Environmental Productions LLC

One of my first home design projects as principal of my own firm Environmental Productions in Avon-Vail at Singletree with Beaver Creek resort in the background for Sam Sterling Homes. While the home is situated near the 10th hole of the Singletree luxury golf course, it answered the call with one of the first attached ADU units built in Avon-Vail on a small lot. The 1,000 ft "ski instructors" unit faces the street and also shares the backyard hot tub.

As it turned out, the "Spec." home paid for itself with income generated from the ADU. The half-basement garden level with the split-level entry was economical way to create both adequate living space and privacy between the main part of the house, and the party-wall-ADU.

Mid-century Walk-out Basement conversion to ADU for a family member. This basement transformation was miniaturized in details for simple living. My home in Barnum Park was designed and built by the late well known-school and church architect Carol Lewis for himself and his young family. The home was then purchased in 1958 by my father, a freelance writer, and immigrant refuge from the Shoa, with my mother also an immigrant-refuge of the Cold War. The basement faces the street as the house is built into a hillside. The tiny front space has had many different lives: first, as a small one-car garage, then around 1960 (when I was born) converted to a rustic office space in which my father, Curtis W. Casewit typed-up some 30 published books 1960-2000 ; for a brief period after 2002, I stored my architects files and such; the back room had originally been designed as a photographer' dark room. was then converted into a bedroom and laundry area. In 2009, my mother decided to move from Independent Living and move back after 40 years and live in the same home with me-- but in a newly created private apartment- ADU! The main front space only about 12' x16' allowed everything to be easily within reach from my mother's sofa. She often entertained friends and family including many generations of children in her attached "granny flat."

One of the earliest LoDo Denver Residential Loft conversions developed by Dana Crawford in 1990, the original warehouse was designed by Architect Frank E. Edbrooke in 1905 with an added floor in 1911. 1450 Wynkoop St. was built for Spratlen-Anderson, the successful Denver wholesale grocery business. Niccolo was part of the Interior Architecture design team under John Carney Jr. FAIA and Elizabeth Metz AIA for this custom loft. The condo apartment space combined two units, on two levels at the corner facing 15th Street.
A circular stair connecting the levels. The upper level integrates the large open warehouse loft space with an extended kitchen island. The lower level a private bedroom sanctuary.

On becoming a registered architect by nomination in early 1992, my first built project in Colorado was a Tricontigon Dome house in Larimer County about 10 miles northwest of Lyons, Colorado. The passive solar home was built over a 2-year period--off the grid. The very collaborative project was built with hand tools without electricity.
The compact design grew organically out from the hillside, and has since its completion in 1994 been expanded with additional rooms for an art studio. A passive solar design, with substantial thermal mass, the home heats it self. Conceived as a free-flowing space on 4 levels, the small home includes a greenhouse area facing southwest with a interior gold fish pond at the entrance level; a ramp up to the main dome floor level; then a loft space suspended from the dome structure, and finally an observation "pagoda" accessed via a ladder.

The task was to design four new town homes to compliment the historic Stevens School condominium conversion originally designed in 1900 by renowned architect Robert S. Roeschlaub--Colorado's first licensed architect. The Stevens School Town homes was an early example of new urban infill in the heart of the Congress Park neighborhood, not far from the Denver Botanic Gardens. The south playground of the school was utilized for the new town homes incorporating a variation of the house forms found in the neighborhood, while also maintaining the pastoral setting. Detached garages were located along the alley. Attention was given to adjacent garden space preserving views of the school from many angles. The over all site development plan presented was by Niccolo and winning approval of multiple zoning variances, revocable permits, and Landmark Preservation Commission approvals from the City of Denver.

I am very proud of my involvement as design architect of the main lobby atrium and public areas of the Embassy Suites/ Hilton Hotel in Anchorage, Alaska on contract with AE7 architects, and Stonebridge the developer/owner. The project was fast-tracked prior to my arrival, and major pieces of the build-out had to be designed as the building was rising from its foundations. The 40-ft tall atrium roof, and fenestration needed to be fleshed-out in cross-section, while all of the ceilings of the public spaces including, the hotel restaurant, ballrooms, gym, and swimming pool needed to be delineated. . Artists collaborated on unique installations, including a dramatic wishing well pool created with sculptural Alaskan whales tails peaking out above the water line.

Music and Architecture have always inspired each other, yet Architecture is not "frozen" Music, architecture is 3-dimensional space that can be experienced in motion sequence. Architecture is potentially warm and populated, and can be understood and explored, and relatable as interior and exterior space. The Synesthesia within both disciplines is abstract but also very tangible and tactile in the making for the architect and musician alike. Since writing/composing/designing his thesis at M.I.T. 1986-1987, Niccolo has striven to develop and apply both disciplines in his Denver architectural practice. He received the top honor M.I.T. AIA School Medal for the 1987 Master Architecture class.
(link to the design thesis in comments)

Every designer has that "first building" --mine was a community training center built in Egypt for The Institute of Cultural Affairs (ICA) with funding from the Ford Foundation. The training center in El Bayad, Egypt-a small town south of Cairo--was expanded in 1982 to house 26 trainees for the duration of the seminars. Classroom space, a meeting hall, a community kitchen, and 14 bedrooms surround two traditional courtyards. The building complex was designed with local materials to respond to harsh desert climate and the vernacular building techniques of the villagers. Optimal cross ventilation, shaded walkways, are employed in the Arab tradition. Limestone walls were utilized with cast concrete roofs reinforced with palm fibers.