Paul Housberg
Title: Untitled
Site: Marriott Hotel, Richmond, VA
Photograph: Tim Schermerhor
Although The Guild Sourcebooks feature the work of artists from all over North America, you might be surprised to find that some are as close as your own backyard. Commissioned for the Marriott Hotel in Richmond, Virginia, by Lenox Hospitality, this installation was a result of an ad placed in The Guild Sourcebooks. "Lenox saw my work on the cover of the seventeenth edition of the book and when they flipped it open, they realized that I was also in Rhode Island," recalls glass artist Paul Housberg. The clients had some ideas about color, and after reviewing a number of Housberg's designs and glass samples, the artist set to work creating the piece for the curved wall separating the hotel's lobby from its lounge.Housberg used hand-cast slabs of glass, which is traditionally used in the dalle de verre technique of stained glass. Housberg's approach, however, was to cut the slabs into equal segments and assemble them into blocks with the cut edges exposed. Any sharpness was sanded smooth. Now installed, the blocks resemble rows of shelved books and refract the hotel's ambient light. Shipped by truck to Richmond in pieces, the work was installed by Housberg and one of his employees in a matter of days. "As with many of my projects, I am interested in expressing the materiality of glass," Housberg reports, "and the clients seemed thrilled with the final outcome."