Architect Paul Dannels reads buildings the way you or I might read a novel. As a tour guide to contemporary architecture, he’s able to let us in on the way that structures, and the way humans move through them, have beauties that are not only formal and static, but also narrative. As a structural engineer as well as an architect, he understands buildings both from a practical and a design standpoint. The creative side of structural engineering is a bit like being a music producer, in that an engineer is trying to help someone else achieve a certain vision. The architect may have an idea of what she wants, but may not know from a technical standpoint how to get there. The structural engineer can help realize the vision in a way that really sings—or that turns the idea into a flop. In most cases the successful efforts of structural engineer are invisible, or at least not in the foreground of awareness, but occasionally there is a project where engineering is very much in the foreground. A sampling of Dannels’s recent projects shows a happy marriage of high concept and elegant execution.

Biography

Paul Dannels is an architect and founding principal of sdi, a structural engineering consulting firm devoted to helping architects realize their visions for bold, beautiful, forms. He grew up in western New York, where as a teenager grand buildings like the Buffalo City Hall and Buffalo State Hospital captured his imagination. He studied engineering and architecture at the University of Michigan, and worked as a construction superintendent in northern Michigan before founding sdi with his business partner Andy Greco.

Paul has conceived the structural systems for buildings on behalf numerous aspiring and accomplished architects, including two winners of the internationally recognized Pritzker Award. His designs have twice been honored for their innovation by the American Institute of Steel Construction with IDEAS2 Awards, the industry’s highest honor for buildings constructed with steel.

Paul lives and works in downtown Ann Arbor, and teaches at Lawrence Technological University, where he presents engineering concepts to architecture students.

Current Projects
December 2010

Currently I’m engaged heavily in construction of the Eli and Edythe Broad Art Museum at Michigan State University. It’s bound to be a really striking building, with bold slanting concrete walls and a gleaming, pleated, stainless steel skin. The architect is Zaha Hadid, of London, England, and it’s a great pleasure to be working with her team to create a building that’s going to turn a lot of heads… and no doubt gain her new fans here in the United States. We completed design of the structural systems earlier this year and construction will continue into 2012.

Of course for the most part, I take on the projects that clients bring to me, so it’s always exciting for me to discover what challenges will come my way next. I’m grateful anytime an opportunity comes my way to help in the development and re-developments of the city of Detroit. Detroit has such an amazing history of grand buildings that were bustling with life just a few generations ago, but now desperately need some loving intervention to preserve them for generations to come. My ongoing Detroit work includes a few buildings for clients who operate the Eastern Market. These are people that really love the city and add in wonderful ways to improve the city’s quality of life.

Hartman-Cox, Architect: Washington DC

Integrated Architecture, Architect: GrandRapids MI

Studio Ma, Architect: Phoenix AZ