Architects or students architecture

[MayorVieira 1]

Yep. I'm also in the 3rd year of architecture and urban design in PUC Minas, Belo Horizonte, Brazil.

 

2004 Copa America Champions! Don't cry for me, Argentina...

 

[axelvan 0]

Isn't it in Belo Horizonte that Oscar Niemeyer built his first (own) buildings when former president Juscelino Kubitschek was mayor there?

btw: I'm gonna be participating in your mystery building game, when will the next building be posted?

[Born78 4]

Odd from Sweden is also architect student. We use to discuss about older architectual styles here at ST (Or he helps me with info about how the roofs have changed during the centuries and he tells me about which elements that are usual in Baroque buildings and so on....)

You guys can give us BATers unique help so please share us of your knowledge. I will within a few days post some pics of buildings in the Ritz project thread. Please help me to define the styles of the buildings after I've posted them if you want.

[Vanderaap 455]

hmm... my knowledge is mainly based on Dutch architecture (I'm first year architecture student)... I especially like the 18th century, and late 19th/early 20th century buildings (among others: H.P. Berlage, G.A. van Arkel and the Van Gendt brothers)...

[mikeyb66 30]

Hopefully, if i get the grades this summer I will be going to Bath University, England to start my architecture course.

[Boris225 1]

Because of my interest in my buildings and designing them for SimMars, my folks have been suggesting that I get a degree in Architecture. So I may be an architecture student in the future...

 

Tell me, would getting a degree in civil engineering first help in any way towards getting a good job as an architect? Because the nearest school to that teaches architecture is 2 provinces away, and I could go to the local University and get a degree in civil engineering first if I needed to...

 

And how are the job prospects? Is there enough room for the both of us? (I'm just kidding here... but I really would like to know how the job market is)

[Joe 90 358]

Boris, I finished an honours degree in Civil Engineering 8 months ago so perhaps I could help shed some light on the Architect / Engineer thing.

From what I can gather, architecture is generally artistic, and engineering is generally technical. The stereotype is of architects coming up with all these awesome looking designs, and the engineer taking one look and saying 'that will never stand up by itself'!
But saying that, I took a paper in Civil Eng History, which covered things like building styles, materials, and structural features (like arches) through the ages. That was probably as close as I ever got to 'architecture' as such, and I have to say it was pretty interesting.
A combination of the two could be useful, but may take 7 or 8 years to achieve. To still be involved in buildings, you'd have to become a structural engineer, which involves a lot of applied calculus. If maths and physics ain't your thing, learn now or forget it!

As far as job prospects go, here in NZ (and from what I hear in other places too) the market cannot get enough professional engineers. My class of about 100 all walked into jobs, so it's definately good to be in my position!
I really don't know about architects, mainly because you don't need them to build roads

[Boris225 1]

Thanks, I'll chew on this for a while, although I would still like to hear the word from the architects.

 

Tell me about long years in school, my mom went through 8 years of medical school. Paid off well too!

 

Very helpful for a $%&^! aren't you? Keep the tips coming! 

[axelvan 0]

I studie at Ghent University, in Belgium, civil engineering / architecture. It's a 5 year program (same duration as civil engineering, same faculty). Its a combination between the technical, engineering side, with a lot of maths and physics in the first to years and also alot of the same courses a civil structural engineer would get. It also focusses on the artistic and theoretical side of architecture. I think its this combination that makes it very interesting to my opinion, but als quiet hard. Of course a this isnt as specialised as structural engineering, but it gives the architect an insight, when he's making a design, not just to focus an artistic gesture but to take in account the structural aspect.

This is the official summary:

This technical-social-artistic degree features a first cycle curriculum built around a problem-oriented learning process. Students acquire, among others, inductive knowledge in dealing with design, architecture and construction issues. Both independently and as a group, they learn to process the knowledge offered in a creative fashion. The locus of this process is the design workshop, where undergraduates discover the complexity of architectonics, how to tackle the problems involved and the most advisable procedures to be applied.
Both first cycle years lay the foundations of the second cycle. They supply a basic package, initiating students in various architectural issues. Through the inductivity of the teaching method undergraduates are encouraged to strive for deeper insight into the various disciplines and their internal relations. The basic science package includes mathematics and physics. Here the architectural aspects emphasize structures and knowledge of materials and they provide the first notions of stability, construction and building equipment. Social sciences, arts and culture are not neglected either: philosophy, perception and expression, form and colour, art and culture production, etc. The architecture pillar is shaped through current architecture, architecture history and introductions to architecture theory, the theory of architectonic design as well as urban development.

The programme of the second cycle leading up to the degree in engineering: architecture is organised around the three pillars of architecture degree: design, construction engineering and the scientific theory of architecture. The training seeks to provide graduates with professional competence, based on cultural and social foundations as well as technical know-how. The design workshop is the main locus for this process.
The synthesizing design activity is fed by formal lectures and seminars offering the theoretical basics involved in the design process.
Through seminars students prepare themselves, both in method and content, for the graduation work. Although the basic package continues to cover all aspects, the students may now chart and develop further their own individual curriculum through elective courses.
In his graduation work the student works out a design or research issue independently under the supervision of a scientific staff. The results of the graduation work are publicly presented at an end colloquium.



It used to be a first cycle (2 years) and a second cycle (3 years). Now its Bachelor (3 years) and Master (2 years). When you graduate the diploma you get is Master of Engineering sciences: architecture.

[Joe 90 358]

Sounds exactly like what Boris is after! You live anywhere near Belgium??
My degree was 4 years, but I know of some who did 5-year double-degrees, usually with management science (we didn't have an architecture school), but they were generally the straight-A type students. CE is regarded as the second most-difficult course after medicine, and the structural guys have to work harder than most. I'm not sure that some ever left the computer labs!

[axelvan 0]

I just wanna say to anyone planning to start civil engineering: architecture, you really should be passionate about it: besides alot of maths, physics and stuff, the design assignments / exercises take ALOT of your free time, and several nights drawing on in autocad behind your pc screen.

[Joe 90 358]

I'd agree with that. The worst week I had at uni involved 22 lectures, 4 3-hour labs, 2 tests and 4 assignments due. At another time a small group of us knocked out a 25 page report in 5 hours because we had no other time to do it! They really lay it on thick!

I recommend you do some research first, as school doesn't really give you a decent insight into either discipline.
It's well worth doing though - hard work, but great fun too

[MayorVieira 1]

Date:7/26/2004 5:49:40 AM
Author:axelvan

Isn't it in Belo Horizonte that Oscar Niemeyer built his first (own) buildings when former president Juscelino Kubitschek was mayor there?

btw: I'm gonna be participating in your mystery building game, when will the next building be posted?

quote>

Yes, indeed, axelvan. Before Juscelino became president of Brazil (building Bras

[wks2003x 0]

Hi Everyone! I'm an architecture student, although I am just a lowly first year student. I spent one semester at Southern Polytechnic State University. We didn't use any CAD programs then, but we spent many late nights in the studio. I transferred to Georgia Tech and I'll resume my architecture studies there in August.

[axelvan 0]

Hi, I'm a third year student in architecture and civil engineering at the Ghent University, Belgium. I wonder if there are alot of architects or students architecture who play this game. I play it when I've got some free time (which isn't much exept for now during vacation).
Anyone else out there?

[JEC 100]

i'll be visiting two more universities next week: UC Berkeley and University of Southern Califorinia (home of Frank Gehry and Thom Mayne), hopefully i'll be excepted to Berkeley because it is the only one i like that has an environmental design program.

but i have a question, since it is a bit different in the states for majors and minors (unless that is the same for you axelvan, than you can help me).

i read that doing a major in architecture and a minor in civil engineering is not recomended because of the workload.

does anyone know more about this (whether it really is too much to handle)?

thanks

[DuskTrooper 314]

I'm also an architecture student. If all goes well (they are still going over my portfolio) I'll be in the UHHCOA this fall. I have taken a few classes in HS that are architecture related, and of course, I do BAT.

[masher 3]

I wanted to be architect until I did my senior project....I chose modern architecture as my topic and after all the research and nights of reading books about it, I discovered that I did not have what it takes to become an architect....
I do like architecture, but I discovered it takes way more than that....you've got to have it in you...
I'm glad I discovered that before going college!

[Superstar 69]

I'm no architect or an architect student, I'm only 15 after all, but my dad is an architect and has been one for the past 20+ years

[U.S.K.C. 0]

https://www.simtropolis.com/idealbb/files//untitled.bmp align=baseline>

[axelvan 0]

Wow, this thread got resurected again.
JEC, I couldn't really answer your question. Since I'm studying in Belgium, the system is a bit different than in the States, as you said. We've got a program civil engineering architecture, which is totally separate from the other civil engineering programs.

[TheCrybKeeper 280]

After reading all of these posts on Architecture; I thought I might point out, that graphic arts can be quite similar(my field of study). AutoCad, Gmax, Poser6 or Bryce5, all are similar in a lot of ways. Geometry and algebra can help also.

I also took 2 years of drafting classes and graduated from carpentry, at trade school. Still love my art the most and have dabbled in/used many artists mediums.

[crazyarchitect 7]

well, as many don't know, I'm doing two years of drafting and design in South Mississippi, then hopefully go to UofH College of Architecture, probably a year's break in between to get more experience

[Motina 77]

I

[Kwakelaar 92]

Indeed it seems you are not taking an easy way out with your thesis. I have no idea what the Shadow archetype would be.

The number one thing with architecture that is critical in today

[DuskTrooper 314]

Date: 7/16/2005 9:21:10 PM
Author: Kwakelaar
Indeed it seems you are not taking an easy way out with your thesis. I have no idea what the Shadow archetype would be.


The number one thing with architecture that is critical in today’s corporate world is selling out (i.e. Daniel Lebeskind and Frank Ghery being the worst examples). Something I lack; being so complex in a simple simple world.


Why would you say they are selling out?

quote>

Simple. Look at the WTC plans, as well as nearly everything new by Gehry(they are nrealy all the same).

[Kwakelaar 92]

I would rather say they have managed after many years to find and create a unique style for themselves. I can not see that their most recent procjects are compromising what they have achieved so far. I can only see that they are able to design and build (and I would surely hope they get paid for it), buildings in places that some years ago would not have been possible.
I am not a big Ghery fan, though I most say I like the work of Liebskind, but I am impressed by what they are able to do.
Both of them have been working for many years, and just recently they are given the opportunity to expand their work.

There are not many architects that can reinvent themselves in every new project. And you will always depend on someone to pay for your work. (They know your previous work and want something similar).I can also imagine that they will try out and go futher with the same basic idea of their design to see where it will lead to. It will be variations on a theme.

Architects are not artists. Art is made for its own sake, architecture is made for a purpose.

This is ofcoures an opinion, and not the universal truth.

[AgentUhOh7 10]

I'm apparently going into architecture, too. I wouldn't mind, however, going into video game development and/or graphic design, although architecture is currently the most intriguing to me.

In fact, in the past week, I have spent more time working on buildings than actually playing SimCity 4.

[toxicpiano 125]

I'm going to be MP (member of parliment). Sorry...

[Boggy1 45]

I'm hoping to get into Urban Planning which I really enjoy.

Although, I wouldnt mind doing Architecture too.