Every single person faces a transition from life in school to college life. Change becomes inevitable as one steps into a new world of youth and enthusiasm. The way one tends to look, analyze, and execute things varies drastically with many new experiences. College life is excitingly cool, but what if it is an architecture college??? It is more of an extreme scenario. More fun-filled, more exciting, more laughter in addition to more reviews, more submissions, more sleepless nights, and most of all more redo’s.
To make it more interesting are the facts that we have lots of site visits, case study visits, north, south and central India tours, and many moments of travel and exploration. Each venture at an architecture school is a milestone worthy of remembering and a beautiful memory.
Learning in an architecture school is limitless for which you can really never restrict to the prescribed books and knowledge. It is an ocean where one has to dive in and slowly learn the skills of survival. Though there are tough and stronger tides all that matters is how well we are equipped to face the scenario.
No sketches? Not an architect …..
The first and foremost thing we learned in an architecture college is sketching. Just like how a poet conveys his ideas through words, an artist through his paints, a filmmaker through his movies, an architect should master the skill of sketching where the sketch is the reflection of the ideologies of the mind.
Our uniqueness and individuality in this field are determined by our own creative ways of expressing our ideas through a very signature aspect. Free hand-drawn lines, line weights, fonts, perspective drawings are all languages through which an architect holds his/her identity and implies to converse.
Another interesting fact is that history is one of the very underrated subjects right from school. But unlike other colleges, history is one important stream where one learns to connect the dots of the past to draw lines of the present which makes sense to the future. The core idea of context-driven design and tradition adopted designs are mere reflections of how well history has been learned, lived, and experienced.
Life and works of other architects…..
In every occupational field across the globe inspiration can be drawn from the ones who outshined the crowd, who thought out of the box, and the ones who believed that their contributions to this society will be timeless.
The iconic works of senior architects who managed to test their limits play a vital role in a young budding architecture student’s mind where he foresees his style and begins to evolve and grow in an individual manner. It gives wings to the thoughts and instills hopes of creativity to probe into the un-achievable.
Structures, materials, and methodologies of construction…..
To be honest, beyond design the other parallel important things which we learn are: how well a material can be explored, the limits of construction methodologies tested and most of all, the stability of the building to be analysed. Although many architecture schools are limited to exploration and innovation and still stick to methods of teaching the procedure which has been existing ever since human civilization.
At every point of learning irrespective of academic syllabus, various resources are available which makes us fortunate enough to choose an ideal methodology to get to know about new ideas, innovations and step ahead to break the conventional style of procedures.
Climate and energy management…..
Although there are many slogans on save the earth and save water campaigns the reality is that we really don’t take adequate measures in taking the right step to preserve the resources. One of the valuable learnings that happen in an architecture school is how mankind can be benefited by adopting methods of energy conservation and efficiency.
A small step brings about a huge difference hence when an architect urges his clients to choose the alternative method and insists on the ideologies of a sustainable design the need of the hour can slowly be met with a cumulative effort. This is one of the most admirable knowledge the college feeds us with to raise citizens knowing the importance of a sustainable design.
User – the most prioritized person…..
Even design done or planned is ultimately done with the sole motive to serve the needs of the end-user by providing an apt solution through the language of design for a spatial problem. An efficient design is one that reflects the ease through which a user is able to easily access, use, and take away comfortable memories rather than remembrances of distress.
In an architecture college, the priority to the end-user is one of the important lessons which we learn and are still learning through the times of an architecture career.
Learning – a ceaseless process that lasts for a lifetime…..
Five years are just the ignition to the process of learning which prepares us for a journey of learning of a lifetime. Anywhere and everywhere learning can happen. It is purely an individual’s passion and interest that determines the capacity of what the person has learned.
Hence, what we learn in an architecture school within that time frame is just a handful. It is just a few drops of the endless ocean where patience and passion determine our skill of survival.
