Archinect - News

Apparently modular remote working pods are here to stay

2021-10-22T12:18:00-04:00

With the work-at-home lifestyle likely here to stay, people are taking things outdoors, creating spaces meant for privacy and comfort. [...] More than a year and a half into the pandemic, working from home seems like an increasingly permanent proposition. Nearly 80 percent of business leaders and 70 percent of the general public said people would likely never return to offices at the rate they did before the coronavirus [...]

Isolated working structures as small as 3x6 feet have been cropping up in high-density areas like London where the office and home have switched places, leaving opportunity at both ends for designers and manufacturers to meet the demands of remote workers whilst also providing space to answer cities' pressing need for affordable housing.

“You might find enlightenment or something from working in a tiny space,” one designer told the Times. Examples of the typology offer exciting glimpses into what could be the future of commuting for a large swath of the population. As many as 255 million people could be working remote full-time by the end of the decade.

The New York Times has more on the modular work pod revolution here.

The pandemic is causing a host of changes in multifamily unit design

2021-08-13T09:00:00-04:00

The conversation around the shift from workplace to workspace often gets stuck on how the office is transitioning to meet the evolving needs of employees. But it isn’t just offices that are adjusting. Like their office-owning counterparts, multifamily landlords and operators are studying shifts in workplace strategy, planning new ways to design layouts and apply technology to support the growing work from home population.

The pandemic has caused a sharp pullback in multifamily construction as developers have struggled to adapt to the shift in lifestyles. Increased needs for high-quality internet and added remote workspaces have beset the residential market historically driven by amenity trends and aesthetic considerations.

Some firms have been investing in comprehensive surveys and other types of consultations. It has been estimated that up to 70% of the workforce could be remote by mid-decade. Propmodo has more on pandemic-induced design trends in multifamily design here.

UK Architects report exploitive work practices amid lockdown

2020-10-15T13:00:00-04:00

The Guardian's Oliver Wainwright sheds light on the incredible exploitive workplace abuses happening in the UK in a recent piece titled Furlough fraud, snooping and firings: architects speak out over lockdown exploitation. From never-ending work days, to secret webcam recordings, and even bizarre firings, people have been experiencing troubling behavior from employers, leading many to report instances to RIBA and the United Voices of the World - Section of Architectural Workers (UVW-SAW).

In one instance, Wainwright reports on a woman who discovered her boss had been monitoring her webcam and secretly recording her client meetings. "I only realized I was being monitored when something I said was later quoted back to me in a team meeting," she says as reported by Wainwright. "And another recording of me was used in a presentation. It was completely insane. It felt like being back at school, with added hyper-surveillance."

Other case studies include employers who have signed up for th...

With death and chaos reigning, Americans turn toward home improvement

2020-08-18T13:03:00-04:00

As many Americans have taken to working, learning, and sheltering at home in the months since the coronavirus pandemic took hold, existing residential spaces have had to play double and triple duty, functionally speaking.

Amid these shifts in use, Americans have begun to undertake home improvement projects en mass, updating and reconfiguring existing spaces, adding onto their homes, and even moving to entirely new locales to better adapt to the fundamental changes in daily life prompted by nearly six months of quarantine. Nearly a half-year into the pandemic, as much of the world cautiously returns to some form of normal daily life, Americans, with no end in sight to the pandemic and the number of known deaths now exceeding 170,000 lives, have taken to renovating their homes.

Previously on Archinect: Divergence between housing and commercial markets continues as pandemic impact on construction and design deepens.

This week, retail giant Home Depot announced record breaking profits f...

3 Tips for Architecture Students Preparing for a Virtual Fall 2020

2020-08-03T13:31:00-04:00

The start of the Fall semester is just around the corner and many students are gearing up for an entirely virtual schooling experience, something most have never embarked on before. How can students best prepare for an online-based semester? What are some ways to leverage optimal mental performance and lasting productivity throughout the entire Fall term? Here are 3 tips to consider as you commence the new school year.

Previously on Archinect: In school, sometimes more research is just more procrastination

Be intentionally mobile

When on campus, you can walk around studio to talk with colleagues, go to the fabrication facilities, walk to get food, travel to your various classes throughout the day, and overall, almost every item on your daily to-do list requires you to change locations. But when all of those activities can be done in one location, namely, your computer, all of that mobility is arrested and you find yourself inactively stagnant.

I decided to audit my physical activity...

What side projects and hobbies has the architecture community adopted while stuck at home?

2020-05-05T16:21:00-04:00

Working from home has provided some professionals with extra time in the day. With the subtraction of commute hours, the availability to pursue extracurriculars seems more abundant. While many are using that additional time to manage the kids or navigate other ripples of the pandemic, others are using the time to adopt new hobbies or commence some new side projects.

Huge hill in my backyard was covered in weeds. The dirt on the right side down by the wall was sitting above the ridge at the bottom. My wife and I removed all of the weeds and transferred a bunch of dirt from the right side over to the left to level out the dirt that meets the top of the wall. Photos courtesy of author.

After everything was cleared up, my wife and mother-in-law planted new plants. We have a handful of succulents, some lavender, pomegranate, irises, creeping myrtle, and some others. My father-in-law and I dug the holes. Photos courtesy of the author.

I've been recently gardening more with my wife and I was...