Hopefully no one has already done this thread, but why did YOU become (or will become) an Architect?
Myself:
1. Loved to draw & design from the moment I picked up my first crayola.
2. Single favorite toddler toy was of course Lincoln Logs & blocks.
3. In 4th grade my (profession) placement assessment test said “Architect”.
4. Love architecture.
In my high-school (in Barcelona) there wasn't a place to do sports -a gym or playground- so they made us go to a small rented stadium in the Olympic ring, not far from the Olympic Stadium... every tuesday we walked to that place and passed by modern landmark Mies' Barcelona Pavilion, a modernist factory by Puig i Cadafalch, some neoclassical crap of the 1929 Expo -the National Palace and several pavilions-, some small corporative skyscrapers erected near there and some other lesser known buildings.... I didn't know nothing about arch yet, not even had a clue of who was Mies at the time I entered arch school.. so I think I chosed to be an architect by osmosis... I remember goin' back and forth of that stadium and always looking out of the corner of my eye that strange and magical composition of exploded walls at the other side of that street... I think Mies pavilion expells some kind of strange influences on certain people... I think I was just a victim...
also my parents took me a lot of times as a child to a lot of fabulous romanesque churches in the Pyrenees, and I learned to draw apses on a notebook before I learned to play football...
that is the romantic version... the real reason is because I loved to draw but wasn't good enough to do Fine Arts, and loved certain areas of science and construction but was too lazy to become an engineer... so I chosed to be an architect... and I've learned to love it once I left school... I read much more and pay attention to buildings when walking through the city now than when I was in school... as Iggy Pop says, an excessive academic discipline kills curiosity...
I love anything creative. I, like most, thought that architecture was a profitable profession. So getting paid well to do something you love seemed ideal.
Of course, reality is never that simple or pretty.
I went to a tour of Texas Tech, my sophomore year of high school, with no intentions of going to Tech, or pursuing architecture, but I was there on a school trip, so we heard speeches from every department. The guy who gave the speech about architecture, related it to poetry. He described architecure as poetry through construction. For some reason, I couldn't get that speech out of my head, he made it seem so great, I ended up applying there, getting in, and even got to hear another lecture from the same guy.
1. Because I love to learn. Everytime you get a new project, unless you do the same thing again and again, you must gather information and learn about all of the project's participants. For example, to effectively design a visual arts theater, you must understand and learn to appreciate the visual arts. You must learn about the profession of the performers, and you must learn what its like to be an audience member. All this, on top of thoroughly understanding the construction trades that make any project possible. You become a renaissance man/woman.
2. Because I love ordering things again and again to find the best possible solution.
univ. landscape here is retarded..... u take what u get, and learn to like it in the process..
and yeah, it's for free, so its not exactly the hugest risk in the universe.
I can fondly look back and remember that as a 2 month old fetus i would play for hours on end with lincoln logs and dream of building shelters for the needy and McMansions for the wealthy in the world. I also liked how the Corbu glasses and mock turtlenecks looked on my somewhat still developing fetus face and body. Somehow because it was so dark in the womb i think that black is the only color around. More recently, the spirituality of being enveloped in that warm tight womb has provided me some Architectural issues that need resolving regarding spaciality, topologies, intricacy, iterant morphologies and materiality that I want to further explore. Now as a 6 month old fetus i am busy taking all the tutorials on the latest 3-d and rendering engines so i can be ready when i fall out. Thus, the only vehicle for fulflling my dreams is ARCHITECTURE. The world will be a better place when i slide on out in a 3 months. This is the history off how/ why/ when i became an Architect.
when i was in high school my college plans were to study sculpture and philosophy.
my father is an engineer.
he said if i put the three together i might actually be able to get a job.
right now, i am suprisingly not bitter, and rarely question why i am in this profession.
Well that WAS my second reason, but I'm afraid I only posted once. Strangely enough, my third reason is that I like trees. So, I think I'm of a like mind with other (aspiring) architects.
i like the idea of creating something that people will use and see everyday, something people interact with. that and architecture is everywhere. there is no escaping it
I wanted to be a painter, but I was too afraid to go to beaux arts so I thought I should try to get a professional degree. I then realized I wasn't such a good painter, so I decided I would become a good architect. Once I got out of school I realized I wasn't such a good architect. So I became a render monkey...
lego
watching construction from home
fine arts as a child (advanced placement for 5-7 y0s)
father financed many constructions
speaking to architects - thinking they knew nothing
artists
my distaste for exacting science
because my parents wanted me to become an accountant. this isn't the true reason, but for the first time, it did get me seriously thinking about what i wanted to become because i did not want to be an accountant. what did your parents want you to be?
I can fondly look back and remember that as a 2 month old fetus i would play for hours on end with lincoln logs and dream of building shelters for the needy and McMansions for the wealthy in the world. I also liked how the Corbu glasses and mock turtlenecks looked on my somewhat still developing fetus face and body. Somehow because it was so dark in the womb i think that black is the only color around. More recently, the spirituality of being enveloped in that warm tight womb has provided me some Architectural issues that need resolving regarding spaciality, topologies, intricacy, iterant morphologies and materiality that I want to further explore. Now as a 6 month old fetus i am busy taking all the tutorials on the latest 3-d and rendering engines so i can be ready when i fall out. Thus, the only vehicle for fulflling my dreams is ARCHITECTURE. The world will be a better place when i slide on out in a 3 months. This is the history off how/ why/ when i became an Architect.
i like the idea of creating something that people will use and see everyday, something people interact with. that and architecture is everywhere. there is no escaping it
i too liked to do forts and treehouses as a kid. i designed plenty of them that couldn't get built, so i thought i would continue that trend and go to school to design things that can't get built. engineers nightmare then and now, though i am trying.
This thread is REALLY making me wanna get some legos. I had this police station set when I was a kid...I must have built that station a different way 100 times.
All I know is that when I become an architect all the windows are going to have iron bars on 'em.
Lego, how lovely is lego!
I can play with these little pieces for hours after hours as a little girl.
I can see the colors of all matters with my interesting explanation.
I can read Wright's autobiography in mid-night.
I can sketch the outlines of buildings as abstract as Frank O Ghery, but at that time, I have no idea about how great to be an architect.
My inspiration comes from my playful life style.
And my aspiration will ends when I get really, really old.
I think the Lego people need to come up with some kind of architecture scholarship or something, seeing as how 90% of all architects played with legos at some point in their formative years.
i did the lego thing, but I am forever indebted to my grandpa's Domino set and his Elks lodge; for some reason I would lay out the plan of the Elks club with domino walls at an early age. sincerely hope that doesn't creep into my design sensibility.
also the first builder's house plan book I laid eyes on, I fell in love with. my mother unknowingly said "architects design houses, you could be an architect".
Loved drawing from an early age, loved exploring, hiding in strange spaces.
Did anyone used to sketch fantasy home floor plansduring school? For a year in elementary school I just kept making floor plans of my fantasy home, complete with toilets and whatnot. The houses weren't much bigger than the one I lived in, but there were always servant's quarters. Then I decided to pursue architecture, and goooodbye servant's quarters.
i also just remembered that as a toddler (must have been between 3 and 5 i would sit for hours on end in the hall of my grandmother's flat, stairing at the patterns on her middle eastersn rugs immagining they were plans of a building or a labirint...not that i knew what a plan was at the time...shit, i had never thought of that. thank you archinecters, for this journey of self discovery!
lego lego lego lego lego. in a huge washing powder tub (dixan? something by johnson&johnson , anyway).
anyone up for a trip to legoland windsor this summer?
Oh and how could I forget sand castles (mine were more like egaliterian communities - but what the hell). I'm an island boy so I had great fun, I wasn't a spade and spatula kid, moulded with my bare hands. True plasticism must be sculpted, probably why I feel most content staring at the images of corbs later sculptural works + gaudi, anything gaudi - and why I always want to take a file to gehry's work mould it damn it!! Ahh sand castle I think I'll build on this weekend.
Hmm and dominos. Loss one or two out of the 28 you got building blocks. Loss one out of every pack - we've got a construction boom!
What a mixture I've had...I must be corb. Maybe that's why I think subconsciously I am corb (I have perfect eyesight which sucks cause i'd look dead sexy in the thick rims)
Because I am an egotistical bastard that thinks he can change the world.
Because if you fail in architecture you can still do other artsy stuff like graphic design or painting but not vice versa.
Because arguing with others is a lot more fun than arguing with myself..although i still argue with myself.
Because as a child I loved destroying legos and blocks and erector sets more than creating things with them.
Because black is my favourite color.
Because I am a bitter individual, although i am not sure which came first architecture of bitterness?
Because i didn't belive my professors when they said architects will never be rich unless they are born rich.
.
when I was 8 I drew an elevation of a house - my dream house I guess - and I was firmly convinced that it should have windows of all shapes but rectangles; heart, star, circle, arched, cloud - I wondered why the shapes of windows lacked so much imagination...
Why did YOU become (or will become) an Architect?
Hopefully no one has already done this thread, but why did YOU become (or will become) an Architect?
Myself:
1. Loved to draw & design from the moment I picked up my first crayola.
2. Single favorite toddler toy was of course Lincoln Logs & blocks.
3. In 4th grade my (profession) placement assessment test said “Architect”.
4. Love architecture.
Because as a white man, the position and possibility of becoming Bootsy Collins would never become a reality.
In my high-school (in Barcelona) there wasn't a place to do sports -a gym or playground- so they made us go to a small rented stadium in the Olympic ring, not far from the Olympic Stadium... every tuesday we walked to that place and passed by modern landmark Mies' Barcelona Pavilion, a modernist factory by Puig i Cadafalch, some neoclassical crap of the 1929 Expo -the National Palace and several pavilions-, some small corporative skyscrapers erected near there and some other lesser known buildings.... I didn't know nothing about arch yet, not even had a clue of who was Mies at the time I entered arch school.. so I think I chosed to be an architect by osmosis... I remember goin' back and forth of that stadium and always looking out of the corner of my eye that strange and magical composition of exploded walls at the other side of that street... I think Mies pavilion expells some kind of strange influences on certain people... I think I was just a victim...
also my parents took me a lot of times as a child to a lot of fabulous romanesque churches in the Pyrenees, and I learned to draw apses on a notebook before I learned to play football...
that is the romantic version... the real reason is because I loved to draw but wasn't good enough to do Fine Arts, and loved certain areas of science and construction but was too lazy to become an engineer... so I chosed to be an architect... and I've learned to love it once I left school... I read much more and pay attention to buildings when walking through the city now than when I was in school... as Iggy Pop says, an excessive academic discipline kills curiosity...
I love anything creative. I, like most, thought that architecture was a profitable profession. So getting paid well to do something you love seemed ideal.
Of course, reality is never that simple or pretty.
I went to a tour of Texas Tech, my sophomore year of high school, with no intentions of going to Tech, or pursuing architecture, but I was there on a school trip, so we heard speeches from every department. The guy who gave the speech about architecture, related it to poetry. He described architecure as poetry through construction. For some reason, I couldn't get that speech out of my head, he made it seem so great, I ended up applying there, getting in, and even got to hear another lecture from the same guy.
1. Because I love to learn. Everytime you get a new project, unless you do the same thing again and again, you must gather information and learn about all of the project's participants. For example, to effectively design a visual arts theater, you must understand and learn to appreciate the visual arts. You must learn about the profession of the performers, and you must learn what its like to be an audience member. All this, on top of thoroughly understanding the construction trades that make any project possible. You become a renaissance man/woman.
2. Because I love ordering things again and again to find the best possible solution.
Didn't like world. Figured I'd try to rig up a new one out of some of this stuff we've got laying around.
Can't sleep anyway.
it most certainly was the great architecture that surrounded me
Because I've always wanted to be rich.
...oh...wait. shit.
NewStreamlinedModel's response has to go down as one of the all-time great answers to this question.
Now to the rest of you, stop being so cheesy.
.mm
chicks dig architects
For me it was retardedness - to a greater degree than pervertedness. But there's another thing . . . I like trees. Have done since the day I was born.
I looked for the profession that required the most education and longest hours for the least pay.
univ. landscape here is retarded..... u take what u get, and learn to like it in the process..
and yeah, it's for free, so its not exactly the hugest risk in the universe.
I can fondly look back and remember that as a 2 month old fetus i would play for hours on end with lincoln logs and dream of building shelters for the needy and McMansions for the wealthy in the world. I also liked how the Corbu glasses and mock turtlenecks looked on my somewhat still developing fetus face and body. Somehow because it was so dark in the womb i think that black is the only color around. More recently, the spirituality of being enveloped in that warm tight womb has provided me some Architectural issues that need resolving regarding spaciality, topologies, intricacy, iterant morphologies and materiality that I want to further explore. Now as a 6 month old fetus i am busy taking all the tutorials on the latest 3-d and rendering engines so i can be ready when i fall out. Thus, the only vehicle for fulflling my dreams is ARCHITECTURE. The world will be a better place when i slide on out in a 3 months. This is the history off how/ why/ when i became an Architect.
when i was in high school my college plans were to study sculpture and philosophy.
my father is an engineer.
he said if i put the three together i might actually be able to get a job.
right now, i am suprisingly not bitter, and rarely question why i am in this profession.
corny as hell >>> i loved legos.
ha. can't fool us. you're guiggster, but you've just relogged on as mmm3
Well that WAS my second reason, but I'm afraid I only posted once. Strangely enough, my third reason is that I like trees. So, I think I'm of a like mind with other (aspiring) architects.
lego.
and la tourrette by corbes (wich i saw two years into my BA, mind you!)
i also liked the idea of being allowed to draw for a living without calling myself an "artist"
but lastly is the whole "build your ideas"-"play god" ego trip.
i like the idea of creating something that people will use and see everyday, something people interact with. that and architecture is everywhere. there is no escaping it
I wanted to be a painter, but I was too afraid to go to beaux arts so I thought I should try to get a professional degree. I then realized I wasn't such a good painter, so I decided I would become a good architect. Once I got out of school I realized I wasn't such a good architect. So I became a render monkey...
lego
watching construction from home
fine arts as a child (advanced placement for 5-7 y0s)
father financed many constructions
speaking to architects - thinking they knew nothing
artists
my distaste for exacting science
because my parents wanted me to become an accountant. this isn't the true reason, but for the first time, it did get me seriously thinking about what i wanted to become because i did not want to be an accountant. what did your parents want you to be?
lego
creativity
the knowledge base required for an architect gives me the ability to pursue a variety of things outside of architecture
the desire to create better surroundings
My dad wanted me to "be" out of his house. So went to college like everyone else.
My dad wanted me to "be" out of his house. So I went to college like everyone else.
I can fondly look back and remember that as a 2 month old fetus i would play for hours on end with lincoln logs and dream of building shelters for the needy and McMansions for the wealthy in the world. I also liked how the Corbu glasses and mock turtlenecks looked on my somewhat still developing fetus face and body. Somehow because it was so dark in the womb i think that black is the only color around. More recently, the spirituality of being enveloped in that warm tight womb has provided me some Architectural issues that need resolving regarding spaciality, topologies, intricacy, iterant morphologies and materiality that I want to further explore. Now as a 6 month old fetus i am busy taking all the tutorials on the latest 3-d and rendering engines so i can be ready when i fall out. Thus, the only vehicle for fulflling my dreams is ARCHITECTURE. The world will be a better place when i slide on out in a 3 months. This is the history off how/ why/ when i became an Architect.
i was more of an erector set person than lincoln logs
i like the idea of creating something that people will use and see everyday, something people interact with. that and architecture is everywhere. there is no escaping it
Liked to build forts and trees houses as a kid and just thought taking to the next level made .....igloos and snow caves !
i too liked to do forts and treehouses as a kid. i designed plenty of them that couldn't get built, so i thought i would continue that trend and go to school to design things that can't get built. engineers nightmare then and now, though i am trying.
lock blocks, legos and linkin logs were also some of my prerequisites to school along with some high school drafting and art classes.
This thread is REALLY making me wanna get some legos. I had this police station set when I was a kid...I must have built that station a different way 100 times.
All I know is that when I become an architect all the windows are going to have iron bars on 'em.
i hear you gster. i wish erector set were this cool when i was a kid.
I drew a skyscraper with tank wheels (in seismic sensitive zone) aged four (before I could even pronounce 'architect'). And lego. Lots of lego.
Lego, how lovely is lego!
I can play with these little pieces for hours after hours as a little girl.
I can see the colors of all matters with my interesting explanation.
I can read Wright's autobiography in mid-night.
I can sketch the outlines of buildings as abstract as Frank O Ghery, but at that time, I have no idea about how great to be an architect.
My inspiration comes from my playful life style.
And my aspiration will ends when I get really, really old.
I think the Lego people need to come up with some kind of architecture scholarship or something, seeing as how 90% of all architects played with legos at some point in their formative years.
i did the lego thing, but I am forever indebted to my grandpa's Domino set and his Elks lodge; for some reason I would lay out the plan of the Elks club with domino walls at an early age. sincerely hope that doesn't creep into my design sensibility.
also the first builder's house plan book I laid eyes on, I fell in love with. my mother unknowingly said "architects design houses, you could be an architect".
Loved drawing from an early age, loved exploring, hiding in strange spaces.
Did anyone used to sketch fantasy home floor plansduring school? For a year in elementary school I just kept making floor plans of my fantasy home, complete with toilets and whatnot. The houses weren't much bigger than the one I lived in, but there were always servant's quarters. Then I decided to pursue architecture, and goooodbye servant's quarters.
i also just remembered that as a toddler (must have been between 3 and 5 i would sit for hours on end in the hall of my grandmother's flat, stairing at the patterns on her middle eastersn rugs immagining they were plans of a building or a labirint...not that i knew what a plan was at the time...shit, i had never thought of that. thank you archinecters, for this journey of self discovery!
lego lego lego lego lego. in a huge washing powder tub (dixan? something by johnson&johnson , anyway).
anyone up for a trip to legoland windsor this summer?
Oh and how could I forget sand castles (mine were more like egaliterian communities - but what the hell). I'm an island boy so I had great fun, I wasn't a spade and spatula kid, moulded with my bare hands. True plasticism must be sculpted, probably why I feel most content staring at the images of corbs later sculptural works + gaudi, anything gaudi - and why I always want to take a file to gehry's work mould it damn it!! Ahh sand castle I think I'll build on this weekend.
Hmm and dominos. Loss one or two out of the 28 you got building blocks. Loss one out of every pack - we've got a construction boom!
What a mixture I've had...I must be corb. Maybe that's why I think subconsciously I am corb (I have perfect eyesight which sucks cause i'd look dead sexy in the thick rims)
Because I am an egotistical bastard that thinks he can change the world.
Because if you fail in architecture you can still do other artsy stuff like graphic design or painting but not vice versa.
Because arguing with others is a lot more fun than arguing with myself..although i still argue with myself.
Because as a child I loved destroying legos and blocks and erector sets more than creating things with them.
Because black is my favourite color.
Because I am a bitter individual, although i am not sure which came first architecture of bitterness?
Because i didn't belive my professors when they said architects will never be rich unless they are born rich.
.
easy. girls, money, fame & drugs. why else?
easier than religion, more flattering cuts, site vists every month vs. end of time, rewarding judgement day acclimatisation programme.
"easy. girls, money, fame & drugs. why else? "
You must be thinking of structural engineering or something, because that ain't architecture.
...those damn engineer/rock stars
I have a "large sheet of paper" fetish.
when I was 8 I drew an elevation of a house - my dream house I guess - and I was firmly convinced that it should have windows of all shapes but rectangles; heart, star, circle, arched, cloud - I wondered why the shapes of windows lacked so much imagination...
Big fan of lego
the spaces in my dreams were always so much cooler..... i would wake up and feel the need to fix things..........
looked at the buildings around me and went, "I bet I could do better"
how about :I thought I could change the world
but then it dawned on me that in Heraclitusian universe, there was no I (and that is not due to the more recent cultures of the I) and only change.
No, but really...I jest (change the world? huh?). I had the most banal reason for studying architecture...none whatsoever.
There was no I, I wasn't there.
p.s: is 'playing lego' as bland a reason as 'being good at maths'?
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