Not just a profession but a passion! A phrase you have heard numerous times but hardly can correlate with the emotions attached to it. Consider a person excited to have a new home or a new place, and they will love to create it as per their liking and interests; now think of a person who does this repeatedly. Designing so many beautiful spaces, isn’t it amazing to talk about it, and we, architects, live this dream and make it happen every single day for the rest of our lives. And after the five years of sleepless nights, redoing, being criticized, and dropping our favourite idea, that’s all worth it.
Point of view
You have lived in an environment for ages yet never really noticed the same. Space, places, and buildings are undoubtedly being seen differently. Any designed space is perfect due to having so many good reasons for why it is like that. That’s the designer’s point of view (pov). A designer never fails to deliver quality design; if he does, is he even a designer! I think of space as suitable for living because someone has put their life in to make it work. Perceiving architecture made us look behind the camera. And we all know that is fun! Before coming into the learning, I observed things, but now I have my own views about them.
Point of interest
These tall skyscrapers never amused me. I’m an old-school Europe-loving architect following Mies van der Rohe (less is more). They say if you are creative, you can be a designer, I say if you don’t put yourself into something, you cannot be anything, and yes, obviously, interest is an absolute requirement. The idea of a roof over the head is one of the three main ingredients of the survival kit. Irrespective of the area, bringing the place out of the space is an art and a point of my interest. While walking through beautiful structures with natural elements impacted me rather than being just a user.
Learnings
Along with so many things, one learns to have patience, be specific, take criticism, result from a process, work with a team and people from other disciplines, etc. It may sound boring but working with rules (once you learn to deal with regulations, you can bend and break them accordingly to meet the solution) and managing your work within time limits is the best thing to remember for the rest of your life as an architect. Not only the designing but also learning everything it takes to make and work a built structure, new technologies, techniques, methods of construction, building materials, etc. The best part is that we never get bored; apart from long hours of studying, many site visits and research are to be done outside the classroom.
Decision making is a power that you gain with time. Once, someone asked me, ‘what are your takeaways from architecture school?’ I just couldn’t answer that; having so much on my mind and picking a few things out of it was difficult for me at that time. But now I think I can tell that I was never a decision-maker who now I am, and realizing that sometimes you have to let go of things and choose what’s best and functional to make it a successful design. Another good thing is teamwork. You can never be a good architect if you do not have a good team.
Embrace your failures
Learning architecture is one of my best decisions so far. The power of creating a space and making your users happy about it, making it functional for them, is the result of a successfully designed space. The truth is, within this professional field, you are going to fail, and you cannot run from these failures. So learn to live with them, route them in the right direction, and see them as opportunities for growth. There will be numerous unique ideas or concepts you have to drop and move forward with a good reason, prominent critics for your work outcomes will be panelized, and embrace everything that comes into your path.
Discipline
Tell me how organized you are? Can you manage and deliver your work on time? Without even knowing it, this five-year duration course will teach you how to prioritize your tasks and solid time management. I like to organize my work, and I’m very precise about it, but learning architecture made me follow up with the time correctly and manage my things within solid time management. Being an evening person made my life easier with all the sleepless nights we went through.
Poetry that stays for millions of years, for which your work is your presence and being appreciated for it forever. If your interest is in built environment and design, being an architect can be an exceptionally fascinating occupation and one that can bring a lot of happiness. Very few individuals can sincerely say that they partake in their positions, yet generally, an architect can. Being able to design and develop objects that proceed to be built, utilized and occupied is staggeringly strong and brings an incredible sense of achievement. Assuming you appreciate creative undertakings, investing wholeheartedly during the time spent making designs, and making decisions, then, at that point, being an architect can be an exceptionally remunerating education and profession.
Bibliography
Anon, (n.d.). 10 Lessons I Learned After Architecture School – Arch2O.com. [online] Available at: https://www.arch2o.com/10-lessons-learned-architecture-school/ [Accessed 5 May 2022].
ArchDaily. (2017). The 13 Most Important Non-Architecture Skills You Learn in Architecture School. [online] Available at: https://www.archdaily.com/871046/the-13-most-important-non-architecture-skills-you-learn-in-architecture-school [Accessed 5 May 2022].
ArchDaily. (2016). 9 Reasons to Become an Architect. [online] Available at: https://www.archdaily.com/793953/9-reasons-to-become-an-architect.
