The Art of Building was founded in 2013 by James Dell'Olio and Darren Davidowich, combining a love for architectural design and high-workmanship construction with the goal of building uniquely inspired projects that elevate their surroundings.
Darren Davidowich
Co-Founder
I was the kid who enjoyed physical work. My early career includes highlights mowing neighborhood lawns, carpentry and working at a local farm. Add this to viewing more episodes of This Old House than any self-respecting teenager should watch, and my career path as a builder was a completely logical outcome.
With degrees in environmental studies and policy, I started my career in planning but soon moved to real estate acquisition and development at Lennar (one of the biggest homebuilders in the US) where I was promoted to Division President of the New York Region at a fairly young age – a huge personal accomplishment but also one that led me to question why we build and what excites me most about building homes.
While at Lennar, I identified an opportunity to geographically expand the company’s geographic footprint into New York state. This led to me founding the New York Homebuilding Division, which grew from a start-up to approximately $90 million in annual revenue within a three-year period. I negotiated, secured approvals, and developed more than 5,000 residential lots in New York, New Jersey and Pennsylvania and, overseeing a 40-person team, built upwards of 500 homes. My time at Lennar also provided me with the opportunity to directly manage infrastructure development including bonding, survey, grading, dry utilities (electric, phone, data, gas), drainage, stormwater management, roadways, water distribution, wastewater collection and treatment systems and of course construction management. These formative experiences were invaluable to me as they honed my professional skill set in land use, infrastructure development, real estate development, construction, and business leadership.
At the end of the day, I was working for a huge publicly traded corporation building a relatively small set of homes that we had perfected to be both efficient and appealing to potential buyers. The houses were the opposite of individualized and business decisions were heavily shareholder influenced. I found the job exhilarating and more than challenging but I felt detached from the homes we were building rather than creating.
After spending several years on my own as a real estate investor, I met James and The Art of Building was born. We were both craving meaning in the work we did, and we shared a passion for building, craftsmanship and the Hudson Valley. Today, fourteen years later, we run a team of 20-plus design and construction employees and have built over 50 projects and counting.
Outside of work, I am passionate about fitness and nature. An early adopter of shinrin-yoku (forest-bathing), when I am not working, I can usually be found in the woods hiking high peaks with my wife Kate and our three dogs, Bentley, Coconut and Pepper.
Chronology
2012 – Present - Co-Managing Partner, The Art of Building2010 – Present - Co-Founder, HETTA Glögg
2007 – 2013 - Co-Managing Partner, Benchmark Property Group
2000 – 2007 - Division President, Regional Vice President, Lennar Corporation
1998 – 2000 - Assistant Planner, New Jersey Meadowlands Commission
2000 - Certificate, Administrative Science, Fairleigh Dickenson University
1998 - Master of Science, Environmental Policy, NJIT
1996 - Bachelor of Arts, Environmental Studies, Ramapo College
James Dell'Olio
Co-Founder
My professional training as a designer-builder started with a series of case-study Lego houses and parking structures for Adventure People and their disproportionately small Matchbox cars. Soon after, my practice expanded to heavy infrastructure projects, focused primarily on dams and canals for the crayfish in the creek that ran through our backyard. By the age of nine, my atelier produced drawings of houses with floorplans (including one with a 120-foot-long living room, complete with a 30-foot-wide fireplace--which, in my defense, did seem to "work" with the scale of the room). But in college, I chose to study philosophy instead of architecture and I sort of forgot about drawing and building for much of the next 15 years.
About 20 years ago, a side-hustle with a series of modest investment properties took on more and more ambitious designs and activated my long-dormant creative side. Six years after that, I met Darren and The Art of Building was born.
Darren and I shared a love of building and the Hudson Valley. We both were disillusioned with our careers and wanted to do something that we were passionate about. For me, I wanted to feel connected to the place and to the people in it. I loved the vernacular architecture of the houses and barns in the region and was so impressed with the artists and craftsmen who lived here. We wanted to join this community of makers and do our share to contribute to the conversation.
It probably sounds hokey, but The Art of Building is a celebration of individuality and uniqueness. We wanted to work with interesting people who wanted houses as individual as they were. We wanted to work with the region's best artists and craftsmen. We wanted to do great design but didn't want to be doctrinaire about it—we didn't want to stay in a lane of being modern or historic but wanted to find new ways to somehow be both at the same time. With the right clients, every project we do creates its own unique spark and special alchemy--and each building becomes an individual in its own right.
Chronology
2020 – Present - Founder and Co-Managing Partner, Sighthound Search Partners
2022 – Present - Vice Chairman, Skyhawk Capital Advisors
2012 – Present - Co-Managing Partner, The Art of Building
2001 – 2019 - President, Ferguson Partners
1997 - Master of Arts, Philosophy, Katholeike Universiteit Leuven, magna cum Laude
1995 - Bachelor of Arts, Vassar College, Phi Beta Kappa, Maguire Fellow
Lauren Cawse, AIA, LEED GA
Architect, Partner
As a kid I had no interest in architecture whatsoever. I liked art and literature a bit more than math and science, but I was pretty well-rounded and didn’t feel drawn to any particular vocation. This changed the day I accidentally stepped into a college architecture studio: as soon as I saw the space strewn with drawings, models, maps, and engaged, focused students I knew that this is where I wanted to be and the form that I wanted my education to take. The eventuality of actually becoming an architect felt far away and beside the point—this was about learning to explore and communicate ideas in visual, three-dimensional ways. It was an inspiring lens through which I could continue to study a broad range of subjects. Over time though, my interest in architecture in and of itself grew and matured. The field that includes the design and construction of buildings is vast and much of it I find utterly fascinating.
My path to the Hudson Valley was circuitous. I studied architecture in New York City and in Boston, which were my laboratories of buildings, public spaces, and infrastructure. During a gap year from graduate school I worked in the field assisting a carpenter. I spent my internship years as a designer for the international star Moshe Safdie, working on enormous projects: museums and a cultural center in the US, a new university for women in Bangladesh, a resort in Singapore. During the recession I pivoted to a very technical historic restoration practice in New York City (new design work dried up but old buildings still needed care). When the economy revived, I was able to marry my design training with my preservation knowledge at Beyer Blinder Belle, a leading firm in the American preservation movement. I was project architect for the transformation of the Henry Street Settlement Firehouse into a social services center, which won a Lucy Moses Award, the highest preservation award bequeathed by the New York Landmarks Conservancy. In 2016, the firm joined forces with the renowned Dutch architects Mecanoo to win the competition for the renovation of the 42nd Street Campus of the New York Public Library. I took on the role of project architect for three discrete areas within the scope: the permanent Polonsky Exhibition of the New York Public Library’s Treasures, the Center for Research in the Humanities, and the Library Shop and Cafe. As part of that project, we also renovated the Stavros Niarchos Foundation Library, the largest circulating branch in the NYPL system.
Eventually, the spell cast by New York City began to lift and I longed for green grass and dark night skies. My partner and I began spending time exploring different towns in the Hudson Valley and one weekend we stayed in a Rhinebeck guest house that was very well done. Before leaving, I checked to see who was behind the thoughtful design: it was the Art of Building. I cold called James and Darren and discovered clear commonalities but also ways that I could start to round out the team. It is a creative conversation that continues every day, always searching for ways to learn and to improve with every project.
Chronology
2021 - Present - Partner & Project Manager, The Art of Building
2014 - 2021 - Architect & Associate, Beyer Blinder Belle Architects and Planners
2010 – 2014 - Architect, Walter B. Melvin Architects
2007 - 2010 - Architectural Designer, Safdie Architects
1999 – 2001 - Architectural Designer, Walter B. Melvin Architects
2006 - Master of Architecture, Harvard University Graduate School of Design
1999 - Bachelor of Arts, Architecture, Columbia University, Columbia College
Ilsa Falis, RA
Architect, Partner
When I can’t sleep I close my eyes and build houses. I started doing this when I was a kid. Unable to sleep, I would clear my mind and imagine myself in a forest in Maine or on a tropical beach. Depending on my location, I would build a simple frame from the branches of fallen pine trees or I'd construct an ornate human-scale castle from seashells and sand. These buildings weren’t entirely fanciful; I liked to puzzle out the proper techniques for planeing and notching branches and mortaring seashells. It was the logistical puzzles - the 'how' rather than the 'what' - that I found most engaging. As I grew older and studied first art history and paintings conservation and later architecture, these simple imaginary structures became more substantial exercises that were often rooted in my classwork. Later, my insomniac nights were occupied by whatever knots I was trying to unravel in my professional life, but they always involved some form of imaginary building.
As an architect, I spent the first decade-plus of my career drawing during the day and imagining the actual physical steps of building what I drew at night. This slightly obsessive habit has made me a better architect than I might have been otherwise, and has become an important part of my waking practice as well. It's not enough to create a beautiful finished product - I want to create a building and design process that is also beautiful (i.e. thoughtful, supportive, economical, and rigorous). This emphasis on the creative journey has been particularly important in a career that has focused on custom residential architecture, which is inherently personal and collaborative. My job isn't just to deliver a house to a client after some number of months, it's to guide my clients through the design and building process and to help them articulate their goals, often in an unfamiliar language. This is one of the most important parts of my job - I'm as much a translator as anything else. I think it is my interest in process - human process and technical process - that has made me so well-suited to a professional practice that marries architecture, design, and construction management.
I wish I could claim to be thoughtful and intentional in my personal life, as well as my professional life, but I've recently become a mom and the early years of parenthood have been defying my organizational tendencies. My daughter was born at the end of 2021 and my family moved to Rhinebeck six months later. My time outside of work is spent trying to keep up with an increasingly active toddler and the renovation and maintenance of my house. I manage to squeeze in occasional moments spent making art and being awestruck by the landscape of my new home, and more than occasional moments spent snuggling my cat.
Chronology
2023 - Present - Partner & Project Manager, The Art of Building
2020 - 2023 - Project Architect, Studio MM Architects
2015 - 2019 - Project Architect, Deborah Berke Partners Architects
2012 - 2015 - Project Manager, Joeb Moore Partners Architects
2012 - Master of Architecture, Yale University
2006 - Bachelor of Arts, Art History, Scripps College
Karl Hansen, AIA, NCARB, CPHC
Architect, Project Manager
While earning his Bachelors of Architecture at the University of Arizona, Karl Hansen developed a passion for design in close communication with the environment: His experience with extreme landscapes ultimately led to projects that prioritize performance, sustainability, and resilience.
Over the past decade, Hansen has put those academic interests into practice. Upon relocating to the East Coast, Hansen landed at a mid-size firm, where he worked on a variety of projects including educational, healthcare, and mixed-use structures. From there, he transitioned to River Architects in Cold Spring, New York, continuing to hone his knowledge and skills in passive building techniques. Compelled by the opportunity to engage more deeply with the construction process, he joined the Art of Building team in 2024.
Jane Irvine
Project Manager
Pacific Northwest native Jane Irvine moved to New York City later in life, excited to steep herself in the city’s rich architectural history. She put her background in project management and decorative background to work with construction and building companies, as well as her own eponymous design firm and The Shade Store, before relocating to the Hudson Valley and joining The Art of Building in 2021. A longtime yoga practitioner, she is forever channeling balance and growth.
Cooper Hall, AIA
Architect, Project Manager
Cooper Hall comes from a long line of builders, carpenters, and woodworkers—a legacy that ultimately led her to pursue architecture studies as an undergraduate at Yale. From there, she honed her design skills and sensibilities at Hart Howerton, with projects from New York and Miami to California and the Caribbean, before relocating to the Hudson Valley in WHEN. In her off hours, you can find her restoring and renovating her historic home in Pine Plains.