Next
Courts, around water.
Noon already casts basins, jets and channels that carry water from one to the next. Next come the rooms built around that water: a court to bathe in, a court open to the rain, and a court that keeps quail.
I · The bathing court
The Roman bath, made for a Texas yard.
A cold basin, deep enough to go under, cast in one piece. Steps down into it, a ledge to sit on.
A shallow pool held warm by the sun and the ground, the water running on to the next as at the rill.
Stone underfoot, a bench in the shade, plants close around, a wall for privacy. A place to sit between one water and the other.
II · The impluvium
The Roman court open to the sky: the roofs lean in, and the rain falls into a cast basin at the centre.
A square of sky in the middle of the court. The roof around it sheds its rain inward, not away.
A shallow cast basin under the opening that catches the rain and holds it, a mirror in the floor.
The overflow kept, not lost: carried on to the beds, or to a cistern under the court.
III · The quail court
An impluvium that keeps birds: a walled court where quail live around the rain basin, under planting and shade.
Walled and netted overhead, open to light and rain. Native grasses and low cover for the birds to move under.
The rain basin at the centre, with a shallow edge the birds can drink from.
Eggs from the yard, birdsong at the door, and ground turned and fed by the flock.
How each is built, how the water is kept clean, how the bath is warmed and how the birds are kept are being worked out now, the way every Noon piece is: read the ground, draw it, then pour it once.
- Prepared by
- NOONDesign ☉ Build ☉ Systems
- Issue
- 09.2026
- Studio
- San AntonioAustin · By commission anywhere
- Sheet
- N