Scott Pons

Background

Scott is a licensed Professional Engineer with over 25 years of experience in civil engineering, construction, building enclosures, and historic preservation. He has broad building enclosure consultation experience for both new and remedial design including exterior facades, fenestration, roofing, podium decks, balconies, and below-grade waterproofing. His extensive historic preservation experience includes condition assessments, prioritized repair recommendations, materials conservation, and repair design on a wide range of building types. Since 2005, he has focused on evaluating and designing repairs for damage to existing historic structures and contemporary building enclosures affected primarily by long-term deterioration and water intrusion. Scott has also provided construction administration and monitoring for most of his projects to ensure contractor work is performed in accordance with contract documents.

What is your most interesting project or accomplishment?

It’s less a single project than the path that got me here. I spent time on the materials manufacturing side working for Shaws of Darwen, a historic English terra cotta manufacturer, selling into the U.S. preservation market. Almost no engineer doing condition assessments and repair design has been on the production side and watched how the material is actually made. That experience directly shaped a paper I co-authored on slip casting and terra cotta manufacture, and it still informs how I evaluate terra cotta, and all masonry, failures today.

What do you love about your job?

Forensix’s whole practice is built around the idea that architects and engineers who specialize too narrowly miss the problems that live in the gaps between disciplines — civil, structural, and architectural. That’s exactly the kind of work I’ve done for 28 years: forensic investigation into why something is failing, followed by repair design, followed by seeing it built correctly through construction administration. As West Region Director, I now get to make sure that full-cycle approach is how our California and Arizona teams operate, not just how I personally work.

Why did you follow your career path?

I didn’t start out headed toward historic preservation — I came up through civil engineering and general construction, working as an estimator, project engineer, and project manager. It was at Simpson Gumpertz & Heger in the early 2000s, investigating water intrusion and doing materials assessments on historic buildings, that the specific problems of older buildings, and building envelopes really captured my interest. That sent me to Penn for the preservation degree. Every stop since — Spectra, Preservation Engineers, McGinnis Chen, and now Forensix — has stayed in that same course of evaluating and repairing existing, damaged, and historic structures.

What are your interests outside of work?

I spend a lot of time on projects on my 1960 house, and the list never seems to get shorter. When I’m not working on the house, I volunteer at a local animal shelter, mostly helping to train the dogs in our care to find their forever homes — a good counterbalance to a week spent on facades, seismic retrofits, and waterproofing details. Living in Orange County keeps me close to a lot of the historic Southern California building stock I’ve worked on over the years.

Who or what motivates you?

Buildings that are one bad repair away from losing what made them worth saving — or, just as often, one bad repair away from failing structurally. I’ve written enough condition assessment reports to know that the difference between a building surviving another 50 years and losing its historic fabric, or worse, usually comes down to getting the diagnosis right the first time. It’s just as important to train the next generation of architects and engineers to properly diagnose and develop repairs for our existing buildings.

Who or what do you love to work with?

Historic buildings and facades are still what I find most technically engaging. On the people side, I like working with architect-engineers who aren’t afraid to work across disciplines — which is really the founding premise of Forensix — because the best outcomes on existing buildings almost never come from a narrow approach.

Favorite Quotes:

“Look before, or you’ll find yourself behind.” – Benjamin Franklin

 

“If you can’t explain it simply, you don’t understand it well enough.” – Albert Einstein

Years of Experience:

28 years (since 1998), with the last 20+ focused on historic preservation, building enclosures, and existing-building conservation work.

Awards, associations, organizations, etc.:

• Licensed Professional Engineer, State of California
• LEED AP, Green Building Certification Institute