the way we learn architecture is powerful but also not real.
(On Self and Work)
A: I feel like as a person and as a designer you have something to bring to the table, and I don't feel like we always get told that.
B: I agree, I think that it is so important to give time to understand, like actually understand someone's work, especially before you critique. And I think that this class does practice this… but anyway, you’ve studied a lot of architecture, but I sense you are feeling unsatisfied or you are looking for more?
A: You know, I started to become really interested in furniture, because for me it was so crazy to make a real thing. We always make drawings and models, and those are super exciting and beautiful, but for me, there's a part of architecture that feels so far away. It's like we're always talking about things that are not real. I mean, you learn that way. I love school and I love the kind of authorship that it gives you. Like we can talk about what you just designed, and you can tell us exactly how life would be in this space, you know? That's super powerful, but that power is also not real, that architecture is not something that you’re going to design on your own. It's never going to happen that way.
What I really love about architecture school is making things and I think that there's a lot of power in knowing how to do things, how to make things. The knowledge that we gain in architecture school is not complete, it's not enough to build something. I want to push to operate in a way in which I can make things, make things that in themselves would be architecture or make things one to one. I don't know if it's really possible, but I've been interested in film because it is kind of a mashup of all these things that we learn to do. Movies are made up of sets, but also animation, and also miniatures. It is all of these forms of representation combined into one and then additionally, it is filmed so that so many of us can engage in it. Like my parents, my grandparents, me, everyone. I think I'm trying to find a way that I could not necessarily do a one-person machine, but to feel closer to the production of architecture. So, I like thinking about architecture that is not just a building.
B: I totally get that. There's always like a fear in working with others or a client versus doing what you want to do. I mean, I think, in so many ways the collaboration is amazing because no one is going to get what they want. So, it promotes cooperation and flexibility and the conception of amazing things. But then there's also a part of me that's like - I just want to be able to make things by myself or make whatever I want. I think there is a sense of satisfaction in containing all of the knowledge of how to do or make something within oneself. What you are saying makes a lot of sense.
