Four hours on a terrace at Anopoli

Every project in this office starts the same way: before anyone opens a drawing, two of us go to the site at four different hours of one day. Early morning, the middle of the day, the late afternoon and the last light. We take a tape, a notebook, a thermometer and something to eat.

At Anopoli, in May 2016, we sat on the second terrace from twenty past seven until five to seven. At twenty past seven the whole hillside was in the shadow of the mountain and the stones were wet with dew. By eleven the sun was on the walls and we could see which ones had bulged: the shadow of a leaning wall is wider at the top. At ten past three the wind came up from the gorge and we understood why the old shelter has its door on the east. At five to seven the light was low and orange, the swallows came out, and one of the owners walked up to ask what we were doing.

None of this is on a topographic survey. All of it went into the project. The four drawings above are the same terrace at the same four hours, redrawn from our notes.

What we look for

• Where the shade falls, and when it moves off.
• Where the wind comes from, and where it stops.
• What you hear, and what you see from the place where you would sit.
• How the ground drains after rain, if we are lucky enough to be there when it rains.

It costs a day. It has never been wasted.