Goshen Arkansas | 2018 | House

The Heads House derives its name from a series of sculptural heads created by the client’s father, Richard Staples Dodge, who was a painter and sculptor. Many of these cardboard heads, with their playful often triangulated shapes, have adorned the client’s houses over the past 50 years.

Compelled by the client’s story, the architecture acts as a memory device. The facades reference Dodge’s sculptural forms, which are stitched together by the house’s massive roof.

Designed for the clients’ to age-in-place, the house is organized as two volumes—one long and low that contains the main living spaces and master suite, and a two story volume containing the garage and guest rooms. The gap between is the main entry. Once inside each space is defined by a unique ceiling vault to create implied “rooms” in an otherwise open plan with expansive views to the landscape. The material palette (metal, shake) and red color are borrowed from the utilitarian buildings that surround site, grounding the abstract form in its local context.

Photography by Aaron Kimberlin