Special Thanks

 

Even without any new features for animals, building commercial multi-family housing requires scores of people working together, and without everyone’s efforts, it simply wouldn’t be possible.

As such, I would like to thank everyone who contributed vital services to the creation of Lion Canyon, including: Arturo, Brent, Brett, Caleb, David, Deven, Epi, Fernando, George, Gerardo, Glen, Jared, Jeff, Jeremy, Jeremy, Jennifer, Jim, Johnny, Meredith, Michael, Mike, Mike, Mike, Oscar, Pablo, Peter, Raul, Robin, Ron, Sal, Steve, Steve, Todd, and William, plus everyone who worked on their teams.

Above all else, this project is dedicated to Sadie and her mother. Every feature was designed and every decision was made with you two in mind. Throughout the thousands of hours spent working on this project, you were in my thoughts every moment. Thanks for everything.

I’d like to thank practically everyone on this page for having stimulating conversations, putting in extra effort, teaching me at every step, being willing to try something new, caring about making the world a better place, and most of all, for putting up with me, because working with me is, on my best day, [excruciating/an excruciating sequence of frustrations that at times seem like they might never end.]

I would also like to thank:

• My parents, for your time and attention; for your love and sacrifice, like buying us food and clothes when, in retrospect, it would have been wiser to feed me less and put the savings into an S&P 500 ETF; for not discouraging my wild ideas when I was a kid; and for consequently making me someone who still thinks moonshots like this one are worth trying.
• Clay, for teaching me something new every time we speak and for having the patience of a saint, the uncounterfeitable Boy Scout ethics this project demanded, the courage to build a bunch of things that have never been built before, and the professionalism to treat my objectives with respect, even the ones that seemed frivolous.
• Mark, for reminding me repeatedly that I am not, in fact, an architect; for helping me to understand and appreciate the depth of the profession; and for correcting Copernicus, who foolishly thought the Earth revolves around the sun, rather than the ADA.
• Brian, for going down yet another rabbit hole with me, riding along in my quest to find the most improbable and circuitous path to save the world; and for, during so many marathon late-night conversations, joining me in collaboratively torturing ourselves over minutia that we both know probably won’t ever matter.
• Trevor, for, unbeknownst to you, saving Brian’s sanity by enduring even more marathon late-night conversations over minutia; for being great at getting what’s stuck in my head out into a practical form others can see; and for sharing an unhealthily never-ending pursuit of perfection.
• Andrew, for being better than you said you were; for knowing how to craft a story in such a way that makes what I’m doing seem interesting; and for somehow asking the very same question forty times without ever feeling repetitive.
• Diane, for having the empathy to truly understand this project’s goals; for spending the energy to put that understanding to practical use; and for giving me a moment of euphoria and solving several of my problems at once, all by introducing me to a new kind of light fixture.
• Jeremy, for living a strangely parallel life, then working side-by-side with me on this and so many other projects; for having answers in seconds that would have taken me days to find myself; and for reminding me how to use computers.
• Christine, for inspiring me with your creativity; for turning my vague vision into functional art, transforming the mundane into objects of beauty; for letting me rename a few of your masterpieces; and for loving animals more than I do.
• John, for sparing me the trouble of learning lessons the traditional, expensive way; for assuring me that the laws of physics cannot be persuaded to be broken, no matter how convenient it would be; and, in general, from preventing things from burning down.
• Other John, for questioning everything, sometimes repeatedly; for debating philosophy like our lives depend on it; and for approaching the network design for a tiny apartment building with the same level of professional security that would normally only be found in the largest corporations.
• Yet Another John, for your captivating conversation; for your expert advice; and for shepherding such a large order of custom furniture without complaint, as if seventeen weren’t an infuriatingly high number of revisions.
• Karl, for honing your craft to the point you can transform ordinary doors into functional works of art—portals that form memorable experiences and evoke feelings of awe and security simply by walking through them.
• Matt, for solving difficult problems, casually and without fanfare; for sharing my reverence for the design of everyday objects; and for turning my words into metal with surprising speed and precision.
• Kathy, for your excellent organizational skills; for not murdering me for wanting to discuss this project ad nauseum; and most of all, for helping me have the time and focus to work on this project, without which it would have been orders of magnitude more difficult.
• Danny, for being perhaps the single person in the world with the arcane knowledge required to form complex shapes with vinyl, the ability to fit in tiny spaces, and the willingness to try something so new and different because of your extreme love of animals.
• Steve, for caring so much about the design of such understated, yet important and ubiquitous elements that you have elevated wayfinding object design to both an art and a science; you would have advanced design wherever you chose, so thank you for choosing what you did.
• André, Georg, Giulia, Judith, Matthis, Miriam, Rebecca, and Solenn, for your courteousness, patience, enthusiasm for experimenting, and willingness to provide unvarnished feedback. It was a genuine pleasure; should future tenants be half as considerate as you, I won’t hate being a landlord.
• My neighbors, for putting up with months of construction noise without complaint; but more importantly, for trusting me to do my best to minimize the impact to the neighborhood, ultimately supporting a project you would categorically oppose if it were undertaken by an outsider.
• Countless others, including the thousands in academia who produced the research this project is based upon, as well as the millions of giants upon whose shoulders they stand; the inventors of automatic litter boxes, high efficiency fans, televisions that look like framed art, and, of course, dim-to-warm lights; the dozens of people who work for the City of San Diego that reviewed and approved this project…

It may seem absurd to express gratitude to so many people, but it is a sincere reflection of the reality that, although it feels substantial to me, my own contribution to this project is miniscule compared to that of all the other people who made it possible.

So, to everyone on this page and everyone I forgot to mention: Thank you.