Interview– Edward I. Mills

“Clarity, honesty, and tenacity to understand. You know, if you don't like something I'm doing, you have to be open with the people you work with, and people can't hold grudges. Like, there's been a lot of times in my career where people held grudges against me because I thought a certain way and forced my way to do a certain design on projects. So, I won't go into it, but there have been plenty of times where I've worked on maybe 20 competitions with partners and other people involved, and I usually ended up pushing my design and getting my way because I was probably the most passionate person. But you have to be willing to believe that if somebody has a better idea, you should adopt it.”

What was your favorite time in the ‘architecture’ realm? Different things become important at different times. Out of all the styles, actually, style is a bad word. Anyhow, when I started out, modern was nice and core. And then in the '70s, most of the architects were into the whites and the grays. The whites were Corbin. The grays were becoming more postmodern. And then the '80s became more deconstruction. And then the '90s saw the free-for-all with all the glass. Again, style is not really important because what's important is doing a building that's right.

How do you define 'right'? Well, it's one of its time. It's also one that functions and is also one that has a certain beauty. Although it can be, you know, it can be kind of ugly but still be a good building. So, it's kind of like art. For example, there are fairly ugly buildings which I also don't like. But I'm not going to say that it functions wrong. It could be right if it functions well. To me, if the building is truly good design and aesthetically pleasing and functions very well, that would be right.

What type of job would you take without hesitation? That's a tough question because most architects consider a museum to be the top kind of project, and I'm not sure that's true. Personally, I like doing houses because you have a clean slate with the property and one client, and you're trying to build shelter that means something. So that would be my answer to that.

For example, for this project, we had four or five concepts that we presented over a period of three to four weeks or even a month. It didn't start as a cube that we cut out forms; it started with concepts. The reason we ended up with a cube was to be able to get the volume pumped up and keep the square footage, so we ended up having more square footage. But the concept was that every room had a view in the front, and the siding of the pool on a small lot kind of made the original concepts change. We had a bar building at one time where we put the pool in front, so you could look through the pool to the ocean. But the owners didn't like that particular concept, so we went to a cube and did the cutout.

What are the most memorable stories related to your industry? I was working for Pei and Cobb in '75 as a project architect for the arena in Augusta, Georgia. I met with Pei, Cobb, and Freed, who were the three partners at that time. Harry Cobb was doing the Boston job, and I would go to his office at least three days a week, maybe four, to talk about the design.

During this time, the Hancock Tower was being built, and the glass started to loosen. It was on the cover of Time magazine and called the plywood building. That was way before your time. But if you read yesterday's Times and Harry Cobb's obituary, they tell the story.

I saw Harry under pressure, probably the kind of pressure that very few architects in their life have faced. Maybe Calatrava had it when all his buildings went bankrupt in Spain and they kicked him out of his hometown recently. But Harry and Gary (Gary Lawrence, the structural engineer) bankrupted the French institution to build a building for the American Center in Paris, and they went bankrupt because the dollar went down. But nobody faced the pressure that Harry did with the Hancock Tower. It was the tallest building in New England, and it was covered in plywood, and they found the answer, they solved the problem, and they went on to continue their business.

What impressed me was Harry's grace under pressure. Most of us would have cracked and been angry all the time. So that was one of the stories that was memorable to me. Although I have a lot more stories, that's one of them.

What are the things you wish you had known before you started working this industry? I guess the the business part of architectures. What I didn't know about. So I'll leave it at that.

If you could go back, would you choose the same career path? Same career, but I would change some things. Well, I would have gone to graduate school a little bit sooner. I would have taught longer when I was younger. I don't miss teaching, but I think in your 30s and 40s teaching is good because you're around all these ideas, and as students are pushing it, it's not coming from the students, it's the steamers identifying with certain ideas. At the time, it pushes your head, and it makes you as a teacher change.

What do you value most from people that you work? Clarity, honesty, and tenacity to understand. You know, if you don't like something I'm doing, you have to be open with the people you work with, and people can't hold grudges. Like, there's been a lot of times in my career where people held grudges against me because I thought a certain way and forced my way to do a certain design on projects. So, I won't go into it, but there have been plenty of times where I've worked on maybe 20 competitions with partners and other people involved, and I usually ended up pushing my design and getting my way because I was probably the most passionate person. But you have to be willing to believe that if somebody has a better idea, you should adopt it.

Interview– Jim Kettig

In-Process Interview Project