Young Architects Forum

Wednesday, June 7 - Convention Report from YAF, a.k.a. What We Did Today in L.A. Part I

What a day! "A Day at the Getty", that is. The pre-convention summit was all we had hoped for and more. Michael Palladino, AIA and James Crawford, AIA of Richard Meier & Partners Architects (Partner and Associate Partner, respectively) led the group on a tour of the Getty Center complex. Along the way, they shared some great tales from their 25+ year odyssey in making the Getty a reality, from contentious neighbors to touring the world's most famous museums (someone has to do it) and from heli-pads to seismic faults.

What impresses me the most is the extreme attention to detail. Nothing is left to chance; every surface, every view, and every material transition is carefully considered and detailed. The integration of the landscaping is also well executed.

If you haven't been to the Getty...go. If you have been...please share your thoughts.

Wednesday, June 7, 2006 - What We Did Today In L.A. Part II

After the tour, YAF hosted a "A Dialogue with Today’s Top Designers." Moderated by Jade Chang of Metropolis Magazine, panelists included Edwin Chan of Gehry and Partners, Pavel Getov of m0rphosis, and Michael Palladino of Richard Meier and Partners.

When asked if they had considered going out on their own, all were unanimous in that they were completely fulfilled in their current positions. All had earned a lot of trust and respect, and enjoyed great autonomy. Working with acclaimed and accomplished architects had provided them with the opportunity to work on much more exciting and challenging projects than they would have been able to procure on their own (think Bilbao!).

All agreed that the time to leave would be when they were no longer able to learn and perform at the highest level. I thought that was a probably a pretty good test for many of our life endeavors.

the wrap up - sunday june 11, 2006

well, it was a good time in l.a. this year. from having the opportunity to participate in the 'day at the getty' mentioned above by lisa, to moderate a panel (LA4:Ideas, on thursday afternoon), and to watch my home yaf group (atl:yaf) receive it's second 'emerging professionals component of the year' award in less than four years, it was a quick and (by the end) draining experience. thanks to everyone on the advisory committee for making the week a good one and thanks to lisa for getting this blog up and running...

night all.

How to build up your architect reputation.

Answer is simple, to design some buildings which can pick up your reputation greatly. How to make the buildings famous? The famous must be greatly functional, unique, special with new style. The building should hook up the people who visits.

So how could a building like this come out? Actually, one building is a work which need to put the architect, contractor, builder and supplier together. The building will go nowhere if one of which have problem.

But architect is the Key. He can pick up which kind of material the building can use.

For a certain project, the architect need to answer a question, how to design the building to be the best with a cost limitation.

Provided that the abilities of architects are same(one architect is not much better or worse than others). the materials for the building might be the biggest working area for the architect to work on.

An architect need to pick up the doors, windows, the ceilings, the lightings, the floor tile, the wall covering, the solid surfaces, the custom furnitures, the exterior wall on the building. What the people can see is what can improve the architect reputation.

So the problem turns to one issue how to find a good material with low cost.

Take an example, architects was supposed to pick up a wood mantel for a fireplace at cost of $1500. Do some research and find a company who can make marble mantel in the same price. You can find many of these company. For example, http://www.evanshomeluxuries.com in Boston, New england area. There, some mantel is about the same price.

Another example, for a entrance wood door, some times the price runs to $8000. If you use a cooper door, brass door, bronze door with the same price, definitely it will make the building a better reputation.

Use the granite tile to substitute the ceramic tile. A lot of suppliers can do that.

Use the wrought iron fence to substitute aluminum fences. Many.

You can find it.

It is the architect home work to do the research about all the material which will be used on the building. Do not point on the contracts do your homework if you want to be famous and make your money.

Architects are busy. I know some of architect company begins to hire buyer to do the investigation work about the architect material. This will be a fashion.

Hey very nice blog, is this a custom design?