Doug Michels: Visionary
Architect
From a doll's house to the White House, from Cadillacs buried in Texas
to dolphin-astronauts swimming in space, architect Doug Michels's visions embraced big
ideas in the most individualistic, awe-inspiring, and mind-expanding ways.
Michels was gearing up for his big sixtieth-birthday bash at the end of
June when he died in a rock-climbing accident in Australia. He had been working with a
production crew on a film about whales and fell while climbing to an observation point at
Eden Bay, his parents told the Houston Chronicle.
Michels first burst onto the design scene in 1968 as a founding member
of the Ant Farm group of "underground architects." Perhaps one of the group's
most famous works was the 1974 monument Cadillac Ranch on U.S. Route 66 outside of
Amarillo, Texas, built for Stanley Marsh III, grandson of a Texas oil tycoon. Another
early project was the 1971 House of the Century, which activated Michels's lifelong
interest in designing the future.
Over the years, THE FUTURIST showcased several Michels-inspired
projects, including three popular cover stories:
• Project Bluestar for the January-February 1987 issue was
Michels's proposal for an orbiting "think tank in zero gravity," which would
include a support crew of dolphins whose ultrasonic emissions would program the central
computer.
• The Hyperion Project, a design for a Martian city theme park
10,000 years in the future, graced the cover of the March-April 1993 FUTURIST. As he did
for Bluestar, Michels drew on the support of gifted, like-thinking collaborators such as
artist and industrial designer Peter Bollinger and architect James Allegro.
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Project Bluestar (1986) was
Michels's proposal for the International Space Station. |
• Dollennium 2000 for the July-August 1994 issue was an
imaginative, futuristic dollhouse that featured new ideas about changing families and
lifestyles.
Michels's most recent project to be featured in THE FUTURIST was the
Allen Teleport Version 2.0 (May-June 2001), an ultra-high-tech media room and
communications laboratory, developed once again in partnership with Bollinger. Michels's
final, gracious contribution to the pages of THE FUTURIST appeared in July-August 2003,
when he offered commentary on the work of the late A.C. Radebaugh ("Yesterday's Art
of Tomorrow" by Hope Cristol).
Michels was generous with his ideas, and he frequently sent THE
FUTURIST's staff updates on his various projects. Among them were his designs for Dwell
magazine's 2001 competition to redesign the White House. (He won third place.) Another
competition in the 1990s invited new designs for Pennsylvania Avenue and the White House;
Michels and partner Allegro submitted a proposal for The National Sofa, an interactive
monument where people could sit and have live, two-way conversations with the First
Family.
"Doug's vocabulary of ideas transcended words, for he was truly a
visual--and visionary--thinker," said FUTURIST managing editor Cindy Wagner.
"Those of us who would peer into the future can only hope to capture a glimpse of
what Doug Michels could see with laser-sharp clarity."
For more on Doug Michels, visit http://www.paraswest.com/dougmichels
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