Check out this link http://www.theevansgroup.com/ Click 'view presentation" at the bottom of the page. Half way the movie (it is a very long presentation so be patient) you'll see the interior of the office. What do you think of the interior? Would you work there? You probably hate it and prefer to work in an old garage designing blob buildings in Maya. But then again, I don't' believe that everyone on this forum works for a starchitect. So, some of you inevitably work in an 'evansgroep-like' firm.
Anyhow, I was quite intrigued by the way the interior looked. I get the feeling like I'm in Disney Land. Ok, the old loft may associate more with an architectural firm but this really tops everything.
hahaha. That is the best thing i have seen in a long time. especially "marketecture". and i loved how each workspace was like its own little tract home. i'm only surprised that they didn't include garages so they could drive all the way into their individual offices without having to see anyone else.
sadly, this is very relevant to the general public perception of architecture. this is what we are up against, in some respects.
that was supposed to show up AAAAAAAARGH!
just with lots more letters.
amazing.
note: the khaki trosers with the tucked in pastel shirts (does anyone actually dress like that in the states, apart from kmart store managers?)
the village road...i'm speechless...amazing, that is a real gem.
I couldn't make it past the boulevard of dreams, please tell me at the end the movie's "twist" was that this is a joke firm, just made up, a huge hoax? oh god.....oh god. I'm ready to blow my brains out now.
Just kidding, it was hysterical. Especially that "boulevard of broken dreams" they had going on.....speaking of, it looked like the perfect backdrop for a Green Day video about social decay.....as long as the guys in the khakis started crowd surfing.
To their credit, at least their home designs were a tentative step up from the crap developer housing going up in the suburbs around here. Still awful though.
I cannot get over the mini Disneyland. Terrifying and spectacular all at once. Craptastic, in fact.
Hey, I reduce the game
When I boost my brain
What you used to sayin
I loosen the frame
With shock announcements
T-Minus and countin'
Effects control and bouncin'
Star studded and flooded like fountains
A new machine
Real artists are few between
You better lube your screen
My renders are spendor
Three sixty reflecting quickly
Increase your (?dispease?)
So you can,
Upgrade your grey matter, cause one day it may matter
This really shows how we have been badly brainwashed in college. We have been taught to work in old broken down garages that function as studios. A crappy looking office stimulates creativity, so they say. We have been taught to work 80 hours a week and earn shit. We have been taught to only love Corbu, mies, gehry, hadid, Koolhaas' works and hate everything else what the general public wants. We have been taught to play the starving artist. We have been taught to dress a certain way, think a certain way, love our own work and not hate the strip mall. At the end we are a cloned society without any individual identity.
As far as the general perception’s concern, we are the biggest losers. Who in his right mind is going to spend thousands of dollars on education, years in school and at the end can’t earn a decent living and refuses to design something what the public wants.
Even though the architecture at the events group really sucks, they are making architecture what people want. There office epitomizes their philosophy. People love Disneyland and Las Vegas, so clients will feel very at ease at that firm. They have what you would expect form an architectural firm. An IT department, a in house kinko’s, an in house model shop, a theater for presentations. And those architects who attended Cooper Union, Ohio State and Univ Florida probably have a family, want to build some day their own house and therefore work for a company that pays well instead of working for a Maya driven office that pays crap. This offices is the type of office that may give back the respect that architects lost.
Now, I’m not saying that the architecture they produce is great. As a matter of fact, I hate it. But we need to claim back our role as architects, we need to produce what people want, we need to make money and we need to work normal hours back. And once we are seen as doctors, lawyers, bankers etc. then we can slowly change the marchitecture into architecture. Then you can tell your client what’s good architecture and what’s not, because they see you as a doctor. And they will never tell a doctor what to do. So lets stop being the crackhead down the street trying to sell a flat screen tv.
i don't want to produce what people want. if i wanted to do that, i could have saved myself 50k in debt and worked at Burger King that way everyone can have it their way.
jaja, drive out to the newest former greenfield/new subdivision in your area (because driving is the only way you can get there), stand at the gated entry, dodge the humvees (or better yet, stay in your car - it's safer and you get your own music and a/c), and see if you can still say that we should simply be giving the people what they want.
the shitty reality of our biz is that we don't have the goods we wished we had and are soooo tied to the moneybags it hurts. but i wouldn't call anyone in that firm a real architect either. in much the same way i wouldn't produce a video series based on bum-fights, no matter that someone wants to watch. lowering standards because the public responds better just ain't a way to convince anyone of the worth of architecture.
the video was painful to watch. i kept waiting for the punchline especially after seeing the mini-village. too funny.
the people only want what they've been told to want. the real problem with our profession is that we keep letting ourselves be pushed aside when it comes to telling the people what to want.
i cannot, in good conscience as a professional, even think of putting some of the construction details used in strip malls and tract houses on my drawings, and that's before we even talk about aesthetics. for the client who is mostly impressed by sheer size and for whom glued on styrofoam is good enough, what could my giving them what they "want" really bring to the table? if i were to take the average tract house and detail it correctly, I'd increase the cost by six times. Between the extra cost and taking away all the "low maintenence" vinyl, all I'd do is reinforce the client's perecption that architects are needless.
you choose how and what you want to practice and make a living from it.
evans group made that decision and went all the way with it. i appreciate some of the jaja's observations, however, giving the clients what they want is a big subject. as architects we must define what they need/want and explain to them how we intend to deliver. if our work reflects who we are and getting clients based on that is a goal, as it should, evans does that well.
their work, i truly dislike and find it so opposite to my own practice. but, if i was a developer and making millions in their kind of projects, i would not hesitate to seriously consider their services. this firm have speaking engagements in various builder and developer conventions. that type of work is 99% of the housing market.
yes sure, their office and designs are living hell for most of us. but, they are real and do volumes of projects and probably upwards of 50,000 people are directly or indirectly are working and supporting themselves because of what that corporate office do.
they are aggressive, know the corporate go getting (marchitecting), and perfected their production line. they are no different than many firms who are developing suburbs and 'hapiness' neighborhoods. huge amounts of capital involved in what they do and sell.
i worked for a firm like that right after school for several mounths. i felt like a shit and was fired as soon as i was arrested for getting into a drunken brawl and sent to county jail for 18 days. i was just about to quit anyway when one of my bosses told me that only time i can wear a bluejean, if it is ironed. 6$ an hour and ironed bluejeans.. it was not the money issue that i wanted to quit.. they are still in business.
and guess what? my next job was with fog. and it was not that much different except the broken office furniture and working conditions that wasn't much different from school studio. cheap labor like myself did model after model depending on which side of the bed frank woke up that day. after a while it all gets boring if it is not your own work.
the firm movie is hilerious in an ironic ways. did you notice the lowly employee bringing the model to the conference table trying not to block the camera? the whole movie is an overkill and the motherfucking thing loops at the end..
i feel sorry for the employees, but they would feel sorry for me, if they step into my office and discover how much money i make doing what is important to me, as well.
so, this is how i checked the firm out.
1 cent.
abra your 1 cent comments are as always of very high value.
Wasn't there another thread recently discussing "golden handcuffs" - once you start making some money it's very hard to give that up. This firm has found a way to make money in the design and construction world. If my kid was hungry I'd work there too - but I hope I ever come to that.
thanks lb.i hope you and your family (including, ofcourse, your bulldogy) never goes near hunger. btw, your husbands work is quite good. having grown up with a lot of conceptual art friends from cal-arts, i really appreciate that art.
"golden handcuffs". vado has got that one covered upstairs.
thanks abra. Saw an art:21 piece on Mike Kelly last night (he's cal-arts, isn't he?). I like his work but what an annoying demeanor! Anyway I'll tall Brian you like his work, he'll be pleased. Got a possible show in Chicago next year so he's in the studio a lot these days.
Argh here I am thread highjacking again. So sorry. Carry on with discussing the Movie of the Week brought to you by the Committee to Mislead Public Perceptions about Architects.
bigness, sadly there are many offices here in the US where the attire is very similar to the one shown in the video...sad
playing devil's advocate, at least they are subjecting themselves to the type of crap they design too. There are many offices Ive seen who have ultra-chic environments but produce far more regressive work than those guys..so at least they are true to themselves, even though what they do is bull
As someone who designs ultra-sophisticated and luxurious projects for my clients but works in a freezing cold basement with knotty pine paneling, I think I should start remaking my workspace in the same mode I use for my clients.
lb, but that then depends on the $$$ you got.
I meant offices with real contemporary furniture, clean modernist lines and huge unfettered glass windows who produce the same type of work these guys to. That, in my opinion is wrong...
Check this firm out
Check out this link http://www.theevansgroup.com/ Click 'view presentation" at the bottom of the page. Half way the movie (it is a very long presentation so be patient) you'll see the interior of the office. What do you think of the interior? Would you work there? You probably hate it and prefer to work in an old garage designing blob buildings in Maya. But then again, I don't' believe that everyone on this forum works for a starchitect. So, some of you inevitably work in an 'evansgroep-like' firm.
Anyhow, I was quite intrigued by the way the interior looked. I get the feeling like I'm in Disney Land. Ok, the old loft may associate more with an architectural firm but this really tops everything.
War on Perrorism
hahaha. That is the best thing i have seen in a long time. especially "marketecture". and i loved how each workspace was like its own little tract home. i'm only surprised that they didn't include garages so they could drive all the way into their individual offices without having to see anyone else.
sadly, this is very relevant to the general public perception of architecture. this is what we are up against, in some respects.
marketecture. learn it. live it. love it.
btw that's 5 minutes of my life i will never get back.
ya, seriously.
This firm is my nightmare. It's because of firms like this that we have shit architecture.
after watching that, I am seriously considering changing my profession.
"Yes, it is horrible."
hahaha
the music sound like it is from a car racing game
i didnt see a red light district on their boulevard of dreams.
When the revolution starts, I hope somebody pulls a Howard Roark on that building.
cash, lots and lots of cash.
too bad though.
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
that was supposed to show up AAAAAAAARGH!
just with lots more letters.
amazing.
note: the khaki trosers with the tucked in pastel shirts (does anyone actually dress like that in the states, apart from kmart store managers?)
the village road...i'm speechless...amazing, that is a real gem.
thanks!
i think i'm going to puke.
No WAY a cooper union grad could do that. did this person suffer a stroke that cut the blood supply to his brain?!
<------- vomiting linda blair style
I couldn't make it past the boulevard of dreams, please tell me at the end the movie's "twist" was that this is a joke firm, just made up, a huge hoax? oh god.....oh god. I'm ready to blow my brains out now.
Christopher Guest gives it a thumbs up.
dont get any gray matter on your suede boots lb!
What? I didn't think it was that bad.
Just kidding, it was hysterical. Especially that "boulevard of broken dreams" they had going on.....speaking of, it looked like the perfect backdrop for a Green Day video about social decay.....as long as the guys in the khakis started crowd surfing.
To their credit, at least their home designs were a tentative step up from the crap developer housing going up in the suburbs around here. Still awful though.
I cannot get over the mini Disneyland. Terrifying and spectacular all at once. Craptastic, in fact.
Hey, I reduce the game
When I boost my brain
What you used to sayin
I loosen the frame
With shock announcements
T-Minus and countin'
Effects control and bouncin'
Star studded and flooded like fountains
A new machine
Real artists are few between
You better lube your screen
My renders are spendor
Three sixty reflecting quickly
Increase your (?dispease?)
So you can,
Upgrade your grey matter, cause one day it may matter
how much kool-aid do you have to drink again, its been a few months...
Ether:
I think "dispease" is a slurred "disk speed".
about this much ought to do it...
thanks vado.
i like the part where they talk about printing their own money in-house and the weapons division looks fun.
this'll be featured in a documentary about culture, obesity and type 2 diabetes.
but their designs do exude architectural style, lest we forget
The Normative Group....i think i'll start my business plan tomorrow.
i wonder where they keep the gimp?
This really shows how we have been badly brainwashed in college. We have been taught to work in old broken down garages that function as studios. A crappy looking office stimulates creativity, so they say. We have been taught to work 80 hours a week and earn shit. We have been taught to only love Corbu, mies, gehry, hadid, Koolhaas' works and hate everything else what the general public wants. We have been taught to play the starving artist. We have been taught to dress a certain way, think a certain way, love our own work and not hate the strip mall. At the end we are a cloned society without any individual identity.
As far as the general perception’s concern, we are the biggest losers. Who in his right mind is going to spend thousands of dollars on education, years in school and at the end can’t earn a decent living and refuses to design something what the public wants.
Even though the architecture at the events group really sucks, they are making architecture what people want. There office epitomizes their philosophy. People love Disneyland and Las Vegas, so clients will feel very at ease at that firm. They have what you would expect form an architectural firm. An IT department, a in house kinko’s, an in house model shop, a theater for presentations. And those architects who attended Cooper Union, Ohio State and Univ Florida probably have a family, want to build some day their own house and therefore work for a company that pays well instead of working for a Maya driven office that pays crap. This offices is the type of office that may give back the respect that architects lost.
Now, I’m not saying that the architecture they produce is great. As a matter of fact, I hate it. But we need to claim back our role as architects, we need to produce what people want, we need to make money and we need to work normal hours back. And once we are seen as doctors, lawyers, bankers etc. then we can slowly change the marchitecture into architecture. Then you can tell your client what’s good architecture and what’s not, because they see you as a doctor. And they will never tell a doctor what to do. So lets stop being the crackhead down the street trying to sell a flat screen tv.
i don't want to produce what people want. if i wanted to do that, i could have saved myself 50k in debt and worked at Burger King that way everyone can have it their way.
hear, hear, beta.
jaja, drive out to the newest former greenfield/new subdivision in your area (because driving is the only way you can get there), stand at the gated entry, dodge the humvees (or better yet, stay in your car - it's safer and you get your own music and a/c), and see if you can still say that we should simply be giving the people what they want.
the shitty reality of our biz is that we don't have the goods we wished we had and are soooo tied to the moneybags it hurts. but i wouldn't call anyone in that firm a real architect either. in much the same way i wouldn't produce a video series based on bum-fights, no matter that someone wants to watch. lowering standards because the public responds better just ain't a way to convince anyone of the worth of architecture.
the video was painful to watch. i kept waiting for the punchline especially after seeing the mini-village. too funny.
the people only want what they've been told to want. the real problem with our profession is that we keep letting ourselves be pushed aside when it comes to telling the people what to want.
i cannot, in good conscience as a professional, even think of putting some of the construction details used in strip malls and tract houses on my drawings, and that's before we even talk about aesthetics. for the client who is mostly impressed by sheer size and for whom glued on styrofoam is good enough, what could my giving them what they "want" really bring to the table? if i were to take the average tract house and detail it correctly, I'd increase the cost by six times. Between the extra cost and taking away all the "low maintenence" vinyl, all I'd do is reinforce the client's perecption that architects are needless.
sadly, fancy graphic lovers, jaja is correct.
phillip johnson did say architects were whores, but i always imagined he meant the higher end sort
you choose how and what you want to practice and make a living from it.
evans group made that decision and went all the way with it. i appreciate some of the jaja's observations, however, giving the clients what they want is a big subject. as architects we must define what they need/want and explain to them how we intend to deliver. if our work reflects who we are and getting clients based on that is a goal, as it should, evans does that well.
their work, i truly dislike and find it so opposite to my own practice. but, if i was a developer and making millions in their kind of projects, i would not hesitate to seriously consider their services. this firm have speaking engagements in various builder and developer conventions. that type of work is 99% of the housing market.
yes sure, their office and designs are living hell for most of us. but, they are real and do volumes of projects and probably upwards of 50,000 people are directly or indirectly are working and supporting themselves because of what that corporate office do.
they are aggressive, know the corporate go getting (marchitecting), and perfected their production line. they are no different than many firms who are developing suburbs and 'hapiness' neighborhoods. huge amounts of capital involved in what they do and sell.
i worked for a firm like that right after school for several mounths. i felt like a shit and was fired as soon as i was arrested for getting into a drunken brawl and sent to county jail for 18 days. i was just about to quit anyway when one of my bosses told me that only time i can wear a bluejean, if it is ironed. 6$ an hour and ironed bluejeans.. it was not the money issue that i wanted to quit.. they are still in business.
and guess what? my next job was with fog. and it was not that much different except the broken office furniture and working conditions that wasn't much different from school studio. cheap labor like myself did model after model depending on which side of the bed frank woke up that day. after a while it all gets boring if it is not your own work.
the firm movie is hilerious in an ironic ways. did you notice the lowly employee bringing the model to the conference table trying not to block the camera? the whole movie is an overkill and the motherfucking thing loops at the end..
i feel sorry for the employees, but they would feel sorry for me, if they step into my office and discover how much money i make doing what is important to me, as well.
so, this is how i checked the firm out.
1 cent.
abra your 1 cent comments are as always of very high value.
Wasn't there another thread recently discussing "golden handcuffs" - once you start making some money it's very hard to give that up. This firm has found a way to make money in the design and construction world. If my kid was hungry I'd work there too - but I hope I ever come to that.
Ja! Ja! jaja
Give me Palast zo I kann danz!
Mein Architekten
Wunderbar!
thanks lb.i hope you and your family (including, ofcourse, your bulldogy) never goes near hunger. btw, your husbands work is quite good. having grown up with a lot of conceptual art friends from cal-arts, i really appreciate that art.
"golden handcuffs". vado has got that one covered upstairs.
i can't believe they had an urban section. what a waste of space on the internet.
thanks abra. Saw an art:21 piece on Mike Kelly last night (he's cal-arts, isn't he?). I like his work but what an annoying demeanor! Anyway I'll tall Brian you like his work, he'll be pleased. Got a possible show in Chicago next year so he's in the studio a lot these days.
Argh here I am thread highjacking again. So sorry. Carry on with discussing the Movie of the Week brought to you by the Committee to Mislead Public Perceptions about Architects.
I love everybody in this thread...
abra use this and you wont need starch...
i want a boulevard of (broken) dreams at my office...
bigness, sadly there are many offices here in the US where the attire is very similar to the one shown in the video...sad
playing devil's advocate, at least they are subjecting themselves to the type of crap they design too. There are many offices Ive seen who have ultra-chic environments but produce far more regressive work than those guys..so at least they are true to themselves, even though what they do is bull
That's actually an interesting point, sameold.
As someone who designs ultra-sophisticated and luxurious projects for my clients but works in a freezing cold basement with knotty pine paneling, I think I should start remaking my workspace in the same mode I use for my clients.
Schnitzel hier, Schnitzel da.
Office Baroque
lb, but that then depends on the $$$ you got.
I meant offices with real contemporary furniture, clean modernist lines and huge unfettered glass windows who produce the same type of work these guys to. That, in my opinion is wrong...
I agree sameolddoctor. I'm just pining that I don't have the $$ to afford a $10,000 couch in my office.
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