8. Jeremy

Jeremy spent the long weekend bouncing between activities with his friends, avoiding the running list of things that he needed to fix around his house. Did people really need a garbage disposal, anyway? People probably didn’t use them in Europe. He attended his monthly figure drawing class and had gotten a glass of Lambrusco with his friend Yuna. Both of the artists embraced the best parts of a Colorado spring and reminisced about Jeremy’s first year in Vanberg. That year, he had awoken in early May to find two feet of snow on the ground, so you could never be too sure when the next beautiful Sunday would occur. Sunday morning was a spin class with Foster, followed by lunch with Emmy and Ryan that had, of course, devolved into an exhibit planning session before Jeremy made an excuse about grocery shopping so he could extricate himself. He overslept his alarm on Monday and was able to sneak into his studio without Emmy or Phoebe accosting him and making him social.

An only child, Jeremy preferred the days where he was given tasks via email and could allow his brain to wander down whatever path would end up being the most efficient for creativity to flourish in order to get his work done. At the moment, his biggest task was figuring out a design that integrated history and science, which was enjoyable, but for some reason wasn’t holding his attention. Jeremy had even tried a new, more caffeinated tea blend from his office stash, which had only succeeded in making him feel like he was vibrating slightly. Trying to jog his creativity, Jeremy tried a new playlist, taking his desk from sitting to standing, then finally, he opened his YouTube account. Perhaps visual stimulation would help.

His eyes caught on the Smokey Bear documentary that he had sent Davis in their first email. A strange overture, he realized, but something that he remembered one of his first advisers in graduate school talking about. Making a personal connection was important for so many of the people you would work with in exhibit design. These were people who were experts in their field, who were used to talking at such a nuanced level of detail about their work that trust between a designer and a client was essential. People had to trust that you would represent their research, their community, their forest with the same kind of care and affection they had for it. And while Jeremy knew he would never be an expert in these fields, he liked being able to brush shoulders with the brilliant minds for these moments.

Hoping to spark something that would allow him to work on any exhibit he was supposed to be working on, Jeremy clicked on the channel that hosted the Smokey documentary and found one on something called Mission 66. Vaguely worried about the title, Jeremy found himself enraptured by the history of how modernist architects were used in national park visitor center design.

Yes.

This was interesting.

There was so much to pull from here, so many stories.

And damn gorgeous design.

The interplay between the sleek modernism and the rustic surroundings would make for an eye-catching contrast, in addition to connecting the Klarluft National Forest with a larger national conversation in design. And it would be unexpected, too.

Jeremy felt a spark in his fingertips akin to the first time he had participated in a charette, when the entire curatorial and design team was holed up together in an office, bouncing ideas off each other. It was invigorating. He opened his sketchbook, and a mockup of an exhibit took place that took the visitor through the establishment of the forest. Jeremy could connect it to all the grandiose spots of the west: Mesa Verde, Yosemite, Yellowstone.

Grateful, not for the first time, for his studio in the attic of The House, a Queen Anne Victorian that held the offices for a combined history and science museum, Jeremy opened his personal computer and his business email and tapped out an email.

Davis,

I have a few design ideas that I think would be best to discuss with you in person…