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The arrogance of 'Architects'

zoolander

The arrogance of 'Architects' never ceases to amaze me.

The majority are walking cliches, dress in their 'architecty' clothes & glasses, admiring the same products because they read the same magazines etc.


Wake up you little fools, you are the reason the rest of us (the other 1%) have a bad name!

How about spending the rest of today thinking original thoughts, not realing out jargon to hide the fact you havent any really any idea what the hell you are jibbering about.

I dread working with other offices on projects, because I just know that some that dressed like the dark night with libesking glasses will be sitting opposite me talking rubbish.

I generally play the dumb card when the jargon starts, and kindly ask them what they mean, thats when the fun really starts, you can see their faces getting redder and the perspiration on the forehead.

 
Aug 8, 08 11:45 am
Alackrity

take out a small diary and start scribbling rapidly, pause and ask how they spell their name, then put it away.

Aug 8, 08 11:49 am  · 
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digger

looks like someone might need to consider an anger management class -- pretty sure zoolander (the other 1%) earned his own "bad name" through the way he conducts himself - now he wants to blame others because he's a fucking idiot.

sounds like a massive inferiority complex to me - do you really have any choice when it comes to playing the "dumb card"?

Aug 8, 08 12:17 pm  · 
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4arch
The majority are walking cliches, dress in their 'architecty' clothes & glasses, admiring the same products because they read the same magazines etc.

Since I got out of school I haven't encountered too many of these. Maybe you need to move to a new city.

Aug 8, 08 12:30 pm  · 
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zoolander

Got a great reputation in this city digger.

Just get annoyed by walking cliches, who 'think outside the box'

No inferiority complex, I just cannot stand pretenders.

Aug 8, 08 12:35 pm  · 
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ether

what is it like to not pretend? I've forgotten what and who I really am.

Aug 8, 08 12:45 pm  · 
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zoolander

Its great, you should try it.

Aug 8, 08 12:54 pm  · 
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ether

i haven't the slightest clue what you are talking about.

Aug 8, 08 12:57 pm  · 
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i know at least ONE architect who fits zoolander's stereotype.

yeah, actually ONLY one.

Aug 8, 08 1:19 pm  · 
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In the Ichnographia Campo Martius "certain landmarks remained: the Tiber River, the Piazza Navona, and a Colosseum-like structure, which was in the wrong location and, in a sense, at the wrong scale."
--Peter Eisenman, "Piranesi and the City" (2007).

In fact, the 'Colosseum-like structure' is clearly labeled Amphitheatum Statilii Tarvi, positioned by Piranesi in its most likely location, and delineated at about 2/3rds the size of 'the Colosseum' which is probably what the Amphitheater of Statilius Taurus was.

Eisenman's misrepresentation of the facts here is somewhat compounded in that Wilton-Ely had already years earlier noted the presence of the Amphitheater of Statilius Taurus within Piranesi's Campo Marzio.

Eisenman inerpretes Piranesi's Ichnographia Campus Martius in several self-serving ways, but he never comes to realize that on one level the Ichnographia Campus Martius is a gigantic test of Ancient Roman topography.


"Hey Doctor. I don't know what you want me to see, but this thing I'm looking through looks like some plan from Piranesi's Campo Marzio.

Aug 8, 08 1:27 pm  · 
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drums please, Fab?


As a caterpillar becomes a butterfly, so must you become Derelicte!

Aug 8, 08 1:31 pm  · 
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rza

I do believe zoolander, that you are not even an architect!

Aug 8, 08 1:34 pm  · 
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zoolander

Eisenman grinds my gears also.

Anyone can quote some Derrida & Levi-Strauss, who cares pete.

Aug 8, 08 1:42 pm  · 
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Apurimac

I too have only met 1 architect that matches zoolander's description. Unfortunately he does not wear all black however.

Aug 8, 08 1:42 pm  · 
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marmkid

so are you posting thinking you are talking to the 99% or the 1%?

could be insulting if its the 99%

Aug 8, 08 1:45 pm  · 
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Antisthenes

hater

Aug 8, 08 1:51 pm  · 
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mack

immature poets imitate, mature poets steal

-ts eliot

Aug 8, 08 2:19 pm  · 
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Antisthenes

human knowledge can not be contained by any but shared by all

Aug 8, 08 2:22 pm  · 
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drums please, Fab?

a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush

Aug 8, 08 2:56 pm  · 
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Sarah Hamilton

Gross.

Aug 8, 08 3:13 pm  · 
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"I'm not arrogant, just obscurant."

Aug 8, 08 3:40 pm  · 
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Oh, now I get it!
Aug 8, 08 3:48 pm  · 
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khmay

yeah i hATE wearing my thick black prada glasses. fuck im arrogant.... me... wanting to be able to see across the room.

Next time i find an interesting designer lacking taste in fashion i'll buy you a new flannel and pleated chinos. Next time you post something like that, refrain from making no argument whatsoever.

Aug 8, 08 4:30 pm  · 
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"There you have rivals, and these not unformidable: you have people of real taste, and not a few of them. The first will do all they can to destroy real merit and the others will judge and from that condemn or approve. For this reason it is evident that unless one can appear equal if not superior to these antagonists, so as to acquire preference from the connoisseurs, all attempts to succeed, even with good interest, won’t continue for any tract of time, so that after a little blaze you are sent home with little honour and less profit. These considerations made me determine to go to the bottom of things--"
--Robert Adam at Rome to James Adam at Fort Goerge, 4 July 1755

Aug 8, 08 4:45 pm  · 
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silverlake

When you look at architecture, try not to concern yourself with the pieces - look at the building in its totalitarianism.

- Pat Healy

Aug 8, 08 5:22 pm  · 
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yeah i hATE wearing my thick black prada glasses

what about my thick green prada glasses? Yes, that's right. I like black. It's slimming! (hopefully) And I wear thick framed glasses. I chose them because I wanted a high quality frame that would last me for decades, and Prada had the smallest label of the higher quality brands. They make my eyes look bigger, which my face kind of needs. I try to mix it up with some bright accessories, fun jewelry, etc. but I am here admitting that I fit many of the stereotypes about the personal appearance of designers. I happen to genuinely like them, and in general find them more flattering than when I have tried other looks.

BUT, I am asking you to possibly try and be a more informed person by looking beyond the black and the glasses, and not assume that those who do happen to fit this stereotype are also jargon-spouting morons. If you are so set on being better than the rest of us, how about starting by dropping some of the assumptions and judgement?

Aug 8, 08 8:46 pm  · 
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i think you're safe, rationalist, if your glasses are green and you're transitioning into graphic design. you've been de-arroganted, maybe.

Aug 8, 08 8:54 pm  · 
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the architect's wife style
Aug 8, 08 9:01 pm  · 
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zoolander

Green prada glasses, I rest my case

Aug 9, 08 9:23 am  · 
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zoolander

we're all 'good guys' really.

All in this together,

Aug 9, 08 9:29 am  · 
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i know one or two black wearin styin architects. they are perty good architects. one is on world class track. not arrogant. more surfer dude than anything, really.

me, i like bright shirts with too many buttons and wear blue jeans to work more often than not. am i allowed to be arrogant?

Aug 9, 08 12:01 pm  · 
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chatter of clouds

i wear all black (including the undies; what a sacrilege it is to wear white beneath the black) when i want to feel like a silouette, crip edges blur content. yes, a clean kind of anonymity. a manner of disappearing hypochondiriacally. no emotional blueprints, only cliff outlines.
so i also dont understand the virtue of wearing black and being unclean.

but there are other times when i fantasize about wearing earth colours. i'd be in an autumnal mood, feeling all orange inside and darkish charred outlines outside. a ripe autumnal fruit. heady colours with a small dash of blood red, the skin bursting open. its a very wonderful feeling

pastels...i wear them either when my innards are as bland as the daylight and i go to work....or when theres a fresh evening breeze alleviating the heavy and humid jasmin'ed evening after a long day at the beach and how heavenly to wear pastel sky blue cotten/linen pants or a cheeky yellow-green top or ...

clashin colours?


as for glasses, my current pair are quite mulholland drive-sque (the Adam Kesher character). I lacked a frame in my life at the time I bought them and I had gone through a lineage of progressively disappearing rimless aqautic-light glasses. I was also worried that my character was dissapating into what is called a "soul-mudering" ritual of work-home and lonliness. The glasses brought me a semblance of gravitas; I can feel a more potent sympathy/antipathy, I hope to even feel more ominous. I have no idea what my next pair would be like; they'll communicate their sense belonging to my nose and ears in their own time.


I really have no idea what you mean by pretentious. How can anyone pretend unless it is their nature to pretend?

Aug 10, 08 8:35 am  · 
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chatter of clouds

but sense of belonging

Aug 10, 08 8:37 am  · 
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shellarchitect

can anyone suggest a way to sound humble while telling a contractor that their suggestions would be "butt ugly"

Aug 11, 08 1:27 pm  · 
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postal

shuellmi... i've actually had success getting a contractor on board by telling them... "that would $%&*! suck"... the dirtier the better (that depends on the contractor i would assume.) then they get a good laugh, and you still maintain control. i find that doing a "hmm, well,... ya know..." gets me nowhere and casts doubt upon my role. (especially as i tend to be the youngest in the room)

it's not sounding humble, it's sounding friendly. it's reminding people of who is responsible for what.

Aug 11, 08 2:58 pm  · 
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It is funny that just because people choose to talk theory either in place of techtonics or alongside of it that you are labelled as pretenious. For me its what I believe, I don't just spit what others have said, but offer my critique if necessary. Are you equally critical of non-architects?

But to add I don't wear black, all the time. Its far too hot/humid for that. It is reserved for night time wear only. I don't wear glasses for reading, but I have a pair of rectangular rimmed Prada glasses. I had been wearing Ray Bans for years...because my eyes are sensitive to the bright sub-tropical sunshine. I had been wearing the same frames for years...prada looked significantly better on my face.

Aug 11, 08 3:55 pm  · 
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marmkid

i think that anyone who thinks less of an architect for dressing a certain way or thinks that makes them pretentious, then most likely has problems with a lot of people today.

thinking less of someone for dressing a certain way or talking a certain way only makes you look bad

people should be concerned with how they present themselves and not as much with how others present themselves

if you really dont like how someone is, its simple
dont be friends with them
i am pretty sure they wont care

if you honestly have a problem with how someone dresses, you need to grow up and/or get over yourself


and just to add
i dont wear glasses, i have contact lenses
i dont wear black all the time, maybe once a week i will wear a black shirt, because it is slimming
if anyone cares or has a problem, please let me know so i can be sure and really really try to change my ways to please you
i am seriously concerned about that

Aug 11, 08 4:03 pm  · 
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WTF?

?  Did someone really write "mix it up with fun jewellery" in defence of their essential green, Prada glasses?  Or have I stumbled on the Daily Mail Style tips for people trying to be funky?  And as for the men, stop looking in the mirror all the time, yes you.  And stop looking at yourself in that plate glass window, yes you too.  With exceptions, my response to the OP is not so much arrogant as deluded.  Pretentious?  Eux?....

Jan 15, 18 7:11 pm  · 
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zonker
I never talk in archibabble - besides I forgot all those big "egghead" terms
Jan 16, 18 11:20 am  · 
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BulgarBlogger

More than just dressing a certain way (personally I could really care less- design architects dress much better than some low-class guito finance guy in a 3-piece suit), I find it pretentious when architects reference others designs on Pinterest and ArchDaily as a basis for their designs. 

Jan 16, 18 11:33 am  · 
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BulgarBlogger

The reason many architects wear black is because black is a neutral color and less loud than white. In other words, architects who wear black believe that by wearing black, they would not stand out socially, and let their work, their actions, their words, be the accent and not their outer appearance.

Jan 16, 18 11:36 am  · 
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geezertect

Black: the preferred color of architects and funeral directors.

Jan 17, 18 7:14 am  · 
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BulgarBlogger

Rick- that is a very practical theory, but I doubt that when Liebeskind or Zaha wear black, they wear quality black designer clothing that they wouldn't mind getting smeared... so no... I don't agree with your theory.

Jan 17, 18 9:09 am  · 
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randomised

They wear black because that's what they think architects wear.

Jan 17, 18 10:11 am  · 
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Non Sequitur

Hurray for necro-thread

Jan 16, 18 12:05 pm  · 
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zonker
But why are architects arrogant?
I've worked in other career fields, flight simulation, then video games - the only arrogant people I ran into, was bomber pilots
Seriously, if you'd smart and really know your stuff, or at least be to convince yourself you know you stuff, then maybe you would tend to over-value yourself and push people around in the studio "can you work late tonight?" Or try and impress people with achibabble that you have no idea what those big words mean - just sounds cool - real 2nd year grad school stuff that you used to impress the jurors as their eyes rolled upwards before they slammed you for being a stupid idiot -
It's ok to be arrogant, as long you can back it up - it's when you get these hollow, insecure idiots who know all the buzz words, wear all the cool clothes and show up at all the AIA parties - posers - they either get fired and or become studio heads
Jan 17, 18 1:40 am  · 
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Wilma Buttfit

Is this about arrogance, wearing black, or extroversion? The black is so you can go straight from the office to a funeral and straight back to the office again.

Jan 17, 18 9:41 am  · 
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Non Sequitur

I'm wearing an orange sweater today... over a black collared shirt.

Jan 17, 18 9:54 am  · 
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geezertect

Halloween

Jan 17, 18 6:23 pm  · 
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bowling_ball

Black is the worst choice up here, for me at least:

- I have 2 dogs with lighter coloured coats
- It's snowy and slushy here half the year - road salts and sand get everywhere. If you don't wash your car every other day, you're going to get covered in that stuff
- I'm on the job site constantly and again, can't keep black clean. I'm on my hands and knees looking at stuff all the time.

Mostly I come across as a better-dressed contractor.  Jeans 98% of the time, sometimes with workboots even....

Jan 17, 18 9:56 am  · 
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BulgarBlogger

Black Suits Matter!

Jan 17, 18 10:14 am  · 
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