As architects, all of us have answered this question and received reactions or replies like so you make drawings, but that a civil engineer can do too and you try a different approach but have any of us be able to find a satisfying answer to it is something I wonder.
Remember the first time you approached a senior with that fear of getting ragged, but then helping them for their final year model, learning to observe, observation being the best teacher, practicing lettering 100 times in different sizes makes you going back to senior kindergarten only difference here is we also draft construction lines for lettering. Studio site visits where you bond with other batchmates, some fall for each other making this entire journey lovely. Those fellow mates who became our family for the next 5-6 years, for whom locals would bring lunch or dinner during night outs. Those night outs were we work the entire night with loud music, some chai, and then early in the morning around 4-5 going out for some poha and chai. Do you remember making logos, markings, writing names on your stationery trying to save it from getting stolen, setting up the table with parallel bar and T-scale, struggling to bring model safely without any damage, and then repairing it just before your discussion?
Our tables are not being just tables but our workspace and bed, on which we spent our five years, sleeping in the day and working in the night, being drowsy in early morning lectures, giving juries, arranging the sheets properly with even spacing for presentation. Many times, while giving the jury, jurors get phone calls, some study your design in detail, some have the same opinion on your design as your faculty, and a juror who keeps on asking for the north. Once in 5 years, we would have a juror who would have liked our design and given back positive feedback.
Do you remember asking your batchmates why did they take architecture, and got answers like didn’t want to do engineering so architecture, was interested in fine arts so took architecture, many more like that? There were different types of batchmates some would be always on with a headphone as if born with them, some daydreamers always lost in the idea. Some getting inspired by nature, some designing fancy projects inspired by geographical shapes, some toppers all finished with work, some asking for help, that finishing submission for each other couple, always asking for extensions, and many more. We have also made that list of architectural firms for internships, sending endless emails, making portfolios, asking who is going where, taking that selfies, group pictures with batch before going for the internship, meeting previous semesters faculties who are also practicing architects asking them to review your portfolio, sending followup emails, nowadays attending skype calls for interviews. The most memorable moments are going on for chai breaks, that going to seniors and discussing your design, meeting a senior in the corridor and ending up discussing different topics for hours, those late-night walks across the campus to avoid sleep, that saving your Sketchup, Revit, Photoshop files, that laptop crashing just a night before submission, those technical glitches are something we still face.
Sometimes an architect is imagined as a well-groomed neat and tidy person, but the mess behind it is seen in their house, where the room is full of cartons consisting sheets, and models of the previous semester, the bed is filled up with sheets, models, sheets holder roll, a drafting board, set square, cutter, steel edge, etc, table with a laptop, some books, some sheets for reference, a cup of coffee, phone, and laptop charger, and lot more, were sleeping space is the foot of the bed, or either working on the table.
As the internship is an integral part of our career, here we get in touch with different types of office environments some are corporate culture firms with cubicles, some are the famous architect office where every word uttered by them are golden words, the friendly office, a competition participative office, fancy designs office and many more, but each of them would have given you a different and unique take away. But all of us have struggled during our internship either with a lot of workloads or no stipend and mainly with the unit systems of meter to feet inches, aiming to learn fancy projects but ending up doing toilet detail.
While going through this entire experience just before the start of a new semester aims are being set about finishing all submission on time, being well organized, but end up being unorganized, while some practicing architects aim at taking some advance and then working, getting a more productive batch of interns, making the project as eco-friendly, co-efficient, sustainable, and lot more. As an architecture student have you ever dreamt of something dreadful happening in your jury, where you either reach late for your jury or your model broke just a night before the jury or something scary, the laptop gets crashed, rendering taking a lot of time. And some of them, become architects without going through all these life-enhancing experiences.
