Let me welcome you to this La La Land of Architects. In this land, you will find people who work till dawn, people who flirt with buildings, and people obsessing over line weights. Believe me, they have their language, one that a normal person will never be able to understand. Walk with me and I will show you why architects are what you think they are.
People choose architecture for innumerable reasons. Mine would be the professionalism of the word ‘Architect’. Only half of the people who chose architecture would be aware of what they were up to. Not that architecture is a horror movie with suspense, but it does give you unexpected twists and turns. Like when you are fully prepared to sketch a plan in your freshman year, your professor will give you a four-lined sheet to practice your font. (Yes, it is exactly what you did in kindergarten).
Your first semester is a warm-up session with Art studio and Model-making classes. Just when you think you are getting the hang of it; you will get criticized every week with a panel of 4 faculties for the teeny tiny bedroom you designed. Okay, the worst is yet to come.
With every semester your design problems will grow with you. For some reason, theory subjects are not even considered to be a part of it. It will always be Design and Redo. Every architecture student would have had a nightmare of their sheets being torn by the jurors the night before the final review. Honestly speaking, this course could give you panic attacks and increased blood pressure. Okay, hang in there!
Down the road, you somehow catch up with the language and you will never know when you started learning. You’ll be able to identify architecture styles, you will criticize every structure you see. You’ll go crazy to an extent where you find mistakes in your place. Just when you pat your back for the progress you have made, they kick you out to face the real world in a so-called internship.
Internships can be awesome or awful depending on the firm you joined. But on the whole, you will realize that you have learned a lot more in your internship than what you learned in the previous semesters. (No offense)
Now that you have had theoretical as well as practical knowledge you can now finish the course with your final thesis. Even after dedicating half a decade of your life to this course, you will be clueless about what you have learned or what you want to do. That’s completely normal.
I always find people who blend architecture with their hobbies like Ankon Mitra who practices Oritecture (an amalgamation of Origami and Architecture).
Architecture is more than a career. It is more like a medium for an artist. What you want to paint is in your hands.
The journey of studying architecture can be a bit scary, but so is a roller coaster. But don’t you want to give it a shot?
