SOM is a great place to start a career in architecture.  It is perhaps the most prominent architectural firm in the world, with a rich heritage of great buildings designed by great architects.  At SOM, a young architect learns how to create buildings of the highest standards, from initial concepts to finished construction.  You develop and hone skills that you carry throughout your career.  It is invaluable preparation.

I had the good fortune to start at SOM.  I was part of small team designing Spiegel Corporate Headquarters (now Sara Lee), a 24 story, 850,000 sf, flagship, Class A office building.  It was promised to be SOM’s first all CAD building.  It was not, and so I also learned to hand draft.  In addition to working on the overall building design, I was given responsibility for the design of the plaza, canopy, entry, lobby areas, elevators and the prominent employee cafeteria.  My suggestion to connect two retention ponds, in front and behind the building