The Block

In 1973, Judd purchased the first three-quarters of this complex of buildings located in downtown Marfa, the site of some of his first large architectural projects and installations. Referred to as “the Block,” it encompasses a full city block and includes two large hangars where Judd installed his art. In 1974, he acquired the entirety of the Block, which includes a two-story house, formerly offices of the U.S. Army’s Quartermaster Corps that served as his Marfa residence.

The Block is enclosed with an adobe wall and includes a second adobe wall designating an interior courtyard; both walls use local construction techniques. The interior courtyard is landscaped with cactus gardens and Judd-designed furniture. The hangars contain Judd’s personal collection of art, furniture, and artifacts along with a personal library comprising more than 13,000 volumes.

Judd renovated the two-story house to serve as his private residence, with a kitchen area and bedrooms for his children. A separate building, next to the house to serve as a bathhouse, was designed to be the same height as the U-shaped courtyard wall built between the house and the eastern building. An additional building was built on the opposite side of the courtyard to maintain balance against the bathhouse structure, keeping with Judd’s interest in symmetry within art and architecture. Judd had plans for two more buildings to be placed to the east and west, which were to house paintings by Judd and others. To the north, there was to be a complex of four small adobe buildings centered around a pond.

In the 1980s, Judd built an enclosed garden with two small pools, grass and cold-tolerant plants in the southwest corner. This garden, known as the Winter Garden, “was meant to be green all winter, because it’s very bleak [in winter in Marfa].” For the adobe wall enclosing the garden, Judd used local construction techniques to make new bricks on-site.

“Aside from Ft. Russell…the Mansana de Chinati, the block, a city block in town, is the largest and most complete place that I’ve planned,” Judd wrote. “Originally there were only two large iron and adobe warehouses parallel to each other and a much smaller two-story building on a block open to the main highway on the south and to the railroad tracks and a feed mill on the north. This was a very general arrangement, which determined at most a corresponding rectangular alignment.”

The Block is one of the building project sites of the Marfa Restoration Plan, a long-term restoration plan for the buildings maintained by Judd Foundation in Marfa. The scope of work for the site focused on exterior elements including the demolition and reconstruction of the winter garden to address a deteriorating foundation and the adobe wall that encloses the garden. Additional grounds work included drainage upgrades, the installation of a rainwater catchment system, the replacement of the gravel surface across the site, and the restoration of the pool.

The restoration and reconstruction of the Winter Garden was completed in 2023. The work comprised the rebuilding of the foundation and the restoration of the encompassing 10-foot-tall adobe walls. The adobe wall was restored by local artisans to incorporate earth from the garden’s original west wall. The garden was replanted with species native to the Chihuahuan Desert including Blue Mistflower, Texas Persimmon, and Black Dalea.