Featured Architect PLEDGER ARCHITECT, PPLC
Featured Architect PLEDGER ARCHITECT, PPLC
Based in Birmingham, Alabama, Pledger Architect is the joint venture of husband-and-wife team Cristiana( Cristi) and Mark Pledger— a merging of their combined experiences alongside a team of creatives. Together, the firm is known for creating elegant yet functional designs for their clients with projects ranging from New York City apartments to mountain retreats, and from historic renovations to semi-custom and custom builds. This broad scope enables Pledger Architect to shape projects with a spirit of design that acknowledges the intrinsic connection between architecture and beauty, complemented by a sense of rigor and the application of practical, livable solutions.
Of their work in Alys Beach, Mark explains that they’ ve designed eight homes through the Somerset Custom Home Program— four villas and four courtyard homes. Cristi says,“ With our understanding of Alys and what it was always meant to be, which was the Anglo-Caribbean-Bermudan identity, our goal was to create these to home in on the indigenous architecture of Bermuda and why it was built and who built it. I remember sitting down one night, I was literally in bed with a sketchbook, and I started to look at the typologies of courtyard houses in Bermuda, and what those layouts look like and how they tried to block winds from the sea, and why they sited things
a certain way. And I sat down and started sketching and came up with a concept.
The courtyard houses are my favorite of the blocks we designed. And I think they’ re the most successful because they work on both an individual level and then together. It’ s like having a sentence, right? You start with a capital letter when you start your sentence and end it with a period— there is some grammar to it. While also honoring the scale and the elements of how things would have looked if this were built by a Bermudan architect at a certain time. The villas were so interesting as almost a study in facade development. We tried to push things, make them different, celebrate it. We enjoyed the process, both academically and from a production standpoint.”
With their own combination of intellect, reverence for beauty, references from personal travel, and varied professional experiences, we’ d love to see what Pledger Architect would do with a custom design opportunity here in Alys Beach.
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