garethace
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Originally posted by Diaspora
That said,
I really took to Geography at second level getting an A1 and I am an avid traveller. I have imported many of my ideas on planning from things I have seen travelling.It shows, in a refreshing and positive way too I might add. But most of all, you do not seem to have adopted the architects’ ‘El Duce’ extremist stance on discussion formats.
I would respectfully suggest that DIT drop classical music from its architectural curriculum and put a module of urban geography in its place. 😉
Hit the nail on the head – I know more about Leonardo da Vinci and rubbish like that – not one single classroom subject in DIT curriculum has anything even remotely to do with the built environment.
Originally posted by Diaspora
Far from it I really enjoyed my five years at DIT as college is about much more than acedemic learning. It is more about learning to teamwork with other people at 4am the morning before the group project is due up.
I was simply asking was there some procedural reason why 60 or so started studying architecture in 1998 and only 7 graduated in 2003?
[/B]No it is just to establish this point very clear and precisely from the outset – otherwise, any discussion is merely dismissed as DIT bashing by the very people would should be listening to this – i.e. Reddy and his crew.
We have to find some way to navigate ‘politically’ so to speak right around the DIT bashers, in order to achieve any sucessful debate about this subject to begin with. This is easier said than done – as most people who have made a career virtually out of DIT bashing, are fully qualified DIT members of the general population themselves.
Furthermore I think, the sucesses of the DIT system are more than evident in the breath and understanding about urban issues brought to this message board, by the both of us.
Give yourself a slap on the back and a thumbs up DIT. Anyhow, what I find educational about this message board, is how different people from a variety of courses and disiplines all seem to converge on similar issues here at something called ‘Archiseek’.
It is possible to drift through years of architecture in Bolton Street, without ever imagining that anyone else in the world except architects worry/think or have opinions about these issues.
A very sore mistake made by countless architects I think, is to only see their own little world. I enjoyed my day yesterday out at the Carlisle pier exhibition mingling and chatting with a very broad cross section of concerned and vested interests. A very fulfilling esperience I must say.
And my open-mindedness in listening/discussing things with ordinary folk out there, was in no small measure thanks to archiseek experience of doing likewise.
The whole wider notion of having a course called architecture in the first place – that is the big question you have to look at really. I have attempted to articulate some pluses, and some minuses. I have attempted to point out areas where geographers and architects talents might overlap and be used in concert with each other. Not, just allowing it all deteriorate into another boozy, late-night, pub DIT bashing contest, which usually is all that happens and solves very, very little.
LIke I say, there are so many more advantages and incentives to go and do anything else except a long siege-like battle against the system of architectural qualification. Getting any work as an undergraduate architect here in Dublin, is like selling the big issue sometimes. Or worse. 🙁
Sub-refugee status, something like that!
Originally posted by Peter FitzPatrick
nah digital is the only way to go …Of course, very true. I just shoot a couple of rolls of 35mm every few months, and cannot tie up €1000 in a digital SLR.
But I still want to use a true wide angle lense -like a 24mm Sigma manual SLR one I have for years – so scanning is about all I can do.
I don’t care for photoCD results – having a good film/flatbed scanner gives me much better results.
PS Firewire rocks
I am sure it does.
Originally posted by alan d
……. I seem to be losing the thread here Lads, sorry.Thought we were talking about the benefits or otherwise of the “City Architect” In my view they seem to be a waste of time.
What makes Archiseek useful at all, is different opinions.
Phil, I assumed you were an architect, your design assessment of Carlisle Pier seemed right on the button. Maybe Geographers and architects do have a future
Both can give a bit to the other I think.
Autocratic, dunno…
isolationist yes definitely.
Like the Bush America was.
Remember Hitler eventually ended up in a bunker.
Architects need to adopt a more reaching-out approach I think:
The Bush management style embodies the pre-creative corporate era–formal, hierarchal, with decision-making concentrated in the hands of only the most senior executives. Clinton was happy in Hollywood and vacationed in Martha’s Vineyard. Bush can’t wait to get back to Crawford. Clinton reveled in the company of writers, artists, scientists, and members of the intellectual elite. Bush has little tolerance for them. Clinton, in his rhetoric and policies, wanted to bring the gifts of the creative class–high technology, a tolerant culture–to the hinterlands. Bush aimed to bring the values and economic priorities of the hinterlands to that ultimate creative center, Washington, D.C.
In fairness though, I guess Frank McDonald and Duncan Stewart together have done much to publicise architecture in a sympathetic fashion. But apart from that, the attempts have been typically ham-fisted – our architectural education setup being the most prime example of BUSH-style politics I have ever seen in my life.
It has improved immensely with USB 2.0.
I always have used SCSI kit myself, so avoiding all of that horrible USB 1.0 rubbish.
USB 1.0 is a 1997/98 technology and was badly due a good firm kick in the you know where.
Typical example of where geographers and architects could/should cooperate. I hope Reddy etc, might bring this issue to the fore – one of the areas I think he is particularly strong in – I still don’t like his pro-traditional isolationist stance on architects and qualification etc, though.
I can’t calculate FAR etc, not my area of expertise, but I can understand it visually.
A typical one of wilderness development, driven by having cars, and lots of home entertainment, web access etc, in the USA.
If I get any more extreme rural developments, I will post them. I think some of these may work as retreat type places, like the ancient Cistercian monastery etc, but as new residential developments…. ?
Some things like this, have integrated well into places like Rathgar Road etc,I think.
Perhaps not pretty in some peoples’ eyes, but definitely sustainable as development I think, on smaller available plots.
I dunno, how to calculate densities on FARs for this but, I think you get the idea.
And another attempt at density.
I think that Wright was very good at doing this sort of thing here.
Perhaps suitable for a number of smaller apartments nowadays on suitable site, circa Rathmines or similar? Certainly would be contextual anyhow.
Another kind of place,
Goind even further denser in FAR;
We certainly haven’t built like this in Ireland since the times of the Eucharistic congress! I.e. The Catholic Church building private mansions on huge swats of land in urban areas.
This type of development, is attractive, as it actually manages to create a strong definition of a street I think.
Docklands? Notice how elements like that bridge in the background, are important perceptual landmarks in such a place.
Originally posted by Diaspora
I am not defending duchas or anyone else but simply saying that it is not a bad thing to have city architects. Not all services need to be farmed out to the private sector on ideological grounds.Like LUAS thing-ies commissioned by Mrs O’ Rourke etc?
Am, just take a look at Ken Yeang and marketing – investments in marketing dollars, and subsequent ROI, are something which BMW, INtel etc have understood now for years. Intel inside ad campaign, Levis add in laundrette boosted sales 800%. BMW recent online ads by famous directors.
In architecture we have lots of small charismatic men, who are excellent at public speaking – that is great, but what about a more subtle approach?
I have this vision stuck in my head of architects, being like Hitler in that footage, where he walks up the steps of the Reichstag in 193x, without any opposition whatsoever, and simply accepted command of the nation on behalf of his brownshirts.
Architects, in their own crazed imaginations, expect things to be just like that for themselves, because they are architects, having spent 10 years qualifying.
Originally posted by Peter FitzPatrick
Don’t know why FKL did theirs in flash, its nothing that couldn’t be done in html with faster download times … [/B]That is very simple, following the dom.com bust, there were thousands of flash designers all over the world left with f*** all to do.
I think though, that most practices with a website, many have 10-20 people working for them – so that 7-8 man hours could be distributed amongst more people.
One of the worst, in terms of soaking up man hours i think was the ‘computer backup’ prior to the days, where offices had servers/automated backup storage systems, which work in off-peak times. Back in circa 1997 this was the case, and CAD technicians, or other appointed expert would devote large portions of his/her week to doing ‘computer backup’.
The monday morning meetings about this used to be a howl. Small architects practices have come up with some very strange and novel solutions to things down through the years – penny pinching being the order of the day – but it rarely paid off in terms of overall economy. Which is surprising, as most architects always complain about ‘accountant-driven’ decision making in terms of building buildings – but when it comes to building a practice, which route do they take? 🙂 LOL.
One of the things, I am very strong on nowadays, is upgrading all workstations in the office at the same time – making everyone equal – in preference to this favouritism encouraged by architect bosses, buying a new system now and again for their favourite employees. THey seem to think by doing so, they are saving money – but losing it hand over fist in terms of overall employee satisfaction and efficient standardised productivity and management.
If you are one of the sods, who doesn’t get a new workstation, you are sitting there wondering, what did I do wrong? 🙂 ROFL.
Very true – analysis of where your business is going. David Wright here at CG Architect,
http://www.cgarchitect.com/upclose/DW/default.asp
has a good article about planning your business you should look at.
One day a week, that is about as steep in terms of commitment as I imagined it would be. Yeah, one day a week is still significant I suppose, in terms of man hours, in a small tight operation.
I don’t follow politics and am reluctant therefore to get into this directly, but my sources on this are shock-proof Diaspora – do more research please and come back to me.
Like I say, educate your market first to accept the product you are selling – this is the goal of an taisce really, if you think about it.
It is more subtle than the iron-fist approach of an duchas, but eventually could swing more people. See what the Italians did to El Duce. And El Duce probably had some good messages for Italy, in terms of its prosperity – but people reacted, perhaps mistakenly and rashly too, against what they saw, as someone with too much power.
I mean, that in very fine-grained complex issues to do with how they environment is made up – they simply assumed to know a lot more than they actually did – and the scary thing was – they actually seemed to have the power to affect things.
A bit like putting Goebbels in charge of the Luftwafa in WWII, despite the fact, he hadn’t got a clue about airplanes. Or Hitler deciding which tank, bomber or assault plan to use in Barbaroza – it can happen, and it was happening with Duchas. I take on board, what you say totally in favour of Duchas – but get the whole story, the real reasons about why they self-destructed, before jumping to conclusions, based on stuff that you might have heard etc.
Your organisation, An Taisce seems to have a very wide interest in all matters environmental – but doesn’t claim totally competency in any of them – An Taisce has persisted much longer than an duchas – and An Taisce will only become better and more crucial to the modernisation of the this country in thinking and execution of things.
An Duchas should have been wearing swastikas – Hitler wanted to be an architect too. It is easy to get drunk on power, and that I think, is why architects have never been attracted by the civil service – their lust for power above and beyond their stations is unstoppable, as seen in an duchas.
Still the message the are carrying is true and good, but it would be better they educated their market, instead of trying to force it to change in one almighty blitzkreig attempt. Check out a Malaysian architect called Ken Yeang – holds joint qualifications in marketing and architecture – shrewd business man, big corporate clients and a good architect to boot.
I have never, actually designed a web site myself – would much rather someone else did that! 🙂
Must consume huge amounts of time/energy though.
Originally posted by Diaspora
Highly preferable to the Sealink to Holyhead in 1983. I think in fairness that the Dublin City Architects and to an equal extent Duchas architects actually do have an operational output.Where the shit hit the fan in Duchas, was the architects realised that ‘hey, we can start to call the shots here’, and their most destructive basic natural instinct, to control and call out orders just kicked into overdrive, as it always will.
Result: Duchas, pissed down too many peoples’ backs and self-destructed in no time.
But like I always say – Fleetwood MAC, created their best work while tearing each other’s eyeballs out, and then were no more.
Civil services inherently aim to stick around much, much longer than that.
Originally posted by FIN
there is also some stigma attaced to civil jobs where they are kinda seen as the low of the low on the architectural food chain.It is not that, you cannot control a civil service the same way as you can control people around you in a small architects practice.
Just look at Stephenson and Gibney – they decided they couldn’t control one another and split!
Think rock bands, the BGs, Fleetwood Mac, Robbie Williams, Divas…. 🙂
So they end up building themselves, their little fantasy islands etc.
But having said, that you cannot dispute their in-built ability to visualise, something economists, accountants, geographers etc, haven’t practiced directly as much as an architect has.
Originally posted by alan d
Don’t know why that is really, tempted to say that architects are insular and not team players, by nature and consequently cannot play or are not interested in a political game. Not motivated only by money, either. That’s why you’ll never find them as executives or directors in city institututions.Unfortunately, in my own personal experience of them as individuals – I would say the vast overall proportion of architects out there today, do fall into that one catagory.
I think, it has something to do with the 5-year course, and the fact, you can never take any credits/benefit from doing that course, and use it in an other area.
It seems to be a ship, you have to jump from very early, if you are not entirely satisfied with your plotted course/captain etc, etc.
I don’t know much about the UCD planning course, but I have heard precious little about it from various architects I have hung around with down through the years.
What I have heard a lot of, is the bickering and hostility shown on both sides of the planning process fence, in this country. A bit like teenager gangs scrapping down at the local disco.
What does worry me though, is the increasingly ‘isolationist’ mentality brough into the RIAI headquarters now, with the coming of the Reddy presidency – similar, in many ways to the Bush administration, contrasted to the Clinton one, in the United States of America.
Originally posted by FIN
gareth i think that the lure of private business and designing the “landmarks” is too strong to take rather than the endless paper shuffling of a civil servant job [/B]I have to disagree completely, since there are people out there, who have both the skills to shuffle papers with the best of them, while also seeing where the architect, might be coming from – to a much larger degree than some economics arts graduate from UCD. 🙂
Originally posted by alan d
Planners, eh? that’s another bone of contention.Glasgow disolved their own architects department about 6 years ago and got rid of the title ” City Architect” the years since have seen a period or unprecedented growth in urban renewal and new design talent coming through, I think.
I am trying to pick up on that line of thinking here, that there are certainly good reasons, that engineerings, geographers and economists have suceeded in cornering the civil service appointments. While architects with huge talent, experience and drive have made precious little headway in that area down through the years.
This is why I think you need to look at it from the educational perspective – a young student looks at a Bolton Street/Queens/UCD course and says ‘f*** that’, and then sees a nicer qualification/employment prospects/course somewhere else – and at the end of the day – does just as well. Or better even.
Just look at architectural courses – you get nothing after doing three/four hard years in architecture except a gigantic boot up the you know where. And you simply cannot carry any of the benefits of that experience/training onto any other course. Talk about building yourself a nice wee lsland in the middle of the ocean….
whereas to the best of my knowledge, with a three year arts degree in economics, you can do a year course in planning in UCD and role on that Bertie civil service lov’in. 🙂
