Greg Herman Puts Historic Preservation into Action by Stewarding Fay and Gus Jones House
Greg Herman is associate professor of architecture in the Fay Jones School of Architecture and Design, where he's taught since 1991.
Editor's Note: As the U of A strives to become an employer of choice, the Fay Jones School of Architecture and Design is highlighting the faculty and staff who help the school excel.
Greg Herman is an associate professor of architecture at the Fay Jones School of Architecture and Design. Herman received a Master of Architecture from Rice University, where he was awarded the William Dunlap Darden Medal, and a Bachelor of Architecture from the University of Cincinnati. He worked in professional practice in Boston, Massachusetts, while also teaching at the Boston Architectural College.
Herman said he wanted to dip his toes more into academia. The economy wasn't great, so, when he was offered a nine-month visiting position at the Fay Jones School in 1991, he decided to give it a go and moved to Fayetteville. After all, one can go anywhere for just nine months. At the end of that term, he was offered a tenure-track position. And he has been here for the last 33-plus years.
"I grew up with the place. The area and the school have changed tremendously," Herman said.
And having been here for more than three decades, Herman said he's had the pleasure of seeing his students become colleagues in the design fields and in the school.
Even though classes with Herman's architecture students have been graduating since 1992, saying goodbye is still a challenge.
"Architecture is an intimate discipline. We work pretty closely with students if they allow it," Herman said. "Students spend five years getting their degree, but then there's another crop every year that's leaving. I find it hard, but I'm also very happy to see them graduating and succeeding."
On behalf of the Fay Jones School, Herman is also the director of the stewardship for the Fay and Gus Jones House in Fayetteville. He has written extensively about Fay Jones' work, including a chapter in Shadow Patterns: Reflections on Fay Jones and His Architecture,
edited by Jeff Shannon (University of Arkansas Press). Herman is also a contributing author to Buildings of Arkansas (University of Virginia Press).
With his interests in the Historic American Buildings Survey and design preservation, Herman said it makes sense for him to oversee the care of the Fay and Gus Jones House on behalf of the school and university.
He first got involved with the house in 2010 when it needed some design-build work. He turned the project into a studio and developed documentation for the Historic American Buildings Survey.
"That was my first dive into HABS, and we won first place nationally," Herman said. 'We won the Charles E. Peterson Prize for that documentation."
From that point forward, Herman started giving tours of the house by request and then moved into an official stewardship position in 2015 when the house was donated to the school and university by the Joneses' daughters, Cami and Janis. He also spent five years overseeing the restoration of the house.
"My role is to advance scholarship, bring the Jones house and the work of Fay Jones to new audiences, and look after the house. If anything needs to be done to or at the house, I am the point person," Herman said. "It's an ongoing relationship and one that I am proud of. It's become part of my daily or weekly routine to check in on the house and see how it feels and make sure everything is okay."
While the legacy of Fay Jones as an architect continues to be relevant, Herman said it is important to learn not to simply emulate his or other architects' work, but to take the ideas of those architects and interpret them, advance them, evolve them.
"Fay was a very intense designer. Just one look at some of his drawings for some of his houses will knock your socks off," Herman said. "They're very precise; they're very carefully prepared; they're very intensively prepared. I think that intensity is one of his legacies. It's something students can continue to learn from."
Herman has served on the board of CITYbuild Consortium of Schools and as director of the Southwest Region/Association of Collegiate Schools of Architecture. His ongoing research includes inspections into the advent and development of American builders' handbooks since the 17th century, with a particular focus on the influence of those guides upon the development of American architectures and technologies, the introduction of new materials, and the development of new building techniques.
Read the full Q&A with Greg Herman.
Contacts
Michelle Parks, director of communications
Fay Jones School of Architecture and Design
479-575-4704,
mparks17@uark.edu