by Heather Livingston
Contributing Editor

Summary: Jack Travis, FAIA, is owner and principal of Jack Travis Architects, a firm that works to effect urban and environmental design concepts from a black perspective. Among his firm’s clients are Spike Lee, Wesley Snipes, and John Saunders of ABC Sports. In 1992, Travis edited African American Architects: In Current Practice, the first publication to profile the work of black architects practicing in the U.S. In 1994, he founded the Studio for Afri-Culturalism in Architecture and Design, a nonprofit organization that collects, documents, and disseminates information on African Americans and African-American culture. Travis is a professor at Pratt Institute and the Fashion Institute of Technology.

Education: I received a BArch from Arizona State University in 1976, and in 1977 I went to the University of Illinois at Champaign for one year and got an MArch.

Early interest in architecture: I went to Catholic school in Las Vegas. In the fifth grade, Sister Juanita Marie asked us to write an essay—on anything we wanted. I chose to write on our school building. I didn’t know it then, but it was an English Brutalism design, where untroweled mortar gives this rustic, shadowy look. I thought that was not a good thing because kids would run up and down the corridors and they could get hurt because of the building. So she said: “It sounds like you want to become an architect.”

I had never heard the word before, so she asked me to go to the library and look up the word. I got a book called So You Want to be an Architect. It was a whole series: So You Want to be a Lawyer, So You Want to be a Nurse, etc. I took the book home and read it, and it said that an architect has to be three things: you have to be a leader, you have to know math, and you have to be able to draw. Being a team captain and good at math, drawing is the one that I had to focus on. I was in fifth grade, and I read that book constantly.

Dedicated to the path: In Las Vegas, in those days, the black side of town had nothing in terms of artistic endeavor. But I’d go to the butcher with my mother where they wrapped the meat off of a large roll of paper. I asked the butcher one day to give me extra paper to draw on. He said, “You can have paper anytime.” For three years, I’d go home and draw on this butcher paper.

One day, I was in the car with my father and mother and saw “Jack Miller, Architect” on a building. It was my name, “Jack”—on the building. I knew I had to meet this guy. So I got enough nerve and knocked on the door met Jack Miller. He had a young assistant, soon to be a partner, Bob Fielden, who was a Godsend as my mentor. He gave me my first job, in high school.

Early professional career: When I got out of school at Champaign, Chicago was too cold. I drove to San Francisco, where I had visited with my parents, amazed by the hills and the buildings. But that’s one of the hardest places to get a job, coming out of school. It’s saturated with architects, and everybody wants to be there—if they’re not in New York.

I worked for Whisler-Patri for a short time before going to a firm working with the utility company PG&E. The offer was $1,500 more than the $12,000 I was making; that was a lot of money back then. The company was huge, which was hard to get a handle on, and mostly what I learned was how to coordinate with engineers.

Wanting to go with the best company in the world at the time, I decided to work for SOM. I interviewed in San Francisco, successfully, and somebody mentioned there were job openings in New York. I had been there the year before in graduate school and, for my research project I’d met Richard Meier, Charles Gwathmey, Peter Eisenman, and Paul Rudolph, so that sounded good.

I moved in 1980 into the Carol Deeds Murphy interior design department, and I’m thankful to this day that I did. There was a scale factor, a socialist aspect, that was missing in my work coming from my background as a poor black child. In two and a half years, I learned more there than anywhere else. Everybody there was very talented.

Wanting to work for a black designer, though, and inspired by an article in Interior Design, I called Lou Schweitzer’s office, right around the corner on Madison Avenue. He said, “Come on over. Let’s see what you’ve got.” It was a dilemma to leave SOM, but I worked for Lou for 13 months and learned a lot. It was a pleasure. After Lou, I worked for Sidney Philip Gilbert. Then, I went on my own. Everything has been placed in order for me as I’ve moved through.

Current scope of work: The current focus of my work is what I call a “black cultural aesthetic.” It’s very important for me to mix Modernism with black cultural iconography.

What is black space? How do black people use space markedly different from other people? And, of course, what are the commonalities. As to the differences, in our communities there is a severe lack of understanding of spatial use and environmental design. How do you establish respect for the environment, so you don’t get graffiti and trash? Particularly for children, you want an environment that is positive and refreshing. In my work, we have a strong research arm on black cultural history as it relates to environmental design. I have a not-for-profit organization called The Studio for Afri-Culturalism in Architecture and Design.

I’m doing what I call the black cultural primer right now for the National Organization of Minority Architects student competition, because many of the students complain that they don’t have the professors, the research, or the know-how to equate black culture with design.

I also have a small practice. I’m now doing a church and just finished two townhouses, both for black clients. The church is for a black Jamaican Seventh Day Adventist group. I just finished another townhouse project for a friend of mine who’s Korean, and we did a bakery in Harlem. We’ve done four or five condos and co-ops for black owners in Harlem as well.

The third component is what I call the cultural design consultancy. In that capacity, I consult and joint venture with majority firms doing work in black and Latino communities. For instance, with Fred Schwartz Architects—who’s an absolutely great guy—we’re designing a condominium building in Harlem on 116th Street. It’s the largest Afri-centric building in the United States right now.

Fred’s idea was to make this African imagery with the brick on the building based on Ndabeli tribal images. The women in the Ndabeli group in South Africa paint their houses annually with these wonderful geometric and literal themes in these very intense colors. He also looked at the Gee’s Bend quilts from Alabama, which were similar in many ways, but that was his inspiration. I gave him the inspiration to look into those places, and then I comment on his approach.

Part of what I think I can do as an architect is to try to bring more education, not only to black and Latino people, but to others on what that legacy is so that there’s a better understanding. If you look at the music and fashion industries, for instance, there is not a big status issue. We have designers out there and people who sing, write, and create music. As a result, our kids want to be musicians and fashion designers and own the fashion outlet, because they see themselves. In my opinion, they don’t see themselves much in architecture, interior design, urban planning, or landscape architecture.

Spatially and in environmental iconography a strong African-American identity is important for our community and for our children. It’s important for people to see it and not find it negatively challenging, fearful, or hateful. It really wants to be a part of an American architectural palette. I don’t think that in general black people are revolutionary. We never left Africa. We were pulled out of Africa. But I do see something that could possibly better the whole American lifestyle for everybody.

Use of space: We do use space differently. If you come up to Harlem, 110th street on up, you will see people using the front space: on the stoops or out the open windows. As black and Latino people go, there is an intense need to be seen and be flashy.

If you go downtown on the upper East Side, if they’re not in the Hamptons, you will see people using the rear spaces for the pool and cabaña. Down on Second Avenue, people using front space are all corralled in front of bars or restaurants very neatly and ordered. But up in Washington Heights or in Harlem, we don’t. Everything is loose and sporadic; a place to be seen.

I equate it back to the equatorial sense. If your culture grew up around the equator, you are more communal in outside space, rather than spatially formalized cave dwellers. In only the last 500 to 600 years have the cultural dynamics mixed. That does not change 40,000 years of dynamics, and this is the differences that pulls us apart. The commonalities allow us to communicate. Everybody wants to live well, have security, and raise their children properly.

What can the AIA and its members do to encourage more black youth to become architects? That’s a very hard question, but I would say off the top of my head that I think more relationship with NOMA. We’ve talked about these things before, including with past AIA presidents such as Ronald Skaggs and Cecil Steward.

NOMA has black members in almost every one of the 50 states, but the biggest problem with NOMA is funding. I think the AIA needs to put aside money and a liaison who works with someone in NOMA who is dedicated to youth. There needs to be a full-time position in NOMA. There needs to be funding and NOMA needs to pull their fair share.

I think that working with AIA and AIA-member firms, we could get a good budget and actually get some things done. We just need a good strong program.

Moreover, the diversity department at the AIA has to really look at the bigger picture, including women, gays, blacks, Latinos, and Asians. It has to be a broader department with a bigger resource base and more people, and they need to set a timeline on where they want to be at a certain time. Where do we want to be in 10 years? You make a list and set funding and you organize yourself to meet those goals. Then, I think you’ll see significant change.