CHARLES GOODMAN SYMPOSIUM + HICKORY CLUSTER

Updated Sep 17, 2024

TOUR BOOKLET LINK BELOW

WHY ATTEND THIS EVENT?

1.  Hear world class Goodman experts Gregory K., Hunt, FAIA, and Richard Guy Wilson

2.  Visit stunning Goodman Houses in Virginia and Maryland

3.  Meet dozens of fellow Goodman enthusiasts

VIP TICKET $150 SPECIAL DISCOUNT ... A REALLY GOOD DEAL ... Use case-sensitive discount code GOODMANVIP to save $150 by purchasing a $350 VIP ticket for only $200.  Includes three-day Friday and Saturday programs admission, Sunday home tours, PLUS the Saturday evening Alexandria, VA Sevareid House VIP reception that is limited to only 100 attendees.  NOTE:  Discount code still valid as of 4:00 p.m. September 3.

REGULAR TICKET $25 SPECIAL DISCOUNT ... Use case-sensitive discount code LABORDAY to pay only $175 for a $200 regular ticket as advised by a Friends of Hollin Hills email dated August 28, 2024.  NOTE:  Regular tickets do not include the Saturday evening Sevareid House event.

For additional ticket information or purchase issues, contact: events@friendsofhollinhills.org

Yes, it is pricey.  But this is a unique and historic Goodman event, the first ever in the nation.  The programs, home tours, and receptions will be memorable and priceless.  You may never have the opportunity to hear Hunt and Wilson again in person.

For official information, visit the Friends of Hollin Hills Goodman Symposium webpages.  For even more details on the Hickory Cluster portion of the event, see below.

DAY 1:  

Friday, September 13, 2024, 6:30 p.m. to 9:00 p.m.

Unitarian Universalist Church, Arlington, VA

WINE, CHEESE, RECEPTION, WELCOME, PANEL DISCUSSION

  Elisabeth Lardner, Moderator

  Allison Heck, Hollin Hills

  Brad Hemp, Highland Hills

  Mary Means, Hammond Wood

  Michael L. Poss, M.Arch., Hickory Cluster

DAY 2:

Saturday, September 14, 2024, 8:00 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.

George Washington Masonic National Memorial , Alexandria, VA

ARCHITECTURE AND GOODMAN PRESENTATIONS, LUNCH PROVIDED

  Richard Guy Wilson:  Mid-Century America Modern ... WORLD CLASS

  Joseph Dye Lahendro, FAIA:  Mid-Century Modern in Virginia

  Gregory K. Hunt, FAIA:  Goodman and the Modern House ... WORLD CLASS

  John Burns, Julia Heine, Mark McInturff:  ... Goodman Design Integrity

  John Carter, FAIA, Gwen Wright:  Tools for Preservation

  Dennis Carmichael, Dr. Jennifer Reut, Mila Antova:  Modern Landscapes

  Robert Fina, Michael Shapiro:  Pleasures of Caring for a Glass House

DAY 2:  

Saturday, September 14, 2024, 4:30 p.m. to 7:00 p.m.

Sevareid House, Alexandria, VA

SELF-GUIDED HOME TOUR

POOLSIDE COCKTAILS, HORS D'OEUVRES, MUSIC, RECEPTION, DISCUSSION

  Janet Lewis, Sevareid House Homeowner

  Michael Cook, AIA, Goodman Restoration Architect

DAY 3:  

Sunday, September 15, 2024, all day ... start locations and times pending

GOODMAN HOUSE TOURS ... BEST FOR HICKORY CLUSTER RESIDENTS

  Hammond Wood House, Silver Spring, MD guided tour

    Janet Bloomberg, FAIA

  Rock Creek Woods, North Kensington, MD self-guided tour

  Highland Hills, Richmond, VA video tour

  Hollin Hills, Alexandria, VA walking tour

DAY 3:

Sunday, September 15, 2024, 2:30 p.m. tentative start time

Start location is Reston Museum at Lake Anne Village Center

GOODMAN HOUSE TOURS ... BEST FOR NON-HICKORY CLUSTER RESIDENTS

  Hickory Cluster, Reston, VA guided walking tour

    Shelley S. Mastran, Ph.D., Reston Museum

    Michael L. Poss, M.Arch., Hickory Cluster

 

HICKORY CLUSTER T-SHIRTS + TOTE BAGS

Hickory Cluster unofficial logo t-shirts and tote bags, produced and donated by Block 3 neighbor Realtor Rob Chevez, founder of The Caza Group, will be available to symposium attendees and others for sale at the Reston Museum starting on Sunday, September 15, 2024.  Proceeds will fund museum operations and events.

HICKORY CLUSTER GOODMAN HOUSE TOUR

The most current version tour booklet, updated September 16, 2024, is available for reference, download, and printing here now.

This guided walking tour will start at the Reston Museum in Lake Anne Village Center where attendees will be briefly introduced to the history of Reston, the First Village, and Hickory Cluster.  

The group will pass through portions of Whittlesey & Conklin's Washington Plaza Cluster and Satterlee & Smith's Waterview Cluster, past the iconic high-rise Heron House, past several unique Gonzalo Fonseca sculptures created for the Reston First Village and located around Lake Anne and in Hickory Cluster, across the Van Gogh Bridge, then walk through 18 acres of Hickory Cluster common area on Reston's extensive paved footpaths and Youngren Bridge, to Goodman House Blocks 3, 1, and 2.

There, attendees will have the rare opportunity to step inside and explore two unique Goodman Houses described further in the guided tour booklet:  

(1)  A three-story Block 3 Model AC, a Hickory Cluster original 1960s sales model home, featured in a November 30, 1965 Look magazine article on Reston, and in a January 1965 At Home magazine cover story

(2)  A two-story Block 2 Model AB, recently fully renovated and upgraded, overlooking the successful 2010-17 stream restoration project

The event will wrap up at the Lake Anne Cafe' Montmartre, owned and operated by a Hickory Cluster homeowner family, perfect for engaging conversations and networking.  

HICKORY CLUSTER BONUS TOUR

At both Hickory Cluster and DC River Park, Goodman prophetically designed hundreds of modern living units to be air-conditioned using circulating closed loop water mechanically chilled down to as low as 45F by central geothermal district energy systems, similar to the chilled water system integrated into the 2024 Paris Olympics athletes village, and like hundreds of similar systems throughout the nation and world.

As guests of RELAC Water Cooling CEO and tour house homeowner Simon McKeown, MBA, the group will have the option to briefly visit the Reston RELAC plant in full operation on the way back to Lake Anne immediately following the Goodman House tours.  For more information on the RELAC system serving Hickory Cluster, see both the RELAC webpage on this website, and the RELAC Water Cooling company website.

BLOCK 3 GOODMAN HOUSE $/SF RECORD @ AUG 6

2024 has been the year of resale records.  One for total price:  $825,000 for a Block 1 Model AC block house.  And one for dollars per square foot:  $448/sf for a Block 3 Model B4 carriage house, the subject of this post.

Realtor investor and Block 3 homeowner Rob Chevez, founder of The Caza Group, purchased the project house last year from an absentee homeowner landlord who lived for years on the West Coast, who rented out the house to problematic tenants, and who failed to maintain the house properly from a distance.  

The project required extensive repair and renovation inside and out, but generated a huge $360,000 or 86.7% return on investment, excluding renovation expenses.  For more photos of the striking finished product, see the full respective MLS listing.

BLOCK 2 SUPER BRIGHT LIGHTS HARM NEIGHBORS

It does not take a super bright high output light bulb to illuminate a Goodman House front entry door area at night.  Most HCA Member homeowners use the equivalent of a 30 watt warm color bulb that produces about 3000 lumens of light.  And that is a reasonable, sensitive, and neighborly, compromise between just enough for security and not enough to be obnoxious or harmful to neighbors.

Goodman's unique and original Mid-Century Modern winged front and rear entry light fixtures were clearly sensitive to this issue.  The closed white glass diffusing jar moderated overall bulb brightness, and custom black metal wings substantially blocked light radiating to each side.  And it made sense to use a limited output bulb because an older 100+ watt incandescent filament bulb would not only be too bright, but it would burn too hot inside the closed diffuser jar and limit its useful life if not melt or discolor a plastic replacement diffuser.  

But recent technology has made available very bright LED or CFL bulbs that do not generate much heat in a closed diffuser.  So the sky is the limit on possible brightness.

However, when either insensitive at best, or blatantly hostile at worst, 100+ watt super bright lights are not only insensitive and obnoxious in general, they can specifically harm their neighbors physically, mentally, and financially, especially when front entry lights are immediately adjacent to neighbor master bedroom windows, and even more so for elderly neighbors who inherently have more difficulty sleeping as they grow older.  Such health impacts, including sleep deprivation, can exacerbate existing medical conditions and even contribute to early death.  

Likewise, impacted neighbors should not be forced to spend hundreds of dollars on new light-blocking window coverings to counter inconsiderate bright bulb bullies.

New residents may not be fully aware of and sensitive to long-standing cluster practices, or they may selfishly just not care about their neighbors or the common good.  Such a situation is ongoing in at least one Block 2 house group.  The previous homeowner of several decades rarely turned on saw her front entry light in general, let alone using a super bright bulb.  Sadly, the new homeowner is neither as  sensitive or considerate as the previous homeowner, despite multiple polite requests to at least use a much less bright bulb.  So much for neighborly community spirit.

BLOCK 1 GOODMAN HOUSE PRICE RECORD @ JUN 6

A Hickory Cluster Goodman House Block 1 Model AC just set another resale market value price record:  $825,000.  The previous record was $745,200 for a Block 2 Model A2B sold in 2022.

And it generated a $450,000 or 120% return on investment, excluding remodeling expenses, for the 2016-24 professional artist homeowner.  The three-story Block 1 home underwent extensive renovation after a 2016 sale by long-time Weatherbee family homeowners.  

Richard E. (Dick) Weatherbee was a former HCA Director and volleyball enthusiast to whom an HCA Common Area bench is dedicated near the Youngren Bridge over the Hickory Cluster pond adjacent to the former Reston volleyball court, now a grassy meadow after use as a critical HCA Stream Restoration Project heavy equipment and mud filter staging area.  

See the corresponding MLS listing for stunning renovation photos. 

HCA MEMBERS CHOOSE RELAC A/C SERVICE ... AGAIN

First, the three-man 2013 RELAC owner operator partnership dropped a December 11, 2023 bombshell on customers:  They would not provide 2024 cooling season service, citing serious financial obstacles, including deadbeat non-paying accounts.  Customer panic ensued, and suddenly local HVAC contractors and quotes were in high demand.

Then the RA Board of Directors took notice, and rather than becoming part of a solution as recommended by at least one Member at its December 2023 monthly meeting, they launched yet another referendum vote to remove the deed restrictive covenant requiring use of available central plant system cooling water service.  

A similar 2015 vote reportedly cost RA Members $50,000 and, like the first referendum, it too failed.  You'd think RA would have learned a lesson the second time around before blowing another $50,000 or more for a third vote in 2024. 

Sadly too, RA blatantly attempted to influence the vote by recommending removal of the covenant due to an ostensible lack of future RELAC service certainty, and apparently by directly encouraging Vantage Hill HOA leaders and residents to vote for RELAC covenant removal, thus hopefully washing their hands of problematic RELAC issues to focus on much more important issues, like pickleball courts.

RA also streamlined the application and approval process for obtaining typically bogus Fair Housing Act medical waivers from the covenant.  How is it that 30-year homeowners just recently developed "doctor-certified" serious health conditions requiring individual whole-house air-conditioning systems?  For homes clearly receiving more than adequate RELAC temperature and pressure service?  And for homes whose real problems are use of single zone systems for multi-zone floor levels, insufficient upper floor ducts and airflow, humidity-leaking doors and/or windows, and excessive window solar gain?  All of which typically remain unresolved whether using RELAC or not.  Some of life's great mysteries.  

The RA Board position and actions were misguided, at best.  RA Member RELAC customers deserved more and better.  But wait, there was light at the end of this HVAC duct after all.

Also in December 2023, a smart, knowledgeable, experienced, and very dedicated group of RELAC customers from several clusters stepped up, led by Hickory Cluster Block 3 homeowner Simon McKeown, MBA, with artist, attorney, and former HCA Director Kristen Uhler-McKeown mastering essential legal, financial, meeting, and website issues.  

This all-volunteer group formed RELAC Water Cooling to assume system financial and operational control from the 2013-23 RELAC team, working closely with Virginia State Corporations Commission regulators, with cooling equipment and operations industry professionals, and with at least two former owner/operator teams, including long-time central plant site landlord Doug Cobb.  

The new RELAC team also tried many times to discuss their plans with and seek support from the HCA Board of Directors.  But the Board deflected such dialog and continued down their path of undermining RELAC continuation by posting mostly negative information on the official cluster website, by hosting and funding an "Industry Day" for HVAC contractor marketing, and by also promoting a "yes" vote to remove the RA restrictive covenant despite a long-standing HCA Member preference for RELAC.

In addition, an HCA Director who is not a RELAC customer, ostensibly on behalf of the entire HCA Board of Directors, and by implication the entire HCA community, challenged the RELAC ownership and control transition Joint Petition by submitting the following message during the SCC petition public comment period:   "As affected party we were supposed to be notified of the petition by May24, 2024. The only notification was by email on May 29, 2024 at 21:21 pm."   While this comment is technically true, it is incomplete and misleading because HCA had in fact known earlier and posted a related official HCA Member notice on May 22.  

Admirably, the new RELAC team took a more positive community approach than did RA or HCA Boards.  They evaluated ongoing finances and infrastructure, and formed new and more viable financial and operational plans.  They built a much-needed and more-professional RELAC website.  And they built community confidence with several in-person and online public town hall meetings to share their vision of RELAC 2024 and beyond with customers and local leaders, including Fairfax County Supervisor Walter Alcorn.

RA referendum voting ended on March 8, 2024.  And like both RA and HCA recommendations, and two previous referendums, it failed miserably.  The vote resulted in only 165 of 343 possible eligible member ballots cast, and for a third time failed to generate a required 2/3 or 229 affirmative majority of all eligible votes to give everyone the restriction-free "choice" to spend up to $15,000 or more on a personal standalone outdoor air-conditioning system.

Note that a winning "yes" vote would have also undermined fellow RELAC customer neighbors who could not afford their alternative individual systems.  Or like Vantage Hill Condo and LARCA Heron House residents, who could not reasonably retrofit their under-designed homes for individual systems even if they could afford it.

Meanwhile, the RELAC Water Cooling team moved forward, despite being undermined by RA and HCA.  RELAC contracted with the Vantage Hill Condominium Association for overall cooling water service to their more than 150 residential units.  Lake Anne LARCA Members have also continued as RELAC customers.  And RELAC collected more than $200,000 in private donations from enthusiastic and supportive customers, outside the SCC tariff structure, for RELAC infrastructure enhancement.

On March 31, 2024, RELAC announced that its cooling water service would be available to all customers in May 2024 as required by its current SCC tariff.  In fact, RELAC was up and running even earlier on April 27 as part of a pre-season test period during an early heat wave, well before the required tariff start date.  Since then, the service has operated exceptionally well, with equipment issues resolved quickly, and customer inside water temperatures measured as low as 49F at a typical 40-50 psi in Hickory Cluster Block 2, about midway within our part of the distribution system, only a 4F heat gain from the RELAC plant to a customer inside utility room meter.

Now THAT is community spirit.  

Community spirit for which Reston has been famous since founding in the 1960s.  Especially in Hickory Cluster where the 1990s million dollar Block 3 parking garage failure was resolved by fellow Block 1 and Block 2 neighbors who gained no direct Block 3 benefit for their hundreds of thousands of dollars in special assessments and 30 years of loan payments.  A resolution about which a long-time garage-area Block 3 HCA Director publicly exclaimed as necessary because " ... we are all in this together. ... "  So much for 2024 HCA Board community spirit and togetherness.

RELAC Water Cooling volunteers:  Keep up the good work.

HCA RELAC customers:  Keep up your unselfish RELAC system support.

For the largest repository of RELAC information available, see the RELAC A/C System page on this website.