Decorated sheds, along with ducks, were first theorized by Robert Venturi, Denise Scott Brown, and Steven Izenour in their 1972 book, Learning from Las Vegas. While their argument focused on semiotics and signs, designing buildings as decorated sheds can also be understood as an important strategy for achieving sustainable design goals. For that reason, it is useful to revisit and reformulate the authors’ original critique, in order to provide a more nuanced discussion of decoration and distortion. This paper’s central claims are advanced in three steps. First, I argue that sustainable buildings increasingly take the form of decorated sheds: energy efficiency and enclosure durability benefit from compact building form; a compact building — one without gratuitous distortion of the enclosure surfaces — is, ipso facto, a shed; such sheds must have continuous control layers, e.g., air barriers and thermal insulation, which create a discontinuity between exterior cladding and building interiors; and cladding, visible to the outside world and disengaged from the building’s underlying structure and interior, can easily be configured as a carrier of decoration. These tendencies are increasingly encouraged in contemporary code mandates and can be seen in programs developed by organizations including Net-Zero Energy Homes, Living Buildings, and the Passive House Institute. Second, while ideas about decorated sheds and ducks theorized in Learning from Las Vegas offer important insights into the design and critique of buildings, I argue that a close reading reveals several logical errors and inconsistencies. Third, I develop a more nuanced argument, one that considers the distinction between decorated sheds and ducks in terms of a fluid matrix organized along the axes of decoration and distortion. Reframing the concepts developed by Venturi, Scott Brown, and Izenour allows these concepts to be better applied to the contemporary use of decorated sheds for sustainable, energy-efficient building.

My paper, entitled “Revisiting Decorated Sheds and Ducks for Sustainable Building,” will be presented at the 114th Annual Meeting of the Association of Collegiate Schools of Architecture in March 2026. You can read the complete web version right now!