New Hudson Valley Houses

New Hudson Valley Houses

Stan Allen, Garrick Ambrose, Steven Holl, Toshiko Mori, MOS

“Poignantly existential, and as such, it is houses that have been some of the most important architectural works.”
—John Hejduk

“In wildness is the preservation of the world.”

- Henry David Thoreau

The organization Scenic Hudson describes the Hudson Valley as “inspirational beauty and health” and has a core mission to preserve and enhance the region for generations to come.  The region is a diverse landscape composed of the Catskill Mountains, Hudson Highlands, fertile rolling farmland, and small historic towns. Historically and culturally, it has played a significant role by attracting and inspiring artists and writers with its dramatic beauty.

The house, as an architectural project, is the fertile ground where new ideas are tested. Its small scale and simple program, haptic details, and devoted idealistic clients, allow for a pure expression rarely afforded in large projects. Every time I go to Los Angeles, my first visit is to the Schindler House on Kings Road in West Hollywood (now the MAK Center). As Schindler’s own home it is a modest building, at just around 3,000 square feet, but it has great intensity. Its heavy and rough tilt up concrete walls support worn lightweight redwood clerestory windows, translucent paper like scrims open into intimate garden courtyards, and custom furniture and millwork embed the space. The house was an experiment in what Schindler called “Space Architecture”, a manifesto into spatial interiority, light, climate, and the interior’s relationship to the natural environment. The house is small, densely packed with ideas, and firmly tied to its situation in the California sun.

New Hudson Valley Houses, merges the idealisms of experimental small-scale domestic space, with that of land preservation and stewardship. Ten recently designed homes by five architects, are presented solely through models and drawings (no photos) that invite viewers into the design process. The houses share four ideal aspirations and are each unique to their situation.

1. Maximum preservation of landscape:

On large rural sites these houses aspire to guard and preserve the natural landscapes of the Hudson Valley in the spirit of the organization Scenic Hudson.

2. Individuation of expression:

The possibility of independent experimental actions, expressive of freedom of individual

thought, are counter to the repetitive dictates of consumer culture.

3. Material / Detail / Scale:

Often underestimated, domestic architecture at this scale is a critical platform for experimenting with the core principles of architecture: light, proportion, material detailing, and scale.

4. Ecological architecture embedded in landscape:

The Hudson Valley’s landscape—shaped by ancient glaciers and varied in its geography, offers a testing ground for new and experimental relationships between architecture and nature. Houses aspire to be free of fossil fuel, deploying varying strategies of solar, geothermal, and green roofs respectively. 

This exhibition is part one of a multi-part series that will continuously explore domestic space in the Hudson Valley.

Garrick Ambrose 07/24/25