing as the tool for the investigation. I wanted to investigate how natural environments- landscapes- inform the way we build- the way we live. I wanted to study those man made interventions on the natural landscapes… those ones that you look at and say ‘I can’t imagine one of these existing without the other’.

As I looked more and more at the requirements and the goals of this year long Rome based investigation, I wondered if maybe I was looking for something more? My interests tend to go beyond one specific investigation in one specific place… my interests were much wider ranging and probably less geographically limited to Rome and its surroundings… at least that was my reasoning after I got the rejection letter from the fine folks in Rome.

I was still set on doing something. I put a plan together that balanced my interests in the outdoors and adventure with my architectural pursuits… not that they are mutually exclusive… my plan balanced a formal agenda with the ability to deviate from that agenda and take the time to make choices on the go. So on September 26, 2012 I left San Francisco and boarded a plane to Iceland with a rough plan, but open to where this journey would take me…