smallest things, from whether the work is done well when nobody important is watching, from whether you return calls promptly and tell the truth about timelines and treat the people who work for you with the respect that makes them want to work for you again.
I grew Holt Ridge over five years into a company that had completed fourteen projects across western North Carolina and that was known in the regional development community as the firm that made buildings with intention. A reviewer in an Asheville architecture magazine had said our buildings seemed to have been thinking about the people who would live in them.
I kept that.
I read it at least once a month for two years.
The house outside Asheville was the thing the five years had been building toward, though I had not known exactly that until I stood on the ridge above the French Broad River on a November morning when I was twenty-nine and felt the specific recognition of a place you have been looking for.
