c 1973

Long-time Rice architecture professor Will Cannady recently donated his papers to the Woodson and they contain some pretty interesting materials. Most engaging for me are the before-and-after photos of the 1976 addition to Cohen House that was designed by Cannady and Anderson Todd. This building has been renovated and extended many times over the years–the first time in 1929, only a few years after it was completed–and it isn’t easy figuring out exactly what happened when. You can see what I mean in this recent shot. There’s a lot going on here:

Cannady’s pictures, though, go some way towards understanding how one of the constant problems, the kitchen, was tackled over time. Here’s a “before” image of the kitchen interior. Note the three rectangular windows:

It’s actually easier to see what happened by looking at the exterior, what was the loading dock area in 1973. Here it is from the side, and you can also get a good idea of its size in the first photo above:

And here it is about a month ago:

All that new interior space is kitchen (which unfortunately I don’t think has been touched since). At first I thought the older part of the building had been removed. Then, wandering around inside, I saw this:

Bonus: I didn’t know this was here until just the other day. It’s a very nice room. It even has a sofa, upon which a young man was soundly sleeping when I visited.