Architecture schools are an amalgamation of sleepless nights, too many unfinished sheets and models, innumerable cups of coffee, dark circles and endless discussions. The whole education process is a long haul and it can get very exhausting at times. It makes you question why you chose the field in the first place because the grueling never stops. But architectural education not only teaches you technical and design skills but many life skills as well. It’s a constant process of going back and forth.
Here is a list of things we have learned or are learning in this bittersweet journey. Have a look.
Always ask ‘Why’
As fresh high school graduates, we have lived our lives being taught something or the other. Be it the various subjects or learning how things are the way they are. Along with academics, we are also used to perceiving people and the environment in a certain way based on values we have grown up with. We barely tend to question anything.
Architecture education forces you to question everything. It makes you wonder why a certain thing is what it is; delving into its past, present and future prospects. It makes you do a double retake at all you have been taught all along in your life. When one tends to understand various perspectives of different people, spaces and communities, architecture stems as a problem-solving activity. Seeing things in a new light and through various perceptions makes you question the whole pedagogy of issues and look for solutions. Architectural education provides for a platform to continuously question your peers, juniors and seniors in the process of learning and unlearning.
In between Paper and Pixel
In the first year of architecture school, we are taught how to hand draft sheets and make precisely cut models with bandaged fingers. Gradually we start to visualize and represent our designs using various software such as Autocad, Sketchup, Photoshop, etc. Whereas when we go for internships there is more software that we use. Thus we not only learn hand drafting, rendering, and model making skills but also digital skills. And we have all come a long way from the beginning of our education, using these various tools in this process of designing and building.
Accepting criticism
As students, we propose designs and get feedback, suggestions and criticisms at every step. It can get frustrating at times and we try our best to defend ourselves but eventually we learn to accept these opinions. As designers, we often get too involved and attached to ‘our’ designs but when someone criticizes your work it allows you to think in a direction that you had obviously not thought of. Within the course of our education, we not only learn to accept criticisms and be more open to ideas but also develop the skills to defend our designs. It teaches you that architecture is a constant dialogue between various stakeholders, designers and builders, and at every step one needs to accept criticism and negotiate respectively to lead to a design that caters to all.
All in one
Architecture school teaches you a plethora of skills ranging from technical skills, hand skills, visualization, representation, etc. The field is a crossover between so many other fields and allows you to explore fields like ceramics and construction in the form of electives as well. It lets you explore various other skills that you never thought of and at the same time, it makes you all-rounded in terms of your personal skillset such that you can also work on miscellaneous projects like graphics, interior design, construction, etc. apart from architecture.
These skills open up new doors and also give a breather in between drafting sheets and making models.
Slow and steady wins the race
One of the most important life skills architectural education teaches you is patience. The patience to endure sleepless nights, make infinite models and do redos. We have all experienced times when we had to redo sheets at least thrice to reach the stage of perfection or have had someone tell us that our design doesn’t work after we stayed up the night working on it. It can get really frustrating and exhausting but the gruesome vicious cycle teaches you the true importance of patience and hard work to create the most plausible design. It teaches you to start over again and again until it is right rather than doing it for the sake of finishing it.
This is an important learning not just for the field of architecture but life itself; to have the patience to fall back several times and rise above the failures.
Time Management
Architecture schools have intense, (almost) unachievable deadlines and time constraints where 24 hours in a day are also not enough. No school can guarantee you to be able to learn how to manage time as we end up procrastinating at times and staying up nights. But there are also days when you don’t even have time to procrastinate to finish all the submissions. But all these high-intensity workloads for submissions do force/ teach one to prioritize and divide your time efficiently in order to meet the deadlines. It is an important life skill to learn as it is of huge help especially when one begins to work in an office. It teaches you to handle multiple projects, give family time as well as take out time for yourself. As architecture school exposes you to such a time crunch, multitasking things, later on, seems much easier and achievable.
Team Work
Architecture is a field that always involves diverse entities and user groups. Architecture school teaches you to work for and with people; constantly being conscious of the multiplicity of people in the society and building an understanding of them. The architecture field requires one to collaborate with a number of people such as the clients, builders, civil engineers, laborers, etc. which calls for effective communication. Architecture school has various group works and that teaches you to design (which is a subjective notion) taking into account everyone’s opinions. It is an important skill we learn as it is of utmost importance, especially in the professional field.
Breaking the Rules
Being a creative field, architecture calls for out of the box solutions for design problems. It forces one to go to the roots and then further learn from the existing typologies and solutions and give innovative answers keeping in mind the varied parameters involved. Architecture schools force you to work with certain existing restrictions such as the context, available materials and technologies, etc. But forces you to formulate new thoughts and ideas while working with these constraints.
‘Learn the rules like a pro, so you can break them like an artist.’ – Pablo Picasso
Architecture schools force you to break free from the existing and experiment with forms, materials, typologies, etc. and at the same time assess its feasibility and functionality. This allows you to take risks and make designs that are one of its kind; not to make a statement but to cater and address as many different sections of the society and the multitude of their needs.
