hey hang...i thought america was the country of freedom.
if you want to work for nothing, your choice - go ahead.

Welcome to our profession.

Any sort of FREE internship does nothing but bring down EVERYONE'S payscale.

All three previous responses are correct

1. It is a choice to work for free
2. If many do make such a choice, it defines our profession
3. Relative payscale is driven downward by enough people making that choice.

Suck it, Vito.

dONT DO IT...!!!!dont!!!

at least provide breakfast too...

"The internship is unpaid but could lead to a more permanent position in the Studio"

Sounds a bit like the witch luring Hansel and Gretel into her gingerbread house...

sanaa had a similar ad a few months ago. 6 months unpaid position that could lead to a job. FOA was also getting alot stick over their upaid gigs.

you don't get paid at school, so consider such a situation as an extension of your education. if you could handle still being poor like a student for a bit longer i think the experience would make it worth it.

Acconci's website is one of the most annoying I've ever seen. But his wikipedia entry is pretty funny.

Three things:

- is he even a real architect? Is he licensed?

- follow the money (always interesting): student takes out loans to pay tuition, that tuition goes to teachers like Acconci (his wikipedia entry lists Cooper Union, Yale, Parsons, etc ...), teacher uses money earned from teaching to run a (fake) architecture firm, teacher 'hires' student to work in fake architecture firm for free, student defers repayment of loans ... always follow the money

- citizen's three points above bear repeating:

wow...and i though the dutch intern system of 250-450euros/month was bad...

"a lunch allowance is provided"

something tells me that this doesn't mean that they'll buy you lunch everyday, but that they'll give you a 15-30 minute break to get your own lunch...

...as in you're ALLOWED to go to lunch.

if i could afford to do an unpaid internship in nyc i think i could buy my own freakin lunch.

P2an- To think that you would see this as an "extension of your education" is exactly the type of attitude that brings the entire profession down.

how disgusting! Unpaid work is degrading to our profession and condones unfair labor practices.

If only there was an architect's union that could protect young designers and architects from being exploited and would fight for a living wage.... But isn't that what the AIA should be doing? They are such a useless organization...

i guess makotom we will have to agree to disagree.

yeah, it is pretty insulting that these places want unpaid interns. it also is probably indicative of those firms not having a very good business side of their firm - if someone like vito acconci doesn't have enough office income to pay his interns, they must be wasting it somewhere else. then again, such internships are a reality in this business and it may be worth it if you really want to get in with someone like vito or eisenman. i haven't heard of anyone but those 2 not paying.

the way i see it, after 6 or so years of studying without getting paid, another 6 months being poor but working at an interesting office that probably helps you get a paying job isn't going to hurt.

i understand all the whining about lowering the profession - but i don't buy into it. as an individual you are in charge of your career and your life - if you decide that an unpaid internship is good for you in the longterm - go for it.

Any office that really cared about your continuing education and development wouldn't let you work for free.

765, these offices ARE NOT interested in your education, you are. it is mutual exploitation. win win situation
(except for the guy who really really needs a pay packet to feed his wife and kids - so ends up having to work at some soul destroying corporate office, and feels cheated that he studied about how great and cultural worthwhile design and architecture could be but instead he draws reflected ceiling plans all day)

look how do you expect great design to happen??? by paying people dont you people know how expensive it is to make iconic architecture?

good design costs and in many cases it costs the office not the client, and again that is the choice of the directors. they want to keep on changing and refining because they want to impress their peers - the client is not interested in that potential foto spread in Domus - we are.
so we use all the fee up, eat through all the profit, even the partners salaries - and yes the poor old interns too...

So are you saying that BAD business management is a worthy excuse for slave labour?

p2an, I fail to see how it is mutual exploitation, or a win-win situation. I see one-way exploitation and a win-lose situation. I also see a proposition for illegal employment.

what always cracks me up is when i see ten models for a 1000 sq. ft. addition and a project team of six or seven listed. wtf? i ask myself.

i'd like to think that you would learn more working for a solid architectural office who are focused in producing quality buildings and getting paid, that making models for vito.

does anyone know what is the AIA position on unpaid labor?

and the moment someone is making money from your work, it's not education...if i could afford to work for free, i'd travel.

the process of making the type of architecture that most of us want to be involved in - is not good for business.

well, I know that part of the AIA Fellowship application includes signing that "The candidate individually does not employ unpaid intern architects, including working students, and neither does
any firm of which the candidate is an owner or manager."

That seems pretty clear to me. So does the whole minimum wage thing.

i believe that if you check into the labor laws of any of the fifty states you will find that it is illegal. however, if you are offering "an internship" i suppose it can be for as little as lunch.

"lunch allowance" means that you cook for the office, or that you go pick up the lunch (as a reimbursable) for the office, and get to eat the leftovers...

My local San Francisco AIA chapter has a document that employers have to sign stating they do not employ unpaid interns.

We employ one student intern every semester here at our firm. They are MArch candidates who are required to have work experience as part of their education. In addition to earning course credit for their work interns are paid $15/hour plus health benefits during their 6 months of service.

We have had a couple of interns not accept an offered position with us based on wage. Apparently there are other firms that have paid better for a 6 month tenure. If $15/hour and benefits are on the threshold of competitive, then students should realize there are good options out there to make money to live on while obtaining structured guidance and opportunities in the experiences that they receive.

I could not employ an intern and not pay them. Architecture is a business and one where a lot of money is thrown around. The client makes enough bank to hire an architect to design his/her new home. Your boss makes enough bank to afford his/her fat beemer and stylish lifestyle. Damn well believe the intern deserves enough bank to pay a few bills and buy a 40 at the end of the day.

If an intern is unpaid my question is, does the employer bill out to the client for the interns time? If not, then the employer is losing out on billing/income for overhead costs such as rent, insurance and other office expenses. That firm would be losing money. If an employer is billing out the services of an intern, capitalizing on them and not paying the intern, then that employer should burn in hell.

This whole image of the struggling young designer that needs to work for free to move up in the profession is total crap. Architecture is still a profession and a business- there's no excuse for not getting paid for the work you do for a for-profit office.

Also, I think working for free just sort of proves to your next employer that you're willing to be the office hack.

i would imagine most of what the unpaid intern does is unbillable and prolly goes to some sort of "marketing" category. cuz building models for the most part ain't billable. i mean if im a client i aint payin for it. etc...

There is pretty much two images of an intern that seem to get used interchangeably. While the line may be blurred at times, one image coveys the unpaid slave labor, the other denotes a young professional who is undergoing development under the guidance of a licensed architect, as in matriculating through IDP. Sounds like Sr. Vito would define the former and working at a larger corporate firm, such as Anshen+Allen or SOM, would be the latter.

this is another reason why the nomenclature should be changed. that way "internship" could not be used interchangeably(sp).

yes, i am a sci-arc graduate. i have never worked an unpaid internship, but have been offered one by one of sci-arc's founders. i also did some freelance work with another prominent faculty member at sci-arc who refused to pay an invoice i submitted. it got ugly.

Vito's done many nice projects. I guess it's a matter of how much you're willing to put out.

You got links to those 'nice projects', higherness?

I suppose one way to look at this is that it's marginally better than in FLW's days, when "students" had to pay to work in his office.

if they say so, it means that they can can get wealthy interns who want an acconci logo on their cvs and there is plenty of wealthy people around the globe ... and afterall it is business ... it doens´t have be fair and ain´t nothing new ...

I was able to attend a nice lecture he did in my non-arch city.

Here's the floating theatre project he did:


A store called "Bamboo" although this picture doesn't show the great interior.


There are much better pictures of this facade, but I can't seem to run by them.


He also did a conceptualization for a South Korean opera house (if I recall) which is admittedly a tad whack but very interesting, at least how he presented it to me.

i might do it if he threw in a continental breakfast with danish, sliced melon, juice, coffee, and a new york times.

In my opinion, not paying your employee creates a vicious cycle in our profession for years to come; a lot of interns (not all) who could afford to work for free happen to be the previleged ones, who also tend to be the ones graduated from those top tier expensive private schools, and what they get out of this experience is that it's ok not to pay the interns. When these interns later open up their own firms with their parents money, will they pay their interns? hell no.

This thread reminded me of the movie Factory Girl.

so now they won't spring the unpaid part of it on people until they show up for interviews...

they better have this ready on the interview table for jafidler...

WHERE'S MY NEW YORK TIMES?!