Television & the movies have lied to us. Nothing new there, but today I’m taking the opportunity to talk about a very specific lie (in a roundabout sense – I may just be wittering).
Architecture is not the glamorous, high flying profession that it’s made out to be in the media. Sure, it beats shovelling shit, but as an architect you will occasionally have to spend the day watching someone else shovel shit, so you can’t have everything. One thing that always amuses me (besides the raft of fast cars, boats and million dollar apartments most screen architects seem to enjoy) is that your average movie architect is always involved in some bleeding-edge multi million pound scheme where as the truth of it is that most of us spend our day to day lives worrying about how we’re going to fit the toilets in.
Glamorous schamorous I say.
(Slightly off topic but I’ve always argued that the most accurate portrayal is Tom Hanks in Sleepless in Seattle, weird when you consider what a fantastical concoction the rest of the film is).
So when the occasional little jewel of a project comes your way you tend to grab it with both hands and secret it away from the rest of the office Gollum-like. I’ve managed to get such a little project myself, tucked up in Yorkshire off the beaten track, but not a green-field site. Client has environmental concerns, money and a willingness to try something different. It all seems a bit too good to be true.
Anyway, I thought I’d record this moment so that when I eventually return to those brain-numbing-toilet-placing moments I can remember why I got into this game. It also remind me that I occasionally need to look back at the old basics like how to draw a golden section so that I don’t spend half-an-hour racking my brains next time.
Midland Film Monkey 