DISPATCH №04 · LAS VEGAS WASH · DUSK
The desert keeps its own hours. Cool arrives twenty minutes after the sun goes down — and not a minute before.
A small magazine on the four most useful hours of a Mojave summer evening, the materials that earn them back, and a working argument against the louvered pergola.
Field Notes
Recent dispatches
Place · 7 min № 01
How to keep a house cool in a Las Vegas summer Mass, mesh, and the four hours of evening you can earn back. A working argument against the louvered pergola.
Field Test · 6 min № 02
What a screen room actually costs in Las Vegas Three bids, three years apart, three different framing weights — and the one variable that moved every quote.
Materials · 8 min № 03
Solar screens vs. window tinting Two ways to defeat a west-facing window. One stops the heat outside the glass. The other manages it after the fact.
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From the Glossary
Browse all entries → A working vocabulary
Mesh, aluminum
A woven aluminum cloth that interrupts roughly 80% of incoming radiation while remaining permeable to wind. The argument of this magazine.
Drop shade
A retractable vertical screen, deployed against late-afternoon sun. Defeats the western horizon, sometimes.
Caliche
Calcium-cemented desert subsoil. Hard as concrete, breaks pickaxes, holds posts forever once you get them in.
Combo system
Mesh + drop shade in series. The serious answer for west-facing exposures.