mine is 8"x8"x1/2" (the cover is thick, the actual portfolio is about 1/4")

jan 15th Im starting a thread so have portoflios ready!!!!

Im excited to see them, but alas i must restraint myself and wait.

i love how we're all holding our cards close to our chests until january... if only the audience knew what each of us held, it'd be like poker on TV. whatever be the case, i'm all in.

Mine's 8"x11.25" 38 pages front and back including covers, 19 sheets total. landscape format.

I'm only posting my portfolio after I see some others.... I haven't seen any other applicants yet so I want to know what I'm up against before I hand everything over to the firing squad!

Have some confidence and cojones Emerson!

*cough*I'll be doing the same*cough*

wow, i can already tell that mines sucks

ugh

we should wait until feb 1 to post portfolios. UTA and Parsons are due then...
mine is 8.5x11 horizontal, 10 pages double sided including covers. (i was a real stickler for berkeley's constraints and just kept the same book for all other submissions...)
(and if you search old discussion posts, the link to my portfolio is out there somewhere. its like where's waldo!)

mine 8.5"x11".. 12 pages(24 sides + cover page and contents).

and +q- feb 1st should be perfect.

8.5x11 landscape. 11pgs front + back...

"finished" mine last night. but couldn't sleep b/c i was having a mini pannic attack that i'm delusional in that although I'm quite happy with it, it might actually be a pile of crap.

now all i have to do is find a sexy way to bind it up so it opens flat. i'm not happy with the spiral ring staples style... any suggestions?

oh and gulggster & emerson, with you too.

I'm glad I'm not alone! I thought my portfolio was done until I got some feedback from my old professor, so now I'm scrambling to get it together. I'm glad my first deadline isn't until Jan. 15. At least that gives me a couple more weeks.... Still struggling with the statement of intent. Everything else seems to be falling into place, but yikes. It is a lot of crap to pull together.

I'm just glad I'm done. I finished it before Berkeley and MIT's due dates and have been avoiding it like the plague until I have to print out more for the Jan. 15 dates. I took a full week and a half vacation from even thinking about applications, which was probably both a good and bad idea.

Feb 1st it is!!!!
The Great Portoflio Post of '06
Have them ready for the world to see.

I am always glad to see i'm not alone in my fantastic neuroses.

are we posting here on the forums or just having PDFs avail?

i think the smugmug and flicker website things seem to work well.
I think Ill put mine up as a pdf in a yahoo site or something like that. Yahoo gives you 20mb of posting space, os that may be what i do.

very well, i think i`ll post mine too.

please note that if you would like your posted-portfolio returned to you, you should include a self addressed email and $1.63 with your posting.

Buck sixty?! Fuck, you can keep it!

anyone else beginning to despise their portfolio?

happy holidays

I went home for the weekend and did not do anything on my portfolio the entire time. So now I don't despise it as much as I did on friday, but I am sure I will when I start up again today!!!

GOOD LUCK EVERYONE!!!!!

I dont know if I hate mine. I see 20 different extra things I could have done to make it better, but Im glad it is done, and I am proud because i think it accurately describes me and my way of thinking.

This is probably late but for all the portfolio/personal statement length questions...

I went through this whole process last year.

I think my portfolio was around 35-40 (letter) front and back pages and my personal statement was a good page or two too long. I applied to Penn, Cornell, Rice and Princeton and was accepted to all. Obviously I exceeded most length requirements but it really doesn't matter.

Make your work good and beautiful. It's pretty simple.


P.S. adam are you out there?

brandonmhorn where do you go now?

brandonmhorn can you post your portoflio? We are all waiting till Feb, that would probably be a good time.

Yeah, I could probably do that.

I'm going to Princeton, I'm surprised to see no one is applying there. (?)

I am applying to Princeton and was wondering if a few rumors about Princeton are true:

-How many people are accepted per year?
-Is it true that the scholarship help is very generous?
-How do you like it there in general?

So...did you come to the open house they had around a month ago?

anyways:

-there's three different programs (1.5, 2, and 3 year), I don't know which you are applying to. This year there were around 20-25 new students overall accepted into the program.

-scholarship help is fairly generous but I still am taking out loans. Princeton (the town and school) is expensive in general. I think it's better than most masters programs though.

-I like it, generally. I had a rough semester but I was adapting to a lot of new things. The faculty is good (and prestigious) and the students are smart (and talented). It's fast paced and overwhelming.
But...next semester's graduate studios: Eisenmann, Sejima, Abalos/Herreros. This semester was Paul Lewis, Gandelsonas, Liz Diller, and Jesse Reiser. Other classes: Mark Simmons, Guy Nordenson, Sarah Whiting, Ron Witte, Stan Allen (I guess you probably already know this). It's pretty amazing to be learning from these people.

Also, the school will do about anything to help you with your projects.

Town of Princeton is pretty dull.

and what else...hmmm...yeah, if you get accepted you should probably go there.

Now that everybody is almost done with their portfolios, I thought I might ask this question:

"portfolio size? 8.5 x 11? Did anybody try to be a little different? lets say 8.5 x 8.5? I don't know maybe its a straight disqualify....

-Happy upcoming new year everyone!

I didnt. I couldnt see myself manually trimming all of those pages. So I left mine 8.5 x 11, landscape. I had to trim each cover manually, and that was enough.

Besides, a slightly different format probably wont make my work look any better, unfortunately.

i went for 6x10, landscape. printing and trimming was a royal pain in the ass, but content gave form to my portfolio. 15 pages back and front. big bold pictures and one liners to describe pictures. anything remotely crappy or didn't go with the flow was discarded. i am ready to commit suicide.

hey, me too. i have to finish my letter of intent for Harvard tomorrow morning, then ship it. The other week I almost hoped I didnt get into any school. I think all the other people in my studio that are taking a year off may have had a good idea. There are only 4 people out of 45 in my studio that are applying to grad school now.

i am working on mine for the gsd too. woo we're on the same boat. except it's been two years since i've been in school and i don't have any arch bkgrd. good luck to you.

well, you know. to be honest, im wondering if non-arch background people have better chances, because they dont really know your design skills yet, right? With my portfolio, i have 3 years of design work, so they can definitely tell I cant design shit. At least, thats my worry. Ha. Oh well. Good luck to you as well.

hey, has anyone dropped their gsd package off? (as opposed to mailing it?) they said there was a drop box somewhere but i deleted the email. does anyone know where on the building that drop box is? i'm trying to save postage on schools i live near.

vigggo: too bad they still hold 1st prof degree applicants to pretty much the same standards... schools want to know you can design/ have the capacity to design or they won't accept you

as the deadline approaches, im beginning to ask myself more and more "why do I want to be an architect again? I'd be happy being a draftsman for the rest of my life, right?" Ha

but, despite that, I was surprised to learn that I'm about 85% done w/ my TAMU application... oh the beauty of not having to turn in a portfolio

8888:

"There will also be a secure drop box outside of Gund Hall near the Quincy Street door if you wish to hand-deliver your application during the break."

laxchc11:

I understand your feelings. But, in a few weeks, Im sure we will all feel a bit better. This is a pain in the ass for sure, but when I really think about it, I would be really excited to go to any of these schools.

vigggo, the only thing is the feeling better part is short lived. It is soon followed by the frantic reading of threads where everyone else is hearing back from their schools when you're not. I found that to be even more stressful than getting everything turned in. Good luck everyone!

After working in 3 different states and 3 architecture offices in 6 or so years I am very exicted to go back to grad school. Have fun because school is much more fun than a job. Not to say jobs suck because they do not, but school is much more exiciting...

yeah, and then the whole fact that the application process as a whole isn't the most difficult compared to actually surviving the program itself. I'm so looking forward to going weeks w/out sleep

The next few months are going to be exciting, to say the least. I've heard that people hear anytime from late March all the way to mid May. They really know how to string you along, don't they?

THAT'S EVIL.... do they have waiting lists too to make it even longer and worse?

you know, i asked about wait lists while visiting Univ. of Texas.. apparently the whole admissions process at grad schools is a little different in that they dont do wait lists.... you get in or you dont and thats about it

Does anyone know if UCLA makes a habbit of updating its application status pages? Its doesn't seem that they have in the last month, since all my stuff has been recieved elsewhere.?

so i am finishing my BArch...one more semester, and i'm applying to programs stirght through...errr, i guess ther term is appliED. reading this thread in retrospect amuses/stresses me. i applied to Yale, Priceton and Berkeley.

I dont think I am going to get in anywhere. Not because i dont have the portfolio or whatever (hey how did you guys end up binding it btw - signiture, perfect, french fold?) or the grades (well, who really knows what good grades are) or the street cred (did i actually say that?) but because, i feel like it's a coin toss. remember when you all applied to UG and you're like, wow even though i might be stellar at everything who knows what they want? that's how i feel.

oh and PS sci-arch is SUPER OVERRATED

it's 4:01, i've been here printing/editing my portfolio since 11am or so. I won't be going in to work tomorrow. i have much to do and less time to do it in. A host of other issues you've all dealt with i'm sure.

I'm subjecting myself to this now so I can endure 2.5-3 more years of it?


and most of me STILL thinks this is a good idea.

jumpy,

I was wondering the same thing about UCLA. I'm beginning to think that they do not keep up with the status of the application as they should have recieved my package over a month ago also.

aren't you all sending your packages return receipt?? so you know its been received?

geland,

Thats kinda good to hear but not really. I was starting to think that my application didn't make it but I guess they just don't update.

I sent all of mine return receipt or fedex so i could track them one way or another.

Princeton and UPenn are the only ones kind enough to let you track your status online, although Princeton hasn't updated in a while.

Do people call to confirm receipt or is that a major faux pas?

Good question, for instance, one of my packages was not delivered because no one was there to pick it up, so a note was left and it is waiting at the post office. Would it be wise to call and let the admissions office know where it is, or is this standard procedure for them, in that they send someone to the post office every day to pick up the swath of packages attempted to be delivered while no one was there.