Creatives are The Answer

Welcome to my newsletter, where you'll find my latest takes on the architecture industry.

Today's read is ~ 4 minutes

It's been a busy couple of weeks - I feel like I said something similar in the previous edition.

Last week I took a trip to London to catch up with one of my close friends who's building something very special for all architecture students - keep an eye out on my page for more information in the near future. We went to the Royal Academy to take a look at the Herzog & de Meuron exhibition, which was really nice.

But...

I was also in London for another reason.

As some of you might know, my final year MArch 2 Thesis Design project was nominated for the AJ Student Prize Award. Although in the past I've not really taken time to be proud of the work I've done, being at the actual event and making sure I attended did give me some reassurance. The event was great! Seeing some familiar faces and actually meeting someone who I've been connected with on LinkedIn for a long time! It's so refreshing to meet new people and to also hear about the profession from their perspective. I know we're all on different paths and have different views. But that's what makes it exciting.

What an incredible venue and a big thanks to Perkins&Will for hosting the award ceremony in their newly finished building at 150 Holborn. Getting a tour by Principal and Design Director Ian Goodfellow topped off the amazing day and I hope there's more opportunities like this in the future to connect with more architects, designers and creatives.

I feel in architecture school we aren't equipped with how we can expand beyond the built environment and delve into other forms of on-the-ground problem solving. I've been battling for years to work towards building something on the side and this passion to create something came about during my second year of undergraduate studies. And although Covid then hit the world, I don't think there would have been much progress anyway.

But I tried lots of things - through podcasting, setting up a new page on Instagram, then came my introduction to YouTube and pushing on LinkedIn. And now I feel that although I'm still driving the LinkedIn, YouTube and (currently a WIP) Instagram engines, there's more that I want to work on. There are so many talented and intelligent students who are enrolled in architecture courses. And all I wish for is for them to push their creative drivers into passion projects that solve problems that mean a lot to them. It's 100% possible, in my opinion, for architecture students to deviate from the profession to work on challenges in other industries. This is an experiment that could be very powerful and as I write this, it's made me want to explore this concept further.

I'll leave you with this link to an extremely valuable podcast episode I watched over the weekend by Ali Abdaal as he interviews one of my favourite YouTube content duos, Colin and Samir. There's so much potential when control is in the hands of the creative and when resources are provided to scale the impact. Let's start working to provide more information and more value to the architects and designers of the future.

The sooner we start, the greater the rewards.

Not just for the profession but for our planet.