my friend silent bob in chicago used to be a photography assistant and once he was on a shoot of ashley judd. apparently she changed right in front of him and he reports that she has(d) nice breasts.

p2an fantastic! i want to live in your photostream!!

beta my life is a freaking trainwreck!

vado, tell me whose isn't?

well if the edmund fitzgerald was a train then the wreck of the edmund fitzgerald would be a good analogy of my life.

lb you are the chrissie hynde of architecture. i've seen that brass fixture in your pocket.

doesn't hurt to repeat myself - that is some very nice work p2an. i didn't notice before that it was in ijburg. didn't your boss do the master plan for that area?

babs is a very cool lady.

cool orhan!

jump, yup cka did the ijburg masterplan so it kind of keeps it all in the family.

I wondered about that, p2an - in addition to your beautiful project it seems every house on the street is wicked cool.

vado just keep singing Freebird and enjoy yourself! Winka Dubbeldam is the Chrissie Hynde of architecture.

vado, you're alive, and staying alive is half the battle.

I got one tiny step closer to licensure today. Woohoo! It's good to have some small good news right about now.

p2an - Absolutely love the clean lines and that staircase is to die for.

Orhan - excellent work and kudos on getting the permit.

Not much else to say. Went out for sushi last evening with the girls and had a fabulous time. The restaurant was really great. I think you all would have liked the simplicity of the lines/design. They have a bar in the front. The bartender is from Poland and has a great flirtatious attitude and so it may become our regular "hangout". Time to get hit the elevations again. Just found out they changed the guardrails on us. Argh!!!

p2an, what is the grille-like thing on the lower level at the front elevation? Is that actually perforated? What is it made of? I wish there were some closer, detail pics of it! It is gorgeous.

I also very much like the raised sitting room area that forms a bridge between the front of the house and the rear. Nice work!

manta, the grille next to the door is a steel panel cut to a design by a local amsterdam artist.
it incorporates creatures that live on and around the island. i must say in the beginning we were not sure how that was going to turn out -but i really like it now.
it adds something to a otherwise sober facade. it also houses all the doorhardware, letterbox, bell etc. and ventilation panel.
i would have preferred if the back panel was also dark grey not white, it would be a bit more subtle. but we didn't win the client over in that one.

thread central is kind of like that tv show gossip girl...except it revolves around middle-aged architects located in the midwest rather than pretty teenage faces on the upper east side. but yeah, they're kind of similar

now that's an idea to pitch to the networks!

i know it's a bit hokey or overused, but gmail now has themes, i am using a really cool ninja theme now. kinda reminds me of samurai jack.

beta, I like the rainy one theme. I don't think it looks that rainy, it's just got a nice texture to it.

Wait a minute. Who you callin' middle age puddles? ;o)

Hi. I missed a bunch of stuff yesterday, I had a headache and I was very sick all day, I barely ate, but I still had to go to school for meetings. Actually I put this information on my status in Facebook - that I didn't feel well - and got stopped in the hallway and asked if I felt better! So that was funny.

The Gmail themes freaked me out. I minimized my window and then I maximize it and next thing I know my Gmail has changed colors.

I have always been told that I most closely resembled Kate Winslet, if we have to pick a famous person to go with. I am flattered by this as I love her.

p2an, the project looks great! Congratulations.

ok then...there's a lot of old people here. does that make any one feel better?

Some days I feel old. Does that count?

youth is wasted on the young.

we are working on a proposal for a home right now where the client asked not for a parking space for a car, but space to put 3 bicycles.

the site is about 9 feet wide and 40 feet deep so you can imagine it is pretty urban...which explains the no-need for cars...but even so, it is a first for me.

thought some of you might be heartened to hear the world is not all going to the petro-kings.


i am getting old. but only physically. inside my head i am getting younger. that's why i walk funny.

Afternoon all.
Busy day at work.
Jump, heheheh...

DubK, Kate Winslet is a good one for you. Especially because she is so fearless as an actress - she has taken on some unflattering, difficult roles and always gives 100%.

jump glad to hear a new project is coming up! Fingers crossed.

Yeah, I'm not a fan of the new google themes because I'm so old and want things to be like they were in my youth 6 months ago.

Wow P2an, beautiful work! Love how the dog blends totally into the walls in one of the pics.

dapper, haha i am glad someone else spotted the dog, i also thought it was cool that he managed to get into the shoot.

I'm feeling pretty young again actually.

DubK, if you're a Kate Winslet type, who would you say I am like?

Thread Central, I have some questions for people doing side work or working as just designers. I've got a couple of residential projects I've been offered as side work, both are new home const, that I would act as the designer on, since I'm not quite licensed.

Can anyone offer some advice on how they have handled this process? How involved are you beyond producing the CD's? Does the client just take the drawings and scamper off to the contractor? Who chooses the engineer/consultants? - I assume the owners. Any guidance would be greatly appreciated.

I'm doing a search, but I thought I'd ask TC as well, since peeps here are a little more straight forward with their answers.

what is this google you whippersnappers keep talking about? time for my nap.

d napper,
if you produced the cd's for the houses, you have already heavily involved with the clients. (this is assuming you are truly doing a custom designed house for specific client.)
unless the clients are engineer themselves or know an engineer, they usually leave it to designer/architect to select the consultant eng.
they might have other consultants but usually it is architect's call for them.
some clients take the money (drawings) and run away and some other smarter ones keep the architect/designer on the job until the house is finished. this is also up to you to offer certain services beyond the initial design and permit set. or it is the way you practice. there are some people who just want to provide drawings and move on and the others who are more involved than that.
i usually stay on the job all the way, but sometimes i have clients who can't afford to keep me on the job, i will re-negotiate, if they are honest with the finances and if i have a personal importance on the work.
sometimes i don't want to stay too long on certain projects where my efforts would be over written by somebody. learn how to pick your battles with clients and listen carefully.
residential work can be very elastic.;.)

economic times are tough. people are smokin and drivin less. so that means that cities like muncie do not have enough money to pay snowplow drivers overtime. which means they won't plow the roads at night? wtf??? is happening.

as always great advice. On monday I am supposed to be presenting a list to the head of school following up on this parody, and I am sure everyone on Thread Central would agree with me on your inclusion. No promises, and forgive my brash way of saying to an open room of a'necteurs but...

I don't know if anyone has noticed that puddles has become Vado 2.0 (dub puddles...deep breath, deep breath - I am your father!!!)

rationalist, you remind me a little of Jullanne Moore. It's the red hair. Also I think you could pull off a bowling/goddess costume like in the Big Lebowski really well.

Hi all,
Up late on the phone with a friend.
Orhan i mean to call you tonight and then they called. Maybe Fri or Sat?

Archi, didn't you mean Vado has become puddles 2.0?

Night all.

oooh, I love Julianne Moore. I'd actually always thought of myself as the Kate Winslet type as well, is why I asked (it was probably that red hair in Titanic). Wish I was half that put together though!

Why am I still awake? I got sleepy, came in to go to bed, and an hour later I'm still sitting here. It's all for the best as the upstairs neighbors are getting it on anyway ... I can't hear much but the scratching of the bed on the floor, it's enough to keep me giggling.

thanks techno... i am elated. sounds great. i hope you get to do it.

nam, i'll be in the office saturday as usual. today is running around trying to get a small job and check out few buildings. lets talk saturday if it is okay with you.

jump, 9x40 sounds like your alley... i had a friend in sydney with 9x60. it was a great space done by her architect father. 2 stories. i am sure you guys would do a great job.

i should get some sleep. as some of you easterns and mid westerns are probably be up in couple of hours.

Dapper: I just did a residential proposal (remodel) for which I'm contracted to do Schematic Design only. We'll come to a design, with some options, that the Owners like, I'll draw it up and give some allowances for things like tile, as well as a very small "residential spec" that lists things we will need like drawers pulls, new insulation around the new window, etc. so the contractors can at least put a number in for pretty much everything we need, and we'll get pricing form three contractors.

These are not "bids". They are budgets with line items. If during consctruction some things come out to cost more or less, those numbers can be worked into the overall price. It's all open book with a standard markup for the contractor.

If the project proceeds, we'll have a new contract with the Owner that gives us a percentage of construciton cost to finish out drawings and do on-site work during constrcution. So we do hourly though SD and % through the end, with the hourly money subtracted from the percentage.

We don't use engineers, it's all design-build by the contractor, and we don't do CD's proper, as we spend a lot of time in the field instead.

It's a method that works great ESPECIALLY if you have a good level of trust with the client, which we tend to have or get as we come well recommended. For a new, untested architect (like yourself) this might not work s well.

Yes, I've misspelled construction many times above - its one of those words I have problems with, and pre-coffee I'm not up to fixing it.

Hi all,
Tired and at work. I knew it would be a rough morning. Ugggh..
Orhan i will call Sat.

Definetely a multiple coffee cup day.

I am still alive

Oh, I should add: We also do permit drawings, which generally require a wall section, so we do have to figure out framing sizes and some details, which we do with the help of the selected contractor. It's pretty simple residential work so mostly we go by rule of thumb, or the contractor calls the Trus-Joist guys or whoever. Actually I think often the lumber yard figures it out!

Dapper feel free to email me with questions, or just post more here as I think it could benefit many (<self-deprecating sarcasm> because I am SOOO experienced and wise...<sarcasm>).

LB - You ARE a wealth of knowledge and I am quite grateful to be privy to some of it. Don't sell yourself short.

Good Morning TC!!! I'm still alive and am wearing my ARCHITECTURE SUCKS t-shirt.

good morning all - I should but mine on as well ****...hmmmm

I have been chatting all morning with an old school friend who is looking to build a 40 room hotel with 3 villas on top of a hill overlooking the turquoise waters of our North Coast - its at least a 3 year project. But it should be fun at least in the first couple phases. I have no clue how to charge for the master planning which it will require (5 acres) so Liberty or anyone else, please throw in your two cents

sounds good techno! i spent my first day wearing my new glasses. loved it, except this morning looking into the mirror with my glasses on and seeing that i have loads of grey hair that i had never seen before - shit!

Thanks for the info LB and Orhan. LB, how do you handle the foundation design?

Both projects are with friends, so I'm still very nervous as to what to expect from them, if I'm putting my best architect-foot forward, interacting with the contractor, etc.

And from her pics: Rationaiist = Bryce Dallas Howard.

i know it's good luck to have a bird shit on your head, but has it ever actually happened to any of you TCr's? it happened to me about 20 minutes ago, and i am trying to figure out if i should go buy lottery tickets.

good luck, huh? well, if that's the way you wanna look at it...

GO BUY (a) LOTTERY TICKETS!!!!


Then go home and shower.

Dapper, a lot of this just comes with experience! But when I first started doing it I relied heavily on Graphic Standards and a lot of talking to builders.

We do at least know what we want to sheath the house in so we know if an 8" concrete (basement) wall will suffice. If there's no basement, we show a CMU crawlspace wall, show a footing below frost line (30"? 36"? I can't remember), and label a few pieces of #5 rebar in it. Typically this is all figured out after the contractor is onboard so s/he will confirm what we draw - they don't want the building to fall over any more than we do!

It's not the most respectable form of practice, but it works well.