Commercial Architecture

Forum Post: Re: How do we stop selling ourselves short?

Daniel Jones — Wed, 15 May 2013 15:38:00 GMT

architecture is a manifestation of human consciousness!

Forum Post: Architectural locations London

paul osman — Thu, 02 May 2013 08:05:00 GMT

Good morning,

my name is Paul and i am looking for some help with a job application as a location scout, and was wondering if i could pick someones brain with an architectural background on contemporary projects in London.

I have been set a brief at the second stage of my application process for a location company.

i have to gain permission to photograph the interior and exterior of a public building.The location can be traditional or contemporary, but must contain a grand hallway or atrium area, i have to then photograph the area providing an overview of its features and facilities. I have to do my upmost to sell this location to an imaginary client.

The only rules within this task are that i must not choose a location from a commercial database, and stay away from the obvious: The V and A Museum, The British Museum, County Hall SE1, National Trust, English Heritage etc.

Now i have already been to the RIBA in Portland Pace and visited the bookshop (excellent books on interiors of London, but my fear is that as these have already been published they are already on a commercial database) and contacted the library (which is unfortunately closed today, but i will be in there first thing tomorrow) with regards looking at recent journals of new projects in London.

In the meantime if anyone has an acute knowledge of recently finished projects in London or the surround that may fit the bill of what i am looking for then please let me know, i cant promise a reward but i will offer a drink (hopefully from my first wage packet) the closing date is the 13th May.

Thanks for your time.

Forum Post: Re: Designers Risk Assessments

John Warburton — Thu, 25 Apr 2013 21:09:00 GMT

They don't like DRA's because they tend to be paperwork that obscures the key information, with the real risks lost in a sea of text, so nobody pays attention. I remember producing a DRA last year and the CDMC asked us to include only the red risk category in the document that we submitted for just that reason. There is no specific requirement for a DRA under CDM, and you just need to be able to demonstrate that you have considered and responded to the unusual risks. He quoted a case where a death occurred with construction traffic on a site which for which a Part 3 was the project architect and had never heard of CDM or a CDMC, let alone produced a DRA. He avoided any culpability because he was able to show that provision for construction traffic had been included in the temporary works scheme and that the accident occurred when the vehicles were not following the implemented proposals. So it is what the designer does, rather than the paperwork he produces that really matters.

Forum Post: Re: Photo-Books

Barney Bonner — Wed, 10 Apr 2013 07:24:00 GMT

http://www.blurb.com/

I forgot to mention the best bit ... you can choose to design your book in Indesign, thus avoiding prrscriptive templates and allowing you complete freedom over layout, image size and text.

Forum Post: BIM Adoption: short survey for BSc Quantity Surveying dissertation

Hassaan Hanif — Fri, 22 Mar 2013 19:08:00 GMT

This survey should take no more than a couple of minutes to complete.

Any responses from AEC professionals with knowledge of BIM would be greatly appreciated.

http://ukbim.co/98723

Thank you in advance.

Hassaan Hanif
Nottingham Trent University

Forum Post: Re: Do "Architects" require more monitoring & scrutiny from the ARB & RIBA?

John Warburton — Sat, 16 Mar 2013 09:53:00 GMT

Presumably we would also be looking to make it mandatory for everyone professing to offer "architectural" services to have relevant qualifications, not just the architects.

Forum Post: Re: Instant Bonding Solutions

Arlo Guthrie — Tue, 12 Mar 2013 12:12:00 GMT

Hi Angela

Sorry for the slow reply (been working away on all the post Ecobuild stuff), but thanks for the kind remark about the site. Nice to hear your commercial manager likes the idea!

We do encourage manufacturers like you to contribute to relevant discussions where you think you can help someone, so do stop by and chip in!

All the best

Arlo

Forum Post: Re: Photography

Richard Buxton — Mon, 11 Mar 2013 12:11:00 GMT

Hi Sarah and welcome to inbuilding,

I've just been on your website which looks great, you certainly have an extensive portfolio.

I'm sure in time there will be the odd question from members of the site about photography which no doubt you will be able to help with.

All the best

Forum Post: Re: Drawing the boundary between the information supplied by the Architect and by the Contractor

Adam Brill — Thu, 28 Feb 2013 10:40:00 GMT

I guess that an old school architect would only ever have produced a limited amount of information as they had more time to get any issues resolved on site unlike today when an RFI comes in via email the contractor wants an answer there and then which in many cases is quite easy to pull off a drawing where all the information is at your fingertips.

That is to say if the contract were D&B and all the contractors had the same information then this element should come out the same particularly if they have been specified. The contractor only then needs to allow for installation. albeit the location will need to be confirmed but this should affect the cost of pricing in real terms.

I think that makes sense.

Adam

Forum Post: Re: Do you think 'Architect' should remain a protected title?

John Warburton — Thu, 20 Dec 2012 15:32:00 GMT

...the "joke" is that the increase in the ARB fee is partly to cover the extra cost of investigating the massive increase in the number of complaints being referred to the ARB against people calling themselves "Architect".

Forum Post: The Shard beat the dust

Rossella Scalia — Thu, 15 Nov 2012 10:42:00 GMT

Piano’s latest building, the £65 million Astrup Fearnley Museum in Oslo is nothing like London’s towering spire. ‘This is the opposite to the Shard,’ says Piano. ‘This place tells the story of horizontality.’

Vertical Piano in London or Horizontal Piano in Oslo? What do you prefer ?

Forum Post: Re: An agora in an agora

Arlo Guthrie — Wed, 14 Nov 2012 12:18:00 GMT

Hi Rossella,

Yes, you are absolutely right, 'General discussions' is the right place for free-for-all discussion about architecture, and I do apologise if my message suggested otherwise, or if you thought I was sounding critical (didn't mean to).

What I was really trying to say is that it is useful to try and include within your post something which invites others to come and agree or disagree with you. So for example, when making a point, you might say: "I think x, what does everyone else think".

This is particularly helpful with a long post, where it helps to separate out what you think are the discussion points, and other information which is there simply to give your points some context.

All the best

Arlo

Forum Post: Smithfield Market, London

Rossella Scalia — Wed, 14 Nov 2012 09:24:00 GMT

Plans for Smithfield Market, London :

flattering ( John McAslan + Partners ) or conservation ( Burrell Foley Fischer ) ?

Forum Post: Re: Cities in Danger : From Material to Human Security

Rossella Scalia — Sun, 11 Nov 2012 11:04:00 GMT

Lebbeus Woods, walls of change. Havana,Cuba.1995

' After thirty-five years of rule by a totalitarian regime, Havana has entered a state of crisis caused by a failed economy, a drying-up of foreign aid from sympathetic countries, and a long-standing American economic embargo that stifles trade for necessities like grain, oil, and ordinary consumer goods. The old city, La Habana Vieja, which is home to thousands of the poorest families, is in full decay, and there are no funds to maintain let alone restore it.

Responding to an invitation, a small group of internationally known architects who can be described as open and experimental in their approaches come to Havana for two weeks to study and discuss the situation, and make proposal for solving a number of pressing architectural problems. Out of these discussions come several exploratory projects.

For the old city, I propose the rebuilding of the Spanish colonial defensive wall ( demolished only at the end of the nineteenth century ), separating it from the rest of the city as a means of protecting this fragile quarter, but also as a sort of urban battery that produces small but sufficient quantities of electricity and potable water. Consequently, the wall sponsors a kind of spontaneous architecture that can become the main new building type for rehabilitating, without outside funding, the crumbling structures everywhere within the quarter '.

Forum Post: A Social Gesture is not a Meaningful Gesture

Rossella Scalia — Sat, 10 Nov 2012 20:33:00 GMT

Charlie Chaplin was capable of doing 60 gestures per minute.

His character was extremely comprehensible through the complexity and richness of his signs. The dualism of his personality is the mirror of a society based on social gestures, cold and automatic, and meaningful gestures, thought and planned.

A gesture might be banal if it is not enriched with meaning .It is vulgar if it is fruit of haste and arrogance. ' Each gesture is an event, one might even say, a drama in itself '.

Walter Benjamin might notice, nowadays, a trend of gestures in Architecture. Circles , triangles, ellipses , outlined with the only purpose of highlighting objects. Rafael Vinoly’s circle around Battersea Power Station, Renzo Piano’s effort to reach the sky and Grimshaw’s life preserver for Cutty Sark. Social gesture or meaningful gesture ?

The drama of Architecture is solved with a sketch on a tissue : spontaneous, without codes, without reason.‘ I suppose that’s one of the ironies of life doing the wrong thing at the right moment ’ , Charlie Chaplin could remark, shrugging .

Forum Post: Re: Drawing in Autocad nowadays is like drawing with a pen 15 yrs ago...

Bertie — Mon, 22 Oct 2012 11:13:00 GMT

I trained at a time when CAD was really starting to take over and have used ArchiCAD and Vectorworks 3D packages as well as Sketchup, but the first two years were definitely more drawing-heavy than computer-orientated and I think like Christine says a lot of clients still respond really well to hand-drawn images as well as the slick 3D visual styles. I wonder whether there might be a risk with too much CAD reliance in that we lose drawing skills, which are critical even if only for visualising ideas for our own means at the developmental stage?

Not trying to knock CAD here, but I genuinely do see people losing drawing skills, and that CAD can in the right hands really free architects and designers up, but in the wrong ones lead to lazy architecture because there becomes an issue if what is 'easier' to draw using the software.

I have a friend who swears by BIM but even she has had nightmares with working on models that someone else has fudged to make it look right along the way, and then you run the risk of building in what could end up coming back to cause issues in construction.

Forum Post: Re: Architects should visualize their own projects!

Truls Olufsen-Mehus — Fri, 19 Oct 2012 10:51:00 GMT

Lumion Free has all features, but limited number u can use in Free, and you get a huge Lumion "non commercial use" logo in the middle of the screen. I made these in Pro. Also you can make the same in Lumion "normal" at half the price.

Forum Post: Who should win the Stirling prize?

Arlo Guthrie — Wed, 10 Oct 2012 13:36:00 GMT

[Poll]

Forum Post: Re: A simple solution to the debt crisis

Christopher Waller — Wed, 03 Oct 2012 17:26:00 GMT

Hi Arlo,

I'm no economist either but Positive Money do a lot of research and they have not plucked these ideas out of the air. They have some pretty good heavy weights on their board and are gaining some traction. Their ideas are really not what you expect and I think to some extent not what they expected but are elegantly argued with some pretty compelling data gleaned from none other than the Bank of England. No explanation I have heard from a politician or economist rings true.

Positive Money offer the only pragmatic, legal and technical solution I have ever seen to what is a pragmatic, legal and technical problem.

I have suggested to Ben Dyson that they do some explanations of everyday micro-economic stuff ....like using a debit card.

The positivemoney.org.uk site should be OK ...try again ...it is a rich source of thought provoking articles with real workable solutions. They really get under the hood of how the system works and not how we are all meant to believe it works!

Forum Post: Re: What are "listed" buildings?

Barney Bonner — Sat, 22 Sep 2012 15:43:00 GMT

Sean ... this should answer all your questions ...

www.english-heritage.org.uk/.../listed-buildings

It is basically a system in which certain buildings are "Listed" ... put on a list for special protection and conservation to protect the built heritage of Britain.