This article first appeared in the 200812
issue of BD+C.
Suman Sorg, architect for the new U.S. embassy in Barbados, took her design cue not from the island’s older civic vernacular, with its association with the colonial past, but from its chattel houses, small homes with saw-toothed roofs that were once inhabited by slaves. The 3.2-acre site is located just outside Bridgetown, on an old coral limestone quarry. Local materials, such as plaster work with contrasting smooth and textured finishes, honed coral, and naturally finished local wood, were incorporated into the renovation of an existing five-story building and construction of an addition.
