Section through a north-facing room: sky light enters high and is carried across the ceiling plane.
01
Daylight and the North-Facing Room
A north room is not a dark room; it is a room lit by the whole sky rather than by the sun.
A room facing north never takes direct sun, so it is lit by the whole dome of the sky instead. That is why the light is so even, and why improving such a room is a question of how much sky the window can see and what the surfaces inside do with it.
Shortridge Design Notes is a set of ten written studies about the way ordinary houses are put together. Each one takes a single subject — a junction, a geometry, an assembly, a material property — and explains how it behaves and why it is detailed the way it is. They are written for people who are about to change something and would rather understand it first.
Nothing here is a commission, a portfolio piece or an offer of work. The numbered plates are drawings made to explain the subject of the study beside them, not records of anything built. Where a subject touches structure, building fabric or anything governed by regulation, the study describes how the thing behaves and stops short of telling you what your particular building needs.
The numbering runs from 01 to 10 and is an order of reading rather than a ranking. The early studies deal with light, drawings and planning; the middle ones with assemblies and geometry; the later ones with materials, structure, finishes and the ground outside. Each study stands alone and each ends with a way back to the index.
