Shameless plugging of ODOS in Homes Section

[jdivision]

3. Willingness to talk and expose their work to the public eye

- ODOS are among the best self marketeers out there, which is also probably one of the reasons (apart from their obvious talent) why they have so much work coming in.

4. The general unwillingness of other practices to have their work in a newspaper

- Yes ODOS are (as I very pointedly wrote) "willing to talk to anyone about any project." Pointedly said because so many other practices simply won't have their work shown off and actually tend to guard it and hide it as if its the last secret of Fatima.

Indeed over years and years I have approached/implored one award winning practice after another for permission to publish and showcase their work (they know who they are, and I'm not going to have a go at them in a public forum) only to be turned down flat, sometimes rudely so.

As you know Mark, but perhaps others weren't, there was an attitude of snobbishness and superiority among many in the profession during the boom towards newspapers and journalists. It was very much "who do you think you are" with one practice in particular being legendary for their boorishness. It was symptomatic of the attitude across all areas of the property business. I've noticed a marked change since the downturn. And for what it's worth the S Times property section is miles ahead of the competition.
Neil

[Paul Clerkin]

semi-related but i've always had difficulty getting material out of architects - it's almost a full-time job chasing firms for information sometimes....

i have found practices in other countries to be much more forthcoming

[Mike Kavanagh]

Hold up Pluggers and Unpluggers all!
Bear in mind that many clients do not wish to have any details of their property published and regard their own building work as their own business.

[reddy]

Hold up Pluggers and Unpluggers all!
Bear in mind that many clients do not wish to have any details of their property published and regard their own building work as their own business.

Really good point actually. Clients can be very difficult to convince.

[bitasean]

whatever happened to Shane O'Tooles column? Did it ever run in tandem with the home section's architecture bit or did the latter replace the former?

[missarchi]

The devil is in the detail...

Due to unforeseen circumstances ODOS Architects are unable to participate in tonight's talk. The talk will be given instead by Atelier Li Xiaodong. We apologize for the late notice and any inconvenience caused, should you wish to obtain a refund please contact talks@inst.riba.org|.

[onq]

Thanks for that. ; )

I'm glad the thread was opened.

Interestingly a rather excellent extension by FKL was the cover project of that particular issue...

And as I said, we are indeed open to all ideas. At the moment we're looking for eyecatching unbuilt one-off homes for a two parter called "Unbuilt Ireland" running this sunday and next sunday. These can even be college projects designed by students or trial projects by young practices, just so long as the graphics are usable.

But once gain, the big picture is that there are only a handful of practices out there completing contemporary domestic work at the moment and still fewer who will let us publish their work.

MarkK

+1 what Mike Kavanagh and Reddy have stated.

Sometimes publication is not down to the architect.

I have done work for some high net worth individuals [HNWIs?].

Some of them have been the subject of kidnap attempts and car-jackings.

Some of these people get worried at the level of detail in a planning application.

They're concerned some genius might plan an attack on their home by viewing the plans.

The last thing such people want is the intimate details of their house layout all over the news.

As proof of that, apart from Hello Celebs, how many really big rollers let people into their houses?

You'll be more likely to get an architect letting you in than a HNWI.

Many of the older, registered architects come from a time when advertising was forbidden by the RIAI Code of Practice.

So outside those publications dealing with reviews and awards and collections of work, they may have an aversion to being published.

ONQ.