Hey everyone from Madison, WI. I am currently a UG student at IIT in Chicago. I work Part time at a small firm in Printer's Row(Clark and Harrison) who works on a real mixed bag of projects Chicago Public Schools, Smaller Residential, Small Commercial, and Healthcare, and a developer, Thomas Roszak, Who has a pretty cool house that we worked on.
Well anyways, I guess this is one of those grueling profession questions. It seems as though the City of Chicago is VERY competitive when looking for jobs. And in my opinion sometimes maybe employers can really take advantage of the fact that they can pay less because people desire to work in such a great city, the ability to find heaps of talent without paying much......Now for the Madison WI part. Is it the same there?? My family mainly lives there and it seems to be much easier to find cheaper housing, and traveling from home to work by car must be easier as long as you dont have to deal with the beltline traffic. Are there good opportunities in Madison WI for someone like me that would potentially look in the Madison area when I graduate in a year from now from school? Would it be a good idea to get a post professional degree for just a year extra in school?
Is there anyone who has gotten a post professional degree and it has served them well in their careers, or is it just best to stick with just the professional Bachelors Degree. I guess I think that it may offer me more open doors, but i dont want to disappoint myself and spend the money if it doesn't.
Is there particular advice about Madison and the profession there?
I've only been to Madison once, but I studied in UWM so a lot of my friends are from the Madison area and have gotten jobs there. It seems most of the big firms in Wisco have offices in both Madison and Milwaukee (Plunkett Raysich, Kahler Slater, Engberg Anderson, etc.), so you could try those.
Personally? I would say give Chicago a shot, while keeping your options open. I mean come on man your living in a word city, take advantage of that. You go to the big guys here and you could end up in NYC, LA or freaking China!
Madison is a blast. 2hr from Chicago/Milwaukee, its a happening small city, great nightlife, culture, University town close to outdoor recreation, water, ski slopes. I could see living there. There was a firm Flaad a few years back that did some large health care - maybe theyre still around.
man i love minneapolis...
prolly my 2nd favorite city... next to chicago that is...
but ill second what people above are saying... chicago isnt THAT ultra competative... im sure you can find a job... especially being from IIT, you can get work almost anywhere... talk to your profs, talk to your friends... you wont have to big a problem finding a job... there might be a lot of architects but there are a TON of firms, and a good number doing interesting work...
Who's the top notch Chicago firm? Lurking around here on Archinect it seems people have complained that the Chicago scene just isn't what a city its size and stature should have. Correct me if I'm wrong, but given that I'd say the professional oppotunity isn't too much better than Madison. Sure you can work for massive Chicago firms with branch offices. Then again, you'll have to put in plenty of years before moving beyond being just a cube number, let alone transferring to NYC.
Pure cost of living you're probably better off in $$ terms to be in Madison. For what less pay you'd get would be more than offset by the lower cost of living. I also agree with your assertion that employers in Chicago take advantage of an ample supply of young talent. I balked at Chicago when I couldn't get an entry level position in-line with the cost of living difference from smaller major metros.
All that said, Chicago does have benefits you cannot place a $$ value on. Great place to live while young for sure. And where you live isn't always about money or else nobody would live in places like LA, Chicago, NYC, etc.
Tough decision since your alternate is Madison. If it was Davenport Iowa the choice would be clear, but Madison is such a great town. Let us know what you decide.
Madison's design community is nice and small, and the city is prosperous, smart, and growing--so why not? You could really make something for yourself there; Kenton Peters has, for example. It seems like a place where there is room for people to carve out a niche for themselves. The city really is a well-kept secret, still, even despite all the publicity it regularly gets for being a good place to be.
I think the only potential downside (maybe not, depending on what you think) is that the city seems to be really geared to ages 0-21 and 35+. It's a great place to be a kid/student, and seems like a great place to raise a kid/have a family. But as for those years in-between, I'm not so sure.
im not going to have an argument about madison wisconsin compared to chicago... im not even sure the comparison is even possible... something like comparing apples to oranges.
ive been here a while and though, yes, there are some ridiculous cynics on this board, i would venture a guess that a great number of them are cynical because this is in fact an online discussion board and everyone is way more tough than in real life. most of my friends are young, right out of school architects who have found good and interesting work in all kinds of firms. from small boutique work, to big name development work, to design build work. so your assertion that you have to sell your soul and work for a corporate branch if you want to be in chicago, wasting away your life till you can transfer to NY is pretty far off.
i hear great things about madison, but to be fair, it seems to me that if one is considering a move for career purposes, the comparison shouldnt even be made.
just as i wont pretend chicago is london ... madison is not chicago
chicago is just a really cool city. so there's no eric owen moss or thom mayne or frank gehry or liz diller or peter eisenman there. or noone even close to that stature. but it's still a really neat city. best skyline in america. some really fun yuppie/hipster neighborhoods (north halsted, etc.). great pizza. great lakeshore. great air connections to the most important cities all over the world. good shopping. i'd venture to say it's the 3rd most awesome city in the nation, behind LA and NY.
whereas madison is like...little yuppie hippie student burocrat enclave. a good place to be away from everything one might be afraid of in a big city.
ouch robust, people in madison got to live somewhere...
I can't vouch for Madison, but I too agree that getting a job in Chicago shouldn't be too hard. The dream job will be hard of course, but it's a delicate balance everywhere... lletdownl gets paid shit, i'm compensated fairly well, he works on interesting stuff, i deal with shit... i think that'll be the same anywhere you go pretty much...
1- LA
2- london
3- NYC (just because I haven't been to tokyo yet)
4- houston (what???? it's the most underrated american city)
5- chicago
6- SF
7- vancouver/seattle/portland (tie for the PNW)
8- mpls (gotta get this up here because it's now my town)
15- philly
never to earn a rank on my list
-new haven
-miami/ft. lauderdale
-vegas
-DC
-trenton
1. los angeles
2. new york
3. chicago
4. boston
5. san francisco
6. denver
7. miami
8. portland
9. seattle
10. phila
11. minneapolis
12. madison
13. austin
14. milwaukee
15. providence
16. houston
17. dallas
18. atlanta
19. new orleans
20. st louis
21. las vegas
22. pittsburgh
23. orlando
24. providence
25. cleveland
26. boise
27. cincinatti
28. salt lake city
29. oklahoma city
30. toledo
31. indianapolis
32. charlotte
lletdownl - hey sorry to rub you the wrong way. I was trying to compare Chicago and Madison the best I could. The bit about selling your soul to a corporate firm was in response to a comment about the oppotunity to work for high profile firms and work all over the country, even "China." Well, the Chicago firms that are doing that are those massive soul sucking corporate firms. There are great botique and small firms in Chicago which I'm sure are great, as there are in pretty much any medium to large city in this country. Chicago doesn't own the market on great architecture firms, but given their size I'm sure they got more than Madison.
I'm firmly of the belief that good architecture can be done anywhere by any firm. Chicago or Madison, I think someone can have a very profitable and prosperous architecture career. That said, Chicago does have some things Madison clearly does not, and vice versa. Everybody evaluates things differently. My brother lives in Madison (not working in arch) and would be willing to sell his soul for that corporate transfer to Chicago. My cousin lives in Chicago and cannot wait to get back to Minneapolis. To each their own.
since migrod brought up the boroughs of NYC, my revised list is:
1- silverlake/echo park/los feliz
2- brooklyn
3- london (that cool area near reagents canal)
4- venice beach
5- manhattan
6- bainbridge island
7- LIC
8- Downtown Artist District - LA
guess I don't have a favorite houston or mpls 'hood yet
no doubt, this is america and good design can happen anywhere by anybody, but...
actually, i'm kinda curious if anyone knows of any good designers in madison?
i'm sure there are some good firms in minnie, but i think to maybe get the thread back on track closer to the original question, does anyone know of any firms makin' waves in Madison? anything interesting?
Haven't heard of anybody making waves in Mad-town. Probably spending too much time at Badger games and getting drunk after down on State street.
Killer - my fav Mpls area is the Uptown Hennepin/Lake area. A bit overrun with drunken college students and suburbanites that want to be trendy on weekends, but it's a truly walkable neighborhood with all the ammenities - housing, retail and entertainment.
Also very fond of Excelsior on Grand just a few miles west of there. Although suburban and notably higher class it gives me hope for urban in-fill and mixed use.
aqua- i'm fond of SE mpls since I live down there, and I couldn't live without the first trader joes in mpls that has made excelsior on grand yuppie haven... but since I've only been here a few months, i was reserving judgement untill I get under the skin of the place and see what direction the place is going...
glad to see this list making tangent get it's own tread.
I grew up in Madison but moved to Minneapolis because it is tough to get a job in Madison particularly when the economy is not hot. Personally I think there are not many quality design firms in Madison at the moment with the exception of Flad. You might count Kenton Peters if you are into him, but the federal court house he did is probably the worst building in the city.
It is much easier to work for a quality design firm in Minneapolis and you have a much wider range of firm cultures. Interesting thing is that I would also say Madison is much more receptive to quality design than say Minneapolis, unfortunatly it often imports it from Minneapolis and Chicago (Velario DeWalt Train, Architectural Alliance), and the city still has the FLW legacy.
Between Madison and Chicago from my experience and what I hear, Chicago is pretty competitive but a first class city. Honestly Thomas Rhozak would be probably the most exciting architect in Madison right now if he was there.
It is also tough to get a job in Minneapolis because it draws from a large region for talent. In addition Minneapolis really does not have the culture of a big city like Chicago, in fact it is very close to Madison in terms of culture. Minneapolis is also one of the most expensive cities to live in the Midwest besides Chicago.
I would personally consider trying to use connections in Chicago, it also is easier to enter the Madison market after working in Chicago for a while from what I hear.
Dec 22, 06 1:51 pm ·
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Hey, Architecters from Madison, WI
Hey everyone from Madison, WI. I am currently a UG student at IIT in Chicago. I work Part time at a small firm in Printer's Row(Clark and Harrison) who works on a real mixed bag of projects Chicago Public Schools, Smaller Residential, Small Commercial, and Healthcare, and a developer, Thomas Roszak, Who has a pretty cool house that we worked on.
Well anyways, I guess this is one of those grueling profession questions. It seems as though the City of Chicago is VERY competitive when looking for jobs. And in my opinion sometimes maybe employers can really take advantage of the fact that they can pay less because people desire to work in such a great city, the ability to find heaps of talent without paying much......Now for the Madison WI part. Is it the same there?? My family mainly lives there and it seems to be much easier to find cheaper housing, and traveling from home to work by car must be easier as long as you dont have to deal with the beltline traffic. Are there good opportunities in Madison WI for someone like me that would potentially look in the Madison area when I graduate in a year from now from school? Would it be a good idea to get a post professional degree for just a year extra in school?
Is there anyone who has gotten a post professional degree and it has served them well in their careers, or is it just best to stick with just the professional Bachelors Degree. I guess I think that it may offer me more open doors, but i dont want to disappoint myself and spend the money if it doesn't.
Is there particular advice about Madison and the profession there?
I've only been to Madison once, but I studied in UWM so a lot of my friends are from the Madison area and have gotten jobs there. It seems most of the big firms in Wisco have offices in both Madison and Milwaukee (Plunkett Raysich, Kahler Slater, Engberg Anderson, etc.), so you could try those.
Personally? I would say give Chicago a shot, while keeping your options open. I mean come on man your living in a word city, take advantage of that. You go to the big guys here and you could end up in NYC, LA or freaking China!
madison is a fun little city.
but you're not gonna find any top-notch design firms there like you would in chicago. nor will the city be nearly as exciting.
but...small city + reasonable costs + whatever else madison offers = high quality of life, it may be totally worth it.
Madison is a blast. 2hr from Chicago/Milwaukee, its a happening small city, great nightlife, culture, University town close to outdoor recreation, water, ski slopes. I could see living there. There was a firm Flaad a few years back that did some large health care - maybe theyre still around.
Justin- come up to mpls, we'd be happy to entertain you fancy for good architecture...
man i love minneapolis...
prolly my 2nd favorite city... next to chicago that is...
but ill second what people above are saying... chicago isnt THAT ultra competative... im sure you can find a job... especially being from IIT, you can get work almost anywhere... talk to your profs, talk to your friends... you wont have to big a problem finding a job... there might be a lot of architects but there are a TON of firms, and a good number doing interesting work...
Who's the top notch Chicago firm? Lurking around here on Archinect it seems people have complained that the Chicago scene just isn't what a city its size and stature should have. Correct me if I'm wrong, but given that I'd say the professional oppotunity isn't too much better than Madison. Sure you can work for massive Chicago firms with branch offices. Then again, you'll have to put in plenty of years before moving beyond being just a cube number, let alone transferring to NYC.
Pure cost of living you're probably better off in $$ terms to be in Madison. For what less pay you'd get would be more than offset by the lower cost of living. I also agree with your assertion that employers in Chicago take advantage of an ample supply of young talent. I balked at Chicago when I couldn't get an entry level position in-line with the cost of living difference from smaller major metros.
All that said, Chicago does have benefits you cannot place a $$ value on. Great place to live while young for sure. And where you live isn't always about money or else nobody would live in places like LA, Chicago, NYC, etc.
Tough decision since your alternate is Madison. If it was Davenport Iowa the choice would be clear, but Madison is such a great town. Let us know what you decide.
Madison's design community is nice and small, and the city is prosperous, smart, and growing--so why not? You could really make something for yourself there; Kenton Peters has, for example. It seems like a place where there is room for people to carve out a niche for themselves. The city really is a well-kept secret, still, even despite all the publicity it regularly gets for being a good place to be.
I think the only potential downside (maybe not, depending on what you think) is that the city seems to be really geared to ages 0-21 and 35+. It's a great place to be a kid/student, and seems like a great place to raise a kid/have a family. But as for those years in-between, I'm not so sure.
Best thing about a college town:
I keep getting older and the girls stay the same age.
I thought it was Hippies
img]http://static.flickr.com/137/327472369_65c2fbd00d.jpg[/img]
ok aquapura, ill correct you when your wrong
im not going to have an argument about madison wisconsin compared to chicago... im not even sure the comparison is even possible... something like comparing apples to oranges.
ive been here a while and though, yes, there are some ridiculous cynics on this board, i would venture a guess that a great number of them are cynical because this is in fact an online discussion board and everyone is way more tough than in real life. most of my friends are young, right out of school architects who have found good and interesting work in all kinds of firms. from small boutique work, to big name development work, to design build work. so your assertion that you have to sell your soul and work for a corporate branch if you want to be in chicago, wasting away your life till you can transfer to NY is pretty far off.
i hear great things about madison, but to be fair, it seems to me that if one is considering a move for career purposes, the comparison shouldnt even be made.
just as i wont pretend chicago is london ... madison is not chicago
but to be fair to chicago... it does get expensive to live here sometimes... and im getting paid shit... maybe thats why im so testy all the time haha
chicago is just a really cool city. so there's no eric owen moss or thom mayne or frank gehry or liz diller or peter eisenman there. or noone even close to that stature. but it's still a really neat city. best skyline in america. some really fun yuppie/hipster neighborhoods (north halsted, etc.). great pizza. great lakeshore. great air connections to the most important cities all over the world. good shopping. i'd venture to say it's the 3rd most awesome city in the nation, behind LA and NY.
whereas madison is like...little yuppie hippie student burocrat enclave. a good place to be away from everything one might be afraid of in a big city.
oooo i like this...
robust says
1.NY
2.LA
3.Chicago
i say
1.NY
2.Chicago
3.LA
ouch robust, people in madison got to live somewhere...
I can't vouch for Madison, but I too agree that getting a job in Chicago shouldn't be too hard. The dream job will be hard of course, but it's a delicate balance everywhere... lletdownl gets paid shit, i'm compensated fairly well, he works on interesting stuff, i deal with shit... i think that'll be the same anywhere you go pretty much...
i like madison too. and i also like denver and portland. but LA they ain't
and that's a bad thing? (not being LA)
if only more of the world wasn't LA!
AMEN
i think my list would actually be
1) LA
2) New York
3) Berlin
4) Rome
5) Paris
6) Chicago
7) Madison
you forgot Miami, Dallas, Salt Lake City, Denver, and Tijuana...
ohhhh-
1- LA
2- london
3- NYC (just because I haven't been to tokyo yet)
4- houston (what???? it's the most underrated american city)
5- chicago
6- SF
7- vancouver/seattle/portland (tie for the PNW)
8- mpls (gotta get this up here because it's now my town)
15- philly
never to earn a rank on my list
-new haven
-miami/ft. lauderdale
-vegas
-DC
-trenton
my real list of best american cities
1.chicago
2.ny
3.mpls
1,094,038. LA
1,099,456. Miami
3,000,000. dallas
9,999,999 (aka hell on earth). Kansas City
american cities:
1. los angeles
2. new york
3. chicago
4. boston
5. san francisco
6. denver
7. miami
8. portland
9. seattle
10. phila
11. minneapolis
12. madison
13. austin
14. milwaukee
15. providence
16. houston
17. dallas
18. atlanta
19. new orleans
20. st louis
21. las vegas
22. pittsburgh
23. orlando
24. providence
25. cleveland
26. boise
27. cincinatti
28. salt lake city
29. oklahoma city
30. toledo
31. indianapolis
32. charlotte
1 Chicago
2 Mexico City
3 Brooklyn
4 Toronto
5 Barcelona
6 Munich
7 San Fransico
8 Vancouver
9 Paris
10 Tokyo
last Houston (but maybe cause I've been here too long)
I love lists. Here's mine...
1. New York
2. Chicago
3. Boston
4. San Francisco
5. Seattle
6. Denver
7. Miami
8. Minneapolis/Saint Paul
9. Houston
10. Detroit
(U.S. Cities Only)
ok my for real list...
1.Chicago
2.Minneapolis
3.New York
4.Boston
5.Seattle
lletdownl - hey sorry to rub you the wrong way. I was trying to compare Chicago and Madison the best I could. The bit about selling your soul to a corporate firm was in response to a comment about the oppotunity to work for high profile firms and work all over the country, even "China." Well, the Chicago firms that are doing that are those massive soul sucking corporate firms. There are great botique and small firms in Chicago which I'm sure are great, as there are in pretty much any medium to large city in this country. Chicago doesn't own the market on great architecture firms, but given their size I'm sure they got more than Madison.
I'm firmly of the belief that good architecture can be done anywhere by any firm. Chicago or Madison, I think someone can have a very profitable and prosperous architecture career. That said, Chicago does have some things Madison clearly does not, and vice versa. Everybody evaluates things differently. My brother lives in Madison (not working in arch) and would be willing to sell his soul for that corporate transfer to Chicago. My cousin lives in Chicago and cannot wait to get back to Minneapolis. To each their own.
yeah i was in a bad mood yesterday sorry to snap
but im actually working on a competition we just won for a great project in china... and my soul is in tact and flourishing...
to play devils advocate
since migrod brought up the boroughs of NYC, my revised list is:
1- silverlake/echo park/los feliz
2- brooklyn
3- london (that cool area near reagents canal)
4- venice beach
5- manhattan
6- bainbridge island
7- LIC
8- Downtown Artist District - LA
guess I don't have a favorite houston or mpls 'hood yet
to play advocate of a different devil...
that one's just not gonna do it kobe, perhaps you could play baseball for a couple years?
no doubt, this is america and good design can happen anywhere by anybody, but...
actually, i'm kinda curious if anyone knows of any good designers in madison?
i'm sure there are some good firms in minnie, but i think to maybe get the thread back on track closer to the original question, does anyone know of any firms makin' waves in Madison? anything interesting?
Haven't heard of anybody making waves in Mad-town. Probably spending too much time at Badger games and getting drunk after down on State street.
Killer - my fav Mpls area is the Uptown Hennepin/Lake area. A bit overrun with drunken college students and suburbanites that want to be trendy on weekends, but it's a truly walkable neighborhood with all the ammenities - housing, retail and entertainment.
Also very fond of Excelsior on Grand just a few miles west of there. Although suburban and notably higher class it gives me hope for urban in-fill and mixed use.
aqua- i'm fond of SE mpls since I live down there, and I couldn't live without the first trader joes in mpls that has made excelsior on grand yuppie haven... but since I've only been here a few months, i was reserving judgement untill I get under the skin of the place and see what direction the place is going...
glad to see this list making tangent get it's own tread.
I grew up in Madison but moved to Minneapolis because it is tough to get a job in Madison particularly when the economy is not hot. Personally I think there are not many quality design firms in Madison at the moment with the exception of Flad. You might count Kenton Peters if you are into him, but the federal court house he did is probably the worst building in the city.
It is much easier to work for a quality design firm in Minneapolis and you have a much wider range of firm cultures. Interesting thing is that I would also say Madison is much more receptive to quality design than say Minneapolis, unfortunatly it often imports it from Minneapolis and Chicago (Velario DeWalt Train, Architectural Alliance), and the city still has the FLW legacy.
Between Madison and Chicago from my experience and what I hear, Chicago is pretty competitive but a first class city. Honestly Thomas Rhozak would be probably the most exciting architect in Madison right now if he was there.
It is also tough to get a job in Minneapolis because it draws from a large region for talent. In addition Minneapolis really does not have the culture of a big city like Chicago, in fact it is very close to Madison in terms of culture. Minneapolis is also one of the most expensive cities to live in the Midwest besides Chicago.
I would personally consider trying to use connections in Chicago, it also is easier to enter the Madison market after working in Chicago for a while from what I hear.
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