Verl is an architect and designer who grew up among the red rock mesas and canyons near the Utah Arizona border. This unique environment instilled in him a heightened regard for the desert’s most prominent resource, the sun. He observed its presence on the landscape, often through the lens of a camera, as it made its way across the horizon; late afternoon shadows casting across textured sandstone crevices, releasing brilliant colors as the day transitioned to night.

 

Those early impressions influenced Verl’s path towards architecture. Throughout his education and travels to Japan and Egypt he was fascinated with the potential that architecture had to create meaningful relationships between humans and nature, earth and sky.

 

Verl utilizes photography, as one of several methods, to study and better
understand different qualities of light and to experiment with visual perception, often through the use of various types of screens or “filters”. His “Lightscapes” and “in Light” series of photographs focus on the experiential, emotional, even meditative qualities of light. Light itself becomes the main subject, rather than the figure or form (he envisions a similar approach to his architectural work). Verl employs diffused, natural light and reflected color to create his images. He approaches both design and photography as a series of inquiries into the ethereal and evanescent nature of shadow + light.

 

Verl is also committed to searching for ways that architects can deliver quality design to more people through design innovation, new construction technologies and alternative models of architectural practice. He has lived and practiced architecture in Japan, California and Utah, where he currently resides and works in his studio. He also teaches design classes at the University of Utah School of Architecture.