Troy Schaum on build constituency in Marfa

Marfa’s transformation from a remote railroad town to a global cultural landmark is inseparable from Donald Judd’s vision of art and architecture rooted in place. His interventions with carefully sited buildings, thoughtfully restored vernacular structures, and deliberate engagement with the landscape created a dialogue between art, architecture, and community that continues to resonate decades later. Following a seven-year restoration, and a fire in 2021 that set back the efforts, the first major building project to be completed as part of the Judd Foundation’s long-term restoration plan for its buildings in Texas reopens to the public in September 2025. At the opening event of the Architecture Office, Troy Schaum of Schaum Architects spoke with The World Around about his studio’s careful restoration of the building, the strategies used to maintain Judd’s original intentions, and how this work helps sustain Marfa’s collective memory.

Satomi Blair: Once you started looking into Judd’s archives, work, and philosophy, was there anything that stood out or surprised you?

Troy Schaum: A few things have surprised me in engaging more deeply with Judd’s work. One of the biggest is his investment in the landscape, the way he thought about the relationship between his work and its surroundings. That is something that is hard to fully grasp from books until you actually come out here. When you see the landscape and how he situated the work so deliberately within buildings and specific sites, it becomes clear how integral that relationship is.

Looking into the archives, you realize he was constantly rethinking those relationships. He was moving things around, reconsidering how the work, the architecture, and the landscape spoke to each other. It wasn’t as if he made one decision early on and left it that way forever. He was always refining and experimenting. Seeing that process unfold was surprising, especially since in books the work can seem like a collection of isolated objects rather than a continuous dialogue with place.

He came to Marfa after having lived and worked at 101 Spring Street, so he already had an architectural mindset. But once here, he began studying the buildings, trying to understand them, making decisions, and introducing alterations or additions to explore how they could take on new life in relation to his art and to the landscape. You can see that experimentation clearly in the drawings within the archive, but also in how he occupied the buildings themselves. 

This building, the Architecture Office, is one of his later projects from the 1990s, among the last he worked on. By then, he was pushing his architectural practice toward the most public level, working on train stations and other civic buildings, architecture that engages the public realm in a direct way. Even though Marfa might feel remote when you visit, he was thinking in expansive terms: about cities, about the public, and about how art and architecture interact within those larger contexts.

“Judd’s Architecture Office is one of his later projects from the 1990s. By then, he was thinking in expansive terms: about cities, about the public, and about how art and architecture interact within those larger contexts.”

SB: Other small towns in Texas or across the U.S. have beautiful main streets, but they haven’t received the same attention or resources as Marfa. How do you see Marfa’s development in relation to these other towns?

TS: There is so much thought, energy, and reflection embedded in the towns you are describing. They all have these gems that just need care, sometimes a little, sometimes a lot, but they reflect who we are as people and embody the craft and thoughtfulness of those who built them. The question is how we engage with those places so they continue to have a life. I don’t think Judd believed it had to happen only in Marfa. Marfa is a beautiful place, of course, but this approach could happen more broadly. That was part of his critique of architecture at the time: instead of focusing only on new buildings and their sculptural effects, why not pay attention to the culture we have already built? Can we take that seriously? Especially during the 1970s and 1980s, when he was working here, much of the architectural community wasn’t asking those kinds of questions.

SB: Let’s talk about the building itself—its history, how it was used over time, and then the work you were asked to do for the restoration.

TS: When Judd first acquired the building, it was still a commercial space on the ground floor. Over the years, it had hosted many different businesses, including a grocery store. If you go down to the basement, you can still see where they once listed produce prices on the wall. The basement stayed cooler, so that was where they stored the goods. It has always been a commercial building with apartments above. When I first arrived, there was still some active commercial use; a barbershop occupied the space that’s now one of the project rooms. 

When Donald Judd began working on it, he stripped away most of the exterior elements such as the canopies, signage, and, most notably, the layers of paint that covered the brick. He sandblasted the paint off, which left the brick surface rough and recessed the mortar joints. That treatment makes the bricks appear to float on the surface of the mortar rather than blending into a uniform wall. In restoring the building, we had to be extremely careful to preserve that effect. Because of the rough brick surface, the mortar tends to catch and build up irregularly, so maintaining the simplicity and precision of Judd’s original decisions required a lot of craftsmanship, especially from the masons.

The building itself dates to around 1910 or 1911, built when Marfa was developing as a water-stop town near the train depot. It served travelers selling groceries and goods, and provided temporary apartments for visitors or workers connected to the ranching economy. By the time Judd acquired it, those original uses had mostly faded. Ranching had changed, and many of the buildings that once supported that economy were sitting empty. Judd was working across several of those structures, and this was one of the last buildings he turned his attention to.

SB:  Could you talk about other vernacular elements, particularly the building’s approach to heat and climate?

TS: We had a few very grainy photographs of the construction site when Judd was working on the building, and it originally had a canopy. If you look around town, the only way to live comfortably in a warm, arid place like West Texas is to have canopies over the sidewalks. They provide natural shade and help cool the street.

This building once had a canopy like that, but it was removed over time. By the time Judd acquired the property, only traces of it remained. So in our restoration, part of the thinking was how to protect the spaces from the intense Marfa sun. We decided to reintroduce the canopy to shield the large glass storefront facing the street. It’s one of those classic architectural contradictions, you want transparency and a visual connection to the street, but large expanses of south- or west-facing glass need protection from heat and glare. That is exactly the kind of practical intelligence Judd appreciated. He recognized that the original designers had already thought carefully about these conditions. Reinstating the canopy felt like the most natural and respectful choice to revive a simple, effective strategy that had always made sense for this climate.

SB: And how about the windows?

TS: The structure has beautiful storefront windows, made by a company called Corner Window Frames, which, interestingly, still exists today. These are early examples of that type of storefront glazing, and they have some really elegant detailing. Originally, the windows used single-pane glass, but since we now use double-pane glazing, we worked hard to maintain the same visual clarity. Judd wanted that crisp, transparent relationship between inside and outside, the experience where, when you are inside, you feel connected to the street, and when you are on the street, you feel almost part of the interior. Preserving that openness keeps the public life of the building active and visible.

Of course, that brings a challenge: how do you maintain that connection while protecting the interior from heat and light? To address it, we used a few strategies, reinstating the canopy and developing passive systems rather than mechanical ones, to minimize both embodied and operational carbon. We employed an old technique known as night flushing, used in hot, arid climates around the world. The building’s brick walls act as thermal mass. At night, cool air is drawn in from beneath the canopy, cooling those brick surfaces; during the day, that stored coolness helps regulate the interior temperature. These were the trade-offs we worked through; balancing environmental responsibility with conservation needs. The goal was to keep the building open and alive while protecting it and the work it houses, within what can be a pretty harsh desert climate.

SB: Marfa is already known as a destination for modern art. By opening this building, do you see this as a way of placing Marfa as a destination for architecture within a broader international context?

TS: Honestly, architects have known about Marfa for a long time. What is exciting now is the opportunity for a wider audience—the people who commission architecture, who live and work in these spaces—to come here and see that architecture can operate differently than what they might usually ask for. Building a constituency for architecture is just as important, maybe even more important, than the design itself. Architecture doesn’t exist in isolation; it needs communities of people who understand and support it. Judd’s work here gives us space to ask those questions: how can architecture serve a broader public, and how might that public, in turn, sustain it? This kind of project helps demonstrate that those constituencies can and should exist. It shows that clients, users, or even cities might begin to think differently, asking not “Should we tear this down and start over? But rather, what new life can this building have?”

Marfa gives us that opportunity. It reminds us that architecture, buildings, and cities don’t happen in a vacuum. They depend on cultural engagement, on advocates, audiences, and communities who care about their future.

“Judd’s work gives us space to ask important questions: how can architecture serve a broader public, and how might that public, in turn, sustain it?”

SB: For the opening night, there was so much of the community out. What does it mean to see the community coming together around architecture in this way?

TS: The community is really coming together around its public sphere, its town, its sense of place. Marfa was a close-knit community long before Donald Judd arrived, and it remains one now. The version of the town you experience today still reflects that. The people of Marfa have been incredibly engaged and supportive throughout this project, before the fire [in June 2021], during it, and in the years since. Last night, I met a woman who grew up here, a rancher who knew Donald Judd and remembered coming to the Glascock Building to buy supplies. She was heartbroken when it burned. Others I have met worked with Judd directly on his art, on his buildings, or have continued that work in some way. Many simply admire the buildings because they grew up with them; they are part of the town’s daily life.

Cities hold collective memory, and in small towns like Marfa, that memory is especially cherished. You feel it in the way people talk about these buildings—their stories, their meaning, their material presence. Working here, you are constantly reminded how architecture carries those shared memories and values forward.

SB: What’s next for you and the Judd Foundation?

TS: Recently, we repaired the wall at the Winter Garden, and the adobe wall at the Block partially collapsed during high winds. Right now, our focus is on understanding how to care for Judd’s adobe structures so they can endure for another 40 years. They’ve already lasted that long, and we’re working to ensure their future.

Beyond that, we are developing a series of plans focused on collection protection and storage—long-term strategies that unfold gradually, depending on funding and resources.

All images © Judd Foundation