 To our show, this is the second part of three parts about the Halle Kolanei heaven with the three guys from the block and one guy we're missing today, that's De Soto. De Soto has to serve all in all fairness he has to try to stay above the waters to finish up an exhibition at his Bishop Museum about surfing but our main guy and the leader of the crew here is with us again live from Long Beach, California, Ron Lindgren, hi Ron. Hi Martin, great to be with you again. Good to have you back and can you do a little recap and a little summary of what we talked about last time? Yeah I'd like to say last time I was mentioning that we were as clients we were called over to Tokyo to meet our our clients on a personal and face-to-face basis and we managed to ingratiate ourselves with them and with a successful face-to-face meeting Ed and I flew them back to our office in Long Beach, pretty much secure that our client was really determined to build a luxury hotel on Waikiki Beach to my design but this would be an unusual hotel in the midst of you know raucous and phonetic Waikiki and by that I mean 465 guest rooms ensconced within what would have to be a quiet and secluded environment but also one which had a distinctly elegant residential scale and such a residential character would be in keeping of course with the past 45-year history of the Halekladi and it would also be utterly unique as luxurious elegant place-making in the very heart of hyperactive Waikiki and besides as we know the volume name Halekladi means house befitting heaven and later I'll be talking about how I attempted to accomplish all this with a combination of urban planning and architecture. Absolutely and may we go to the first slide here which is has also been the last slide last time and I owe it to our exotic escapism expert Susanna who lured me into the lure's lounge living room and this in the front is actually the table that's her favorite table and you are very elaborately talking about the artwork in the back so now we go to the next slide and this reminds me of my son Lenny who is in the midst of medical school and the pedagogy is how they teach them about the human body that they first talk about all the bits and pieces and the parts so they believe that the whole is a sum of its parts and besides all what architecture is this is certainly an aspect and we want to point out here to the very detail you're pointing out to with your hand and share with us the little background intel on that one Ron. Yeah yeah first I should say that this is a stairway that is off of the living room in the lure's house this brings to mind yet another blessing I had as architect and that is that I got to work with a interior designer who did such a wonderful job at the Kahala 20 years before a gentleman by the name of Bob Egan and look at the warmth and tradition he provides here there's a red wood ceiling overhead there are garing together holding doors with tropical lures the existing koala wood floor was just polished up and made to look as beautiful as it was Lenny also made a nice combination of some carpet and some koala wood on the steps what I'm holding in my guilty hand is the fact that I made a bit of a mistake as an architect there those circles were meant to be very elegant and very slim and they were too slim in other words if you grab the beautiful wooden handrail you could waggle it back and forth four inches either way as as the person in charge of being the office rep I had to suddenly come up with a solution to that and the solution happened to be finding some of the same wood and creating some wood blocks and wrapping them around just some of those spindles so that the stair was safe and in fact it actually sort of adds to the traditional look of the stair and I think we can call this architectural prototyping at its best you know trial and error and come up with improvements through that so you've been working with woods let's go to the next slide something you already generally talked about but here in detail you also work with steel tube steel and fabric this was an attempt on my part to expand the lure's house the existing lure's house which we renovated and remodeled I explained the dining experience of the orchids restaurant both out into the lawn towards diamond head and out into a lawn out to the ocean and I wanted to add something that wasn't so much architecture but it looked like maybe it was something that had been added you know years even before uh the new holly cloney was built and so I used a light steel frame and a interesting canopy material that's both waterproof and fireproof and uh this is this ends up looking very informal and also may I say inexpensive certainly true and again reference to our tropical mobiles here this is our p i-ing vehicle here that we recently had to redo the soft top and this is single layer roof and same thing the frame is still good as yours and you just stretch it over it and that does the job it's a very tropical way of doing that versus sitting in our hermetic invasive cars with the ac on right so let's talk about the concrete bones again let's go the next slide and tell us the intel on that one yeah with these columns I was experimenting with softening them in a way and I was using 45 degree chambers everywhere chamfered corners uh recess panels which always give some life to a column uh and scale and there was also a chamfer back at 45 we'll see later that even the top of the column is chamfered and the beams that lie on that were chamfered yeah but this also shows in terms of port and place concrete what a fine job my contractor did it's not such a small thing that those two electrical outlets out there outlets yeah are perfectly centered and are not crooked yeah absolutely and was also a very fine detail what you point out with your hand there is actually that out of the columns grows sort of the framing of the natural environment the green and let's keep continuing about the in the the perfect and masterful sort of inclusion and incorporation of the natural environment into the built environment with the next slide yeah this is uh this is an example of the old highway Kalani had its funniest and best ambiance this was a how-tree restaurant from the 1930s I think it even was there during the war years and there was this incredible how-tree and notice what looks like very modern slim steel beams and uh round columns yeah and let's jump to the next one and see how you interpreted that yeah where the house terrace restaurant was is now really where the house without a key restaurant the new house without a key restaurant was built and so thinking of of the past uh I in the landscape architect got busy with the idea that why not grow four sandpaper vines uh up and into a trellis and in parts of a year the sandpaper vine turns into glorious purple flowers and look at that sort of almost uh how-tree complexity to the uh the root and the the whole system of the plant exactly again an evocation of something from the past yeah and this is the when you go there and have wonderful breakfast buffet which you invited us to so thank you and where all the yummy things are we want to go now with the next slide because that's on the other end of the breakfast area this is one of my my favorite photographs really not because my ugly mug is in it but the fact that it's showing one of the courtyards in the background it's showing a lot of plants growing out of the ground these are tropical plants um cocoa ponds uh 70 80 feet tall but right behind me is the judicious use of tropical plants in planters and so this looks so residential it almost looks like a residential garden that one is walking through absolutely and next picture obviously if you have watched the killingsworth shows of the many we have done and the many more to come there's also a theme to be continued here which is the sort of builds in integration of plants in these sort of concrete troughs and planter boxes so that is here too and uh next slide you also usually the the plants grow up but you also have plants that grow down as in this case you explain us where that is and why yeah this is uh part of the entry experience of of walking into the hotel as a pedestrian this is a portico uh i'm holding very tightly it seems onto one strand of a front burship of vine uh it's certain times of the year in late spring and out in summer there are literally hundreds of those vines hanging down so it almost looks like a white cloud suspended underneath that trellis and this is actually where the almost a little bit you know to well shouldn't discriminate anyone but this is where the smokers are so the smokers have a very nice place and probably when they were all down probably a cumble flogges them and makes them feel less guilty right so thanks to you this is a this is a japanese owned hotel many japanese people come here and as i've learned and i think many people have learned from especially business relationships with the japanese they smoke a lot so there's one spot in the entire hotel outdoors and that happens to be at the end of this particular portico shielded by the sunburst year line and let's look at that sort of architectural element along the other direction with the next slide here and we have to say there's also uh the very you know new entry to the lovely security team that is nice to everyone including us who are always wandering around there more or less dressed as we saw and talked about in the in the last show here but explain to us a little bit the clever strategy of that connector well these are here's where you see where the tailored columns and beams actually form architecture in this case porticos and the porticos connect all of the public spaces at grade and they're all at 14 foot eight inches on center which turns out to be a nice dimension so that two couples can pass each other easily as they're walking from place to place oh i'm really proud of the appearance of these porticos because to me it just seems like they provide a really elegant measured cadence when you're walking through them and i have to confess that i sort of used the idea of even religious cloisters as an inspiration for these uh these uh the porticos yeah absolutely well achieved and they have obviously very poetic processional quality but at the same time as with cloisters who are very clever architectural manifestations of sort of navigations through space it also helps the service people to get very quickly and almost secretly from one place to the other one and the place where you go we're gonna unveil at the very end we have been talking about the aspect of green and the natural environment but in in hawaii there's also the color blue manifested through water that you masterfully incorporated into the building which we see one example in the next slide so tell us you know here again we're in the entry pavilion of four pedestrians will be seeing that uh uh in the next few photographs of busy calia and louis rodo right outside and not only is the sound of water so soothing but it's also masking and in this case it was doing both things uh so that the sound of traffic uh aided by yet another feature that will show you soon uh completely uh canceled out the sounds of the city uh beyond this included hotel yeah and me being the nitpicky guy i urged the hotel management to take that rope away which isn't used wasn't there to begin with but i guess some people ended up in the shallow pool probably didn't drown because it's not deep enough but i say educate the people and somehow deal with liability in a in a less eyesore way so but what you just talked about is uh even more visible and and clear in the next picture and explain us this the strategy of of of this constellation and composition one of the one of the things that i had as an idea that would be very unique to approaching a new hotel especially for those who see it for the first time is that you wouldn't be driving up uh into some motor court or at the shadow of some huge tower but instead you'd be walking down clear road or driving down clear road and you would see what perhaps you thought of at first as being sort of a large commodious home with nothing but blue sky above it and of course when we get into the building a little further along in this presentation you'll see that it's actually an open-air lounge entry space but i'm standing at the right in front of the major feature that really does quiet down the city and i purposely created this strong band of waterfall it's it's a bunch of pieces of a handsome green marble stacked on each other sticking out just far enough so when a seed of water pours over it it splashes and and makes sounds and i remember you saying that was that was prototyping on the job too right trying yeah that that that was a gamble we weren't sure if it was even going to work it's one of those things where i was blessed again but notice also that you look over that waterfall and you see the street and that was my idea too you see the street you don't hear the noise and you suddenly realize that you're entering into a unique secluded and quiet place and raucous wikiki is just outside exactly and in contrary uh you thank me because i was like suicidally in the middle of the road which is actually kalia road is is perpendicular to that that is louis road right oh i'm sorry yes don't worry and and and the clever trick is that actually uh where you're standing there in the property already is few steps up and so being on the road you're these few steps down so you cannot see into it so it keeps it discreet and private and mysterious right while again as you explain when you're in the building you have the overview and you have the orientation so you don't feel stuck i mean that's a very clever move i mean talking ed having been a classicist you're right along in line with him with these super exciting things that uh we will later point out when this was built this is in the peak of postmodernism and we will applaud you many times down in this show and the next show is that you for many of us have been an art the best postmodern architect that we know so let's uh let's move on and already show now what you were pointing out once you're in the space and you look at the gatehouse from the other direction right yeah what seemed to be perhaps a residence to someone who came from there the first time is actually an open-air lounge and here you see it from the secluded courtyards very broad grass lawn and i have to jump in for a moment uh we were also blessed to have the finest landscaper in hawaii richard tong working on this project for us richard uh wrote the book a modern called the modern tropical garden in 1955 which is still the textbook uh today he was a strong force in developing gardens and what he called a theme of tropicalia he he said that gardens in the tropics should look the part rather than being pale copies of some other styles now the interesting thing is that my clients who had akuta did not agree he had visited any number of other hotels in the outer islands and saw a tropical vegetation used lushly and densely and actually very beautifully but in his mind it all looked the same and he couldn't remember one hotel from the other what he wanted was broad lawns uh interspersed with cocoa palms a very few specimen trees and bordering flower flowering plants he loved the lawns around eolani palace with his determination to go his way uh richard tong recused himself from the project and i actually applaud him for of course holding up for his principles but he did not do our landscaping well and you rehabilitated him because you brought in the jungle architecturally and let's go to the next slide right here we're seeing the inside of the pedestrian entry pavilion and i'll say in advance that i have a separate uh interesting pavilion which is as a porch which has to do with the automobile entry but here we have a two-story space it is skylit but uh i put some trellis across it so one doesn't look up into the underside of uh shiny glass or plastic and here we have the tailored columns and beams and you can see how the beam seemed to slide through the columns in a structural expressionism that was in killingsworth's uh prime motif absolutely which you refined again with a 45 degree wedging from there let's keep on going through the cloister courtyards let's wander around and while we do use this picture here and sharing you sharing with us your long-term professional relationship with a lady called leslie wheel here again i must be boring people were talking about how much i've been blessed but here again a woman a woman who was so uh instrumental in creating the beautiful lighting at the kahala 20 years ago joined us in this endeavor at the holly cloney so i'm looking at one of her custom-built sconces and uh and these were her designs and those sconces when they're lit at night provide a spray of light uh on the columns that is really romantic and interesting and leads us to the next slide yeah leads us to the next slide and just reminding us that 20 years ago in the mid-60s she was the leading lighting designer in the kahala and 20 years later he called her up and she said i'm on board right indeed and uh there i am sitting gazing out at the diamond head and over the pool what's really nice about those custom-made chandeliers is that they actually sway in the breeze and that is actually a very nice informal touch absolutely and these spaces you mainly designed for the brides who have their wedding ceremonies on the howl terrace for the security guards which this is their sort of tour and for you and me because i'm sitting there every morning and contemplate but i want to hear we're still in the in the sequence of water i want to hear the little background story about the waterfall stairs that you're pointing to at the very bottom right yes the uh the stairs for example that lead in on both sides into the lower house or a broad range of waterfall stairs and we use them in these two two-story stairways as well what i'm pointing to is that the edge of the stair is a half front lawn and that i've seen uh called a waterfall stair in some other people's architecture so i like the elegance of that and yet the informality of that particular expression and they were also very provocatively prototype because you had some permitting wrestling with them right yeah the fact is today those stairs would be illegal because there would be a chance for example with someone standing on the step but when they take the next step they actually put their foot down on that rounded edge and they would trip yeah that has never that has never happened in the history of the hotel i must say that makes us i could not get away with such beautiful stairs today these were the days and you look out into the in the direction of the ocean but there is another piece of water in front of us and let's jump to the next slide and tell us the background story about that huge pool you'll see and in some later photographs that this is a classic oval swimming pool and chihue akuta loved it but when he heard that it was just going to have a white bottom he didn't agree and he came up at that time with $150,000 to go to South Africa and buy millions and i mean literally millions of tiny little iridescent glass tiles to create the pool bottom the pool bottom is a katalia orchid which also happens to be the hotel's graphic logo there's a little bit of a gimmick in this photograph in the sense that the pool looks huge but the girl floating there on her back very artfully is actually only a five-year-old all right let's look at the pool in plan next picture here is one of the most important drawings that all of a sudden explains it all in plan and we call this a figure ground plan and the ground is black we inverted that the ocean is black the public space is black so are the big black dots in the middle of your project the courtyards and the pool and the other ones are just very filigree lines and they come across as that not just in plan but also in elevation as we have been experiencing before there's never chunky stuff in your face everything is very dematerial right and as as kind of you know ambitious that is is in plan it's even more ambitious to keep that in elevation so let's move to the next slide and share with one of our one of the sodas treasures from his treasure box and this is an artist rendering of the ambitions so this is like to basically you know sell the city design and explain the design and while the skyline is fictitious right so they're actually not the actual buildings but their anatomy of basically being square volumetric boxes is pretty much but explain why you distinguish yourself from that boxiness well what i what i'd like to say really is that this is where i sort of had to become an urban planner we had to provide a quiet secluded place it was the only way that there would be that perceived luxury and that people would be willing to spend the very expensive rates that these rooms managed to procure and so all around the perimeter of the property i placed single loaded corridor guest room buildings in the center i i put one double loaded corridor building and that created these two courtyard spaces one which is part of the entry experience for pedestrians one which is part of the entry experience for people getting out of their cars but that's also the recreational pool courtyard yeah this was the first time in my architectural career that i wasn't creating buildings just as discreet objects in space but rather creating clearly defined outdoor spaces with buildings and this was thrilling but you can also see that the old heli cloning was much luck as a low rise experience at the ocean and so i stepped all of the buildings down to only basically one and two stories height at the at the water and then my last architectural expression was to cap every building even the elevator towers with the very famous and noted diki roofs absolutely and there's two things that you actually improved in the execution one is obvious the pool got oval and not square then the house without a key didn't become two-story but a one-story pavilion and the louis house didn't become the sort of at stick new thing but last slide please what we can see here this is from the sodas archives as well this is just after the completion of the project and if we can bring up one more slides but we're out of time now so we have to leave it with this one here this is another artist rendering that shows your ambition of not doing what the Sheraton did next door that big sort of harsh cliff but that's sort of very elegantly cascading down which you did sort of before with the um kapalua hotel which we're pointing out in the show so Ron we have to stop here but to pick up next week again so thank you for having been with us from Long Beach and we look forward to the conclusion of your fascinating story and until then everyone thanks for having been with us on the show until next week back with Ron you please stay very hallowee lariously Hawaiian just like Ron bye Ron bye everyone