I'll bite. Only had one truly bad experience in my career so far:

Booted from a team by colleagues and friends for "not doing enough work" after asking for some time off (aka not taking on extra work) to recover emotionally and physically from two miscarriages within one year. Note - there was no paid work to do at that moment in time...it was just an excuse to get rid of me so they could do the work alone. Woman on woman in this industry - doesn't get any lower than that in my opinion.

I had a colleague I considered a good friend throw me under the bus to save their own skin. We didn't talk after that. Was a real shame. 

First week at a new job we had an impromptu meeting so I needed to quickly print two schedules I was working on in Excel. I selected the relevant cells and printed "fit to page." My boss looked at them and said "why aren't these columns the same width, are you a fucking idiot?"

...and yeah, I was dumb enough to work there for 4 more years. Starchitect that you all definitely know and talks up how great the firm culture is in interviews and social media.

I designed an addition to an old home in bad shape, for newish friends. The idea was that they would live in the addition and then renovate/restore the original house.

I started with a bare-bones addition to meet their budget but they kept adding and adding... and then had me design the renovations to the main house as well. I had a construction business at the time as well, and once they were happy with the design, I put together a construction estimate, which totaled roughly twice what they had wanted to spend originally. Considering the extra work (and my warnings about budget every time they added something) I thought they would find the price reasonable. They did not.

We had our last few meetings with a loaded pistol (a Luger or Ruger, I forget which) on the table; he's quirky and it wasn't that surprising, and I've been around guns my whole life so they don't bother me if handled with care. But when he turned beet red, started yelling at me and put his hand on the gun, I got out of there as quickly as I could. Then they tried to stiff me for $7K in design fees, after I had already done all of the pre-design and schematic design at no charge, and gave them a discount on my hourly rate after that.

We live in neighboring small towns and have some unique hobbies that make it hard to avoid each other, but we have done pretty well at staying apart for the five years since that happened. I have a temper myself and I have been exercising a lot; if I saw him there is a good chance I would not be able to resist punching him. (She was around for all of it but she's relative milquetoast.) 

They are owners of a nationally well-known small business making a niche product which comes up in my circles regularly. I have to keep my lips shut about just how crazy the owners are. 

Shut up Balkins

A person, that tries to con me into doing freebie work for them - they have 0 funds, and always say the money is coming and I will get get "paid" " but first, you need to quit your day job at XYZ associates to work for us until, the money comes in" Then tries to guilt trip me into doing an entire apt. building at the last minute - 

I'm not anonymous enough for that sort of question... 

The first bad experience that comes to mind is: I’m a fresh-faced idealistic 19yo college student. I go to the wedding of a high school friend, where I’m introduced to a Chicago architect as “This is Donna, she’s in school to become an architect!” to which the middle-aged cynical white guy tosses back his drink and says “Why would you want to do that to yourself?”

Something about that gleeful desire to kill the dreams of young people angered me deeply. I’ve been fighting it ever since.

DB2022 - By any chance, was this an expansion to a museum in fly-over, middle America?

I have a couple;

- Freshly minted graduate eager to show what I can do in a decent office getting paid above average for the region at the time. Walked into the worst bunch nagging, cynical staff setup ever.  The large black cloud over everyone's head was absolutely stifling.  Lasted two days ... dropped off a thank you note on the morning of the third day and never returned ( thankfully I never saw the principle again )

- First major project where I was offered to lead the project design ( simple outdoor pool ).  Shit contractor and mechanical lead who messed up the concept of being able to "pull the plug" to drain down the pool and winterize it IE not freeze out the pipes.  Epic fail, that lead to a brutish encounters with the client ( ex military dude )  / contractor that simply was beyond what I ever could conceive as disrespectful and counter to any meaningful concerted effort to resolve the problem diplomatically. Me being a pleaser ( at least back then ) changed my view of the profession.  My boss had bid the job too low and kept me around to resolve and just hoped it would get swept under the rug or go away. Absolutely hated the experience and nearly quit the profession. In hind sight it was the single best learning experience ever, but F__K did it suck at the time.

-Lastly getting sued in a subrogated insurance claim ( AKA shotgun lawsuit where everyone is named ) I got drawn into a claim where the roof partially caved in on a SF residence due to snow loads at a ski resort.  Structural Engineered didn't spec the right connections and never inspected the work in the are in question. Fair it was  new resort with zero history for snow loading, but they were from the area and the only guys doing work there so it was expected that they had reasonable experience.  Man did I ever paddle to find every shred of evidence to support my case. I even had the smoking gun ( a copy of an email where the contractor asked about using a particular clip connection that he had modified as the spec'd ones weren't available and the Struc. Eng said it was okay to use ) Still had to pay to get outta that one. Turns out the contractor had been cutting corners on multiple projects and got caught a year or two later.  About two years after that the house that had the roof issue burned down ( homeowner issue ) .. Karma!. Funny thing was the homeowner phoned me to assist with rebuild and had no idea I had been sued by his own insurance company ... Still asked to use the old plans as part of the rebuild, at his insurance companies suggestion?????

... I said No!

I was the job captain on a project with an inexperienced PM and a designer with...um...higher aspirations... I'm having a fine old time figuring out the detailing on all the fancy stuff Mr Wannabe Gehry/Moss is coming up with, but I do keep raising the question of whether the budget will support it and keep being told not to worry my geeky little head about the budget.

Then the client takes our 50% set to some contractors for some preliminary pricing which, surprise of surprises, comes in about 3X the project budget and we get sued. All I can keep thinking is, "please, please, please don't depose me, because if all I do is answer yes/no questions honestly it'll be seen as throwing my bosses under the bus."

The first 15 years of it. 

Let's see.

Maybe it was getting fired from my first job. Boss was a tyrant so that's not it.

Or maybe getting fired from my second job. Boss was a condescending dick, so that's not it.

I'm currently being sued as a third party / shotgun approach but haven't lost any sleep about that one. Yet.

There was the time a mafia client stiffed me for $50k in fees. He died in an "accident" a couple months later. Nothing to do with me, but he deserved it. I have funny stories and that was a decade ago.

Recently I was invited for a drink "down by the river" by a client's rep with ties to organized crime, including a well - documented beating he took via baseball bat outside his busy office in front of a street full of people. But we're cool because I made his job super easy. Did I mention he sued my firm before my time there? Because he did, and we won.

Recently drove by an old project of mine (new build 40-unit condo) and the developer apparently went to another architect with our plans and built a copy on the same site. They were nice enough to change up the cladding colors at least. Not worth my time or aggravation to sue as the owner passed away and I don't need the headache.

These are just off the top of my head. I'm sure there are others....

Worked in a religious building / ....wasnt happy about it ...pulled through.

I'll chime in with a couple more so you can all laugh with (at) me, since I managed to secure access to a wifi network that I can access from my van down by the river.

• Working late one night on deadline (like 3am) at the end of a long (like 90 hour week) I drank too much beer from the kegerator (hey, it's there for a reason, right?) so I got terrible beer shits. So I'm in the bathroom in the middle of the night crapping my brains out and the guy I stayed late with to finish the proposal is looking for me. He calls me on my cell and I explain the situation between bouts of explosive gas and fecal matter. He needed an answer right away so he comes in the bathroom and we are talking through the stall door as I'm crapping my guts out. But at least the stalls were nice - marble clad with moody lighting. We got the proposal in on time but didn't win it.
• Developer housing proposal in Iowa City. I drive out there to present to the developer and a couple people from the county with my boss and the aforementioned compatriot from the beer-shit episode. It goes terribly, of course, but I suggest we make an afternoon of it and look at some of the truly good architecture in town - Steven Holl's Art Building West was our first stop. Boss is driving and instead of parking so we can go look at it, he slow-rolls it with the windows down and just goes "yup, that's a whole lot of steel." then we get back on the interstate and drive home. 
• We'll go back to school for this one - I've always made beautiful models and so a prof asked me to do an interiors model for him for a client. I agree, build a banging model with precisely cut and scored millwork (all by hand, no laser shit for me) and put it in a cardboard box for him with packing peanuts (the bio-degradable corn starch kind). Well the fucking box got totally soaked in a rainstorm when he was transporting it to the client meeting and he calls me screaming immediately after, "what the fuck is this, why did you give me a model covered in your cum! There is no way I am paying you for this."
• Again in school - get invited to a prof's house for a dinner. I assume there are other students going. Show up and it is just him, his stripper boyfriend, a single table in the middle of an empty room and a few candles burning. They want to know if I have any Adderall and would like to join for an evening in. Uh... no thanks.
• Second office I ever worked at - first week, the partners take me to lunch (small office.) We have lunch and since I am following their lead, I order a glass of wine and nurse it. By the time plates have arrived, they are finished and moving on to martinis. After eating, they order another round of martinis and dismiss me to go back to work. The come back 2 hours later and all immediately go home. It was like that the whole time I worked there. 
• Client throws a chair across the room, breaking the laminated glass partition wall of the conference room. Instead of banning him from the office (or dropping the account) senior leadership decides it is a better idea to restrict the meeting to only principals and have underlings join via video to take notes. Firm name rhymes with Bensler. 

I'm sure I'll think of more as I continue compiling memoirs from my time in architecture while relaxing in my van. 

the only really bad was about 15 years ago, got an irresistible offer to move to spain and be part of the first european office for a miami/caribbean company - long story short, management was inept to say the least, there was no team work, oversold a good dozen of projects to anxious russians and arabs, and in the end couldn't deliver anything, I was fired for not going to the office on a sunday and working from home instead, the clueless ceo from miami was in town and didn't like my "attitude". The spanish chairman died a year later and the company abandoned their european fantasies. 

I've had few bad experiences. 

While a student intern an PM at a firm didn't think I should have to take notes while he described what he wanted me to draft.  The PM called me stupid and said I should use my brain and proceeded to poke me in the forehead.  I broke his finger and moved to a different firm.  

I did a short stint (one month) at a firm that was plagued nepotism (kids without any arch experience worked there) and a horrible office manager (the wife) who micro managed everything.  The firm didn't get a $50 million project that they had no chance of getting and laid me off because I was 'incompetent'.  This was because I didn't show a mirror exactly the way they did per the the AutoCAD standards.  They tried to deny my UI claim and went so far as the appeal the decision to pay my UI two time, even brining in a 'expert computer annalist' to show I was incompetent (their son).  The UI judge sided with me each time and finned the firm for perjury.  

When I first came to my current location I worked for 9 months at a firm that didn't have the type of collaborative atmosphere I preferred.  I thought I could make it work but the firm viewed collaboration, asking any questions, or needing to have your drawings QC'd as a sign of incomitance.  After a six months owners of firm would make fun of the way I spoke (MN accent and a slight stutter).  I told them this wasn't appreciated and they should stop.  I decided to leave the firm and during my exit interview one owner said that I wasn't cut out be an architect and I should find a new profession.  Over the next three years the new firm  I was with beat the other firm out several large projects - all of which I was the lead designer.  The owner of the previous firm was so upset about this he tried to sue a client we had for showing us favoritism for not getting a project.  The client (a large public entity spoke) with said owner and 'convinced' them not to sue by explaining it was because they didn't do as good as work as my current firm.   

I was on a 4 month co-op term at a 'design-build' company. Was told I'd be 50/50 in the office / on the construction site which I was stoked about. The owner kept finding excuses to keep me on the site, where I was the cheapest labour by far. He'd also call me an idiot for not knowing how construction details worked, questioned how I even passed my classes, and would generally bad mouth all the people I worked on site with. Silver lining of never being in the office is I didn't have to deal with his B's too much. Everyone on the site were great and I learned so much from them.

Fuck you Ed.

Yea, Nova Scotia. 

Catbread - I don't believe this employer is suggested as a co-op option anymore after me and a few students voiced our concerns over the years.

my bad experiences fall into a few categories:

Working with micromanagers who care more about process than final product.

Clients/bosses who take a mile when you give them an inch.

Dealing with stubborn gatekeeping assholes.

And sociopaths.

I think FLW or someone was once asked 'what's your favorite project' and they answered 'my next one.'  i think that applies here too.  'what's your worst experience?'  ya, it's probably my next one.

The path to licensure.

Worst experience was being accused of burglary.  some out of town developer asked me to provide a design quote for a property that they owned.  They gave me the gate code and permission to visit the site.  Two days later I get a call from a detective.  After my site visit the house got broken into.  The detective asked me to come in for fingerprints to rule me out as a suspect.   They ruled me out I guess because I never heard anything back.  The developer called me a few weeks later and tried grilling me over the phone asking if I knew anything.  “Come on man, tell me the truth”.  A month or so after that the developer calls me again and asks if I’m still interested and that they caught someone breaking into other houses in the neighborhood and it was the same guy.  I told them that I was too busy to take new clients.  I had a lot more to say, but I held my tongue and acted professionally.