AR+D Publishing

of it, which is also changed each time they remember it. That’s another form of coauthoring the work. Conceptually, we’re really interested in looping, recursion, and this simultaneity of experiences.

In addition to your work with Dream the Combine, you are each cofounder or co-owner of other organizations. Jennifer, you are cofounder of Dark Matter University and an educator. Tom, you are currently co-owner of the metal fabrication practice Jacobsson Carruthers.¹ Can you tell us about these respective efforts and how they interface with Dream the Combine? We’re interested in how all the puzzle pieces fit together to construct your larger efforts of practice.

Tom: We’re not defined only by the work we do, or by any one of our many roles. Even more fascinating to me, we can feel a number of emotions simultaneously. Jennifer had a student, Sam Schaefer, who talked about the social geometry of material. In architectural terms, we’re talking about materials in terms of matter, but we don’t talk about how anything actually gets done. This person knows that person … there are little networks of trust, and those are the pathways and tunnels through which these projects flow. At a conceptual level, my work as a fabricator has been a way to gain fluency in the language of material. There are real ways that it is helpful. There are also distractions associated with it … Do I really need to make another railing or a hood for somebody? There is a changing terrain. Five years ago, the current setup made sense. Going forward, I think there will be some adjustments.