“People do not buy goods and services. They buy relations, stories, and magic.”

— Seth Godin (American author and a former dot-com business executive.)

Every project an architect works on is not simply a service, but rather a meaningful relationship. The best way to let your potential clients know about this is through sharing it effectively. Most people refer to this step as “Marketing.” However, it takes years of practice to perfect this skill, as your potential client easily neglects it.  

When architects are investing rigorous time and effort in tailoring their client preferences, it is equally important that it reaches the right audience. Digital Marketing is one such effective tool that will set the stage to convey the full potential of an architect’s work. There are countless tutorials and guides on best practices in digital marketing, but we will be focusing on the challenges that are actually transforming architectural marketing.

5 Challenges and its Solution

Challenge 1: Elevating your website – Low Website Traffic

Now that every architect and architectural practice has understood the importance of a website, it’s essential to know how it works. It is also crucial to utilise the website’s tools to their fullest extent. One of the most common issues every architectural practice faces is low website traffic. Although a practice may be doing well with visitors, converting them into clients can be challenging. There might be multiple reasons for a website to be abortive. However, with a few tweaks and effective tools, it is possible to give a complete makeover.

Solution: – Invest in SEO and website optimization

Challenge 2: Supercharge Your Email Interaction

Nurturing a client-architect relationship takes multiple stages to succeed, especially if it’s an online interaction. Sharing updates through emails for architects is becoming more sophisticated, focusing on personalized content, visual storytelling, and integration with broader marketing strategies. One of the best ways to keep your clients engaged and enhance your digital marketing is to use personalized email content.

• Interactive Email Design
• Automated Drip Campaigns

Solution: Email Marketing

Challenge 3: Engage Your Audience Through Social Media

As digital marketing grows, client-architect interaction has taken on new dimensions. Architects leverage social media to showcase their projects, reach potential clients, and build their brands. These platforms have become especially popular because of their focus on imagery, which aligns well with the visual nature of architecture. 

Solution: Sharing Effective Stories on Social Media  

Identifying your target audience is important when sharing progress with these platforms. The top 3 most-used platforms by architects are:

• Instagram – Its visual focus makes it ideal for sharing high-quality images of architectural work, design concepts, and creative processes.
• Facebook – architects use Facebook to share projects, engage with a wider audience, and participate in architecture-related groups and discussions.
• LinkedIn – It’s a platform for connecting with industry professionals, and potential clients and staying updated on architectural trends and news.

Challenge 4: The First Best Impressions / The Proof of Trust

One of the widely faced challenges among freelance architects is making the first best impression. As important as networking events are, it is equally important to make a good first impression on a potential client. We classify this as an ‘elevator pitch’ or ‘business proposal’. 

Architectural proposals are a strategic compilation of your practice’s history, philosophy, mission, and vision statements. The perfect balance of including this information and not making it too monotonous is a skill every architect learns through experience. 

Solution: 

• Tailor your pitch to show how your expertise can address their specific needs.
• Instead of listing services, explain your approach’s benefits to the client, such as maximizing space, enhancing sustainability, or delivering projects on time and within budget.
• Focus on highlighting your USP (Unique Selling Point) sets you apart from other architects. This could be a particular design philosophy, specialized experience, innovative use of technology, or a strong portfolio in a specific niche.

Challenge 5: Effective Publicizing for Digital Marketing

Digital Marketing‌ consists of two functional aspects – strategies and tools. Earlier we discussed some effective strategies, we will now discuss the tools to implement them. The idea of running a creative business means keeping with the current trends in spreading your USP. A good way to do that is ‘effective publicizing’. But what exactly is effective publicizing? 

They are nothing but paid ADs or in marketing it is known as pay-per-click advertising. It is the digital version of brochures and pamphlets. Present-day architectural business owners have started using multiple social media platforms apart from Google and Facebook.

Solution: 

• The most recent platform of advertising that architects have adopted is LinkedIn Ads.
• To make advertising more natural, Youtube Ads is one of the best tools these days, as it has become one of the most visited platforms for potential clients.

Instagram Ads: As a visually driven platform, Instagram is ideal for architects to showcase their work. Instagram’s advertising is integrated with Facebook Ads, allowing for seamless targeting. Instagram Ads often drive strong engagement, making it easier to connect with prospective clients.

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Digital marketing streamlines the process of networking and maintaining a healthy relationship with clients in this digital age. As it is, the most cost-effective method compared to the traditional way of printing brochures or billboards. Understanding and leveraging digital marketing will have a distinct advantage in an increasingly competitive market. 

These effective platforms offer detailed analytics, allowing architects to understand what content resonates with their audience, which campaigns are effective, and where adjustments are needed. This data-driven approach leads to more informed decisions and better results.

The post How Architects Can Conquer Common Digital Marketing Roadblocks appeared first on Archipreneur.

David’s story is an inspiring one and one which demonstrates that using one’s individual skill set to build a thriving, successful enterprise is entirely possible and achievable, even as a young architect at an early point in one’s career. And this, crucially, without the several years of hard graft that’s a common prerequisite for graduate architects prior to securing their first project or client.

In our interview, David explains how his architectural sketching endeavor, Sketch Like an Architect, initially came to be and how he later developed it into a business that is now his full-time job and primary source of income.

David talks informatively about how to use architectural sketching as a marketing tool and shares his thoughts about the profession through the lense of his millennial generation.

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What made you decide to found Sketch Like an Architect? Was there a particular pivotal moment that sealed it for you?

Actually, there was. I can trace it back to a specific period in my life, when I was studying architecture at Aalborg University in Denmark. I’m originally from Prague, where I completed my bachelor’s degree. After finishing in Prague, my girlfriend and I decided to broaden our horizons and go abroad to do our master’s degree in architecture. We ended up in Denmark, at Aalborg University, or AAU. It’s a great school, but whilst there I also encountered some things that I found frustrating and dissatisfactory. So I guess you could say Sketch Like an Architect was actually created out of frustration.

What I experienced at AAU was that many of my peers really weren’t used to sketching things out by hand, or laying out their initial ideas through quick, pen-and-paper hand sketching. I initially thought, “That’s fine – they just use software and can jump straight in that way. It’s just a different approach.” But gradually I realized that when we discussed ideas together, the communication in general just wasn’t very smooth. And as architects, when you work in groups, it’s all about communication. Not just verbal communication, but also visual, right? Being able to visualize and communicate your ideas is integral to what we do as architects.

There would often be misunderstandings, not just because of the language barrier, but also because of the different ways we visually presented our ideas. It became very obvious very quickly just how clearly and effectively – or not – one was able to communicate their ideas.

This whole experience got me thinking and so, after I graduated, I thought, “Hey, I know a couple of tricks and really easy tips on how to get into the flow with architecture and sketching, on how to find your style, on how to get things down quickly on paper…”, and I’d always found that to be a really useful, valuable skill. I knew from experience that others valued it, too. I found myself wondering if perhaps others, even outside of the architecture profession, might also find it interesting, even in an era where the big focus is on technology and BIM, and all that awesome stuff. Which, don’t get me wrong, I’m also a huge fan of.

But I truly believe that there’s a huge amount of value in analogue, in hand sketching, and that it’s an important skill that we can still utilize and benefit from even today.

But I truly believe that there’s a huge amount of value in analogue, in hand sketching, and that it’s an important skill that we can still utilize and benefit from even today. So, Sketch Like an Architect initially came from this sense of frustration that architectural sketching, sketching by hand, was a skill that just didn’t seem to be being employed as widely and effectively as it could be, as a way of sharing and communicating ideas.

When did you discover your talent for architectural sketching for the first time?

I’m not a big believer in talent. If you define talent as something that comes naturally to you, and it’s a prerequisite that you’re just good at it naturally, then great, if you’re one of those people with that natural aptitude. But I don’t think I’m very talented when it comes to drawing or sketching, actually. I’m a big believer in putting in the effort and hard work, and really practicing to hone a skill. I think having that kind of commitment and discipline is much more important than, you know, the initial talent you may or may not start with, because either way,  you still have to develop your skills. I think it’s really important to get into the habit of practicing every day, to keep in shape and continue improving as much as possible.

I’m not a big believer in talent. […] I’m a big believer in putting in the effort and hard work, and really practicing to hone a skill.

As a kid, I spent a lot of time drawing – mainly superheroes like Batman and Spiderman, the Ninja Turtles, stuff like that. And then, once I got to my teenage years, I stopped. I didn’t want to sketch because I was afraid it wouldn’t be as good as I imagined it. Then I started again at architecture school in Prague, and that’s where I really learned to sketch properly, through studying the basics of architecture, and learning architectural sketching, which is quite a specific style. It’s completely different from industrial design sketching, for example. Industrial is much more dynamic and often uses markers, and very confident, fast strokes. Those things aren’t necessarily present in architectural sketching.

But I really took to the style of architectural sketching – it felt good to me. Not everyone I studied with enjoyed it, but it felt right to me. So I started using it often, as a tool for both design process and presentation. It seemed like the natural choice, because it was fast. You could brainstorm, you could solve problems, you could ideate, and you could communicate quickly when you were discussing with your supervisors, for example, or your peers. That’s the beauty of architectural sketching.

And from there, I just continued practicing and honing my craft. It’s been much more about the process and journey of development than about any initial talent, for me.

And then you developed that skill into an actual business, sketchlikeanarchitect.com. So how did that go? What was your first idea for a product and your vision for it?

There was absolutely no vision at the beginning. I had no idea where I was going with it, really, and I certainly had no intention or ambition to make it an online business. It was really, if anything, just a side hustle, not really focused on earning any money. After we graduated in Aalborg, my girlfriend and I moved to Copenhagen to look for jobs, and there was a period of unemployment where I was very focused on getting a job and preparing and submitting applications, getting my portfolio together and networking, all that stuff. Looking for a job was almost like a full-time job in itself.

But during that time, I did also manage to set aside some time for my own personal project. I thought it would be cool to create a little guide on how to sketch like an architect, with tips that my peers, and maybe even some other people, might find useful. At that time I was really delving into online courses, and learning a lot from courses on different platforms. So I thought, “Maybe I can create an online course myself.” I find it a really nice medium because it’s mostly video, so it’s very engaging and interactive. I really liked the idea of sharing my architectural sketching skills with a wider audience in this way.

So I got to work creating that, and alongside that, I put together this little PDF handbook which summarized all the information, including all the tips and tricks and the worksheets. These two products – the online course (affiliate link*) and the PDF handbook, have actually, unexpectedly, turned out to be the most popular products I’ve created.

That’s how it started, and it’s the backbone of what it’s become and what it is today. The PDF handbook (affiliate link*), a 60-page PDF document, and the accompanying online architectural sketching course (affiliate link*). I was just scratching my own itch, in a way, not to mention learning a lot in the process. As they say, it’s the teachers who really learn the most, because as a teacher, you have to really dig deep, do lots of research and practice a lot so that you can pass on your knowledge and skills to others. It was a really enjoyable process for me, and a huge learning curve.

While I was creating these, I was still unemployed. Eventually I started using Instagram, which I’d been putting off for a long time… it wasn’t until early 2017 that I really started posting frequently on the platform. I had decided to use it as a gallery of my works in progress, to share what I was working on, to share my sketches. Over time I learned more and more about Instagram and how it works, what hashtags are for and which combinations were most effective, etc – all those little tactics and practicalities. I became really hooked, actually. I’m a very visual guy, so it was very visually satisfying and addictive both to consume and to produce that kind of content.

So, that’s how it went, during my unemployed phase after graduating. I started this little architectural sketching endeavor and the rest, as they say, is history.

Great, and today, are you living from Sketch Like an Architect, or are you still practicing architecture on the side?

As I say, I started Sketch like an Architect with no real long-term vision or plan. I eventually I got a job as an architect in Copenhagen, and I kept SLaA going as a side hustle. It generated a little income, but not the sort that I could really live on. But we recently moved back to the Czech Republic, Prague, and I can now say that it’s been what I do for a living for some time now.

You have over 100K followers on your Instagram channel. That’s an impressive number! Do you think that a good social media strategy can lead to new clients for architects? And how important is it for Sketch like an Architect?

Yes. Our social media following has grown a lot. I actually put together a strategy, a vision, at the very beginning when I started using the platform, which I still stick to now. It’s basically just about providing valuable content on a very frequent, consistent basis. The question of what valuable content is is something that we talk about a lot these days. It’s well known that a valuable piece of content is either entertaining, educational, or inspirational/motivational, and ideally, you’d have a combination of these aspects in every piece of content that you put out.

I was always focused on providing tips on architectural sketching, tips and tricks, and showing not just “nice sketches”, but also to pose the question, what makes them nice? What makes an image work, and why does this particular image work well? I always try to break it down and translate it into tips that anyone could easily apply to their own illustrations.

That’s the kind of value I’ve always strived to provide. That’s my overarching, general strategy. Then, along the way, I’ve just learned more about the practicalities, about optimal frequency, about hashtag combinations, and so on. But it has both its advantages and disadvantages, a platform like Instagram. It can be very profitable in the sense that you can gain attention, which is basically the main goal of all businesses. The modern world we live in is a very hectic, very saturated one with lots of distractions, and everyone’s competing to get a little bit of your attention. Consumer attention is the most valuable commodity there is for businesses.

Instagram provides a great way to get attention if you know how to use it, and if you know how to provide valuable content on a sustainable and consistent basis. It’s really about thinking long term. It’s not about posting 10 posts a day, but, more importantly, about considering how long you’re able to sustain that. It’s about sustainable frequency – that’s really important. It’s an extremely useful platform for gaining attention, but at the same time, Instagram works on very instant basis, meaning that whatever you post has an extremely short shelf life.

If a post is three days old, no one really cares about it anymore. It’s that quick. It’s like a hamster wheel that you need to keep spinning in order to sustain or promote your growth, otherwise you run the risk of stagnating. So that’s a big downside of Instagram, because it can be really daunting and frustrating, and it requires a huge amount of very consistent work and upkeep. Particularly when you compare it to YouTube, for instance; you can make a video on YouTube, and it still gets views years after you originally posted it. With Instagram, it’s a different story.

It’s definitely a downside that I’m now more aware of than ever before, and I’m now trying to focus on something more long-term and more sustainable than just sprinting on the hamster wheel. In retrospect, knowing what I know now and what I’ve learned through experience, I have a sense that the time, effort and energy that that requires might be better invested elsewhere.

Instagram has also grown and developed since I started out on the platform. As a result, organic reach is decreasing hugely and I imagine it’s become much harder to grow in the way as I grew, for instance. As you said, we have over 100,000 followers now, and it’s been two and a half years of pretty much solid, daily work. But now, it would potentially be much harder than that.

So, of course, it always depends on your aims, your vision and what you’re trying to achieve, and it’s important to consider all of that in deciding whether Instagram is the right platform for you. It has its upsides and downsides, like anything else.

Would you say it’s an effective tool for architects, for example classical architects building buildings, to find new clients?

I still believe so, yes. I think it’s a good and sustainable strategy to share your process as you work as an architect, documenting your work, showing your work with clients. Stuff like: How’s the progress on that project? How was your site visit? How does an initial idea go from a sketch on paper to an actual physical realization?

I think that’s a very exciting process, and one that very few clients are actually aware of, or have an idea of how long it takes, what challenges it presents, the level of detailed preparation and thinking required. So I think it’s really interesting and exciting to share this kind of progress to educate your potential clients.

So if your aim is to get more leads and more clients, then you should put out content that is focused on and targeted at these clients. Not targeted at other architects.

So if your aim is to get more leads and more clients, then you should put out content that is focused on and targeted at these clients. Not targeted at other architects. That’s not the point, right? It’s about being approachable and about showing that you’re still human being behind the complex processes of your profession, and that you’re open to communication with potential clients. I think that could be a really solid starting strategy for many architects looking to make new professional connections and secure new clients.

How do you think architects can embrace their architectural sketching skills and use this as a communication tool in their marketing plans?

I think it’s actually very aesthetically appealing and attractive to share the initial sketches as part of the communication process. It could just be at the table in a client meeting, sketching things out together. I think it’s so powerful; sketching is a tool that, for me, opens up a dialogue beyond verbal explanations and imaginings. It’s much more open, because when you see sketched out images, you don’t have the sense that it’s set in stone. Architectural sketching is flexible, a process, and you can make changes. You can interact, you can contribute with your own doodles or sketches, as well as your words.

So yeah, I think it’s extremely effective to invite clients to approach projects in this way, as a way of getting a clear idea of exactly what the client wants, as well as discussing outer constraints and legislation, and site analysis, and all the stuff that’s essential in shaping your concept together with the client. I think architectural sketching is just a great, very natural, fast tool, in getting started with the developing of that concept.

I think using architectural sketching as a tool for communication and a way of engaging with the client on a more human, relational level is very important.

Of course, there will be clients that may perceive sketches, hand sketches, as something amateur. I’ve experienced that. It’s just a matter of taste. Some people are much more used to shiny digital visualizations, CAD drawings and stuff like that. If you bring a sketch, some people, albeit a small minority, might find it unprofessional, because they’re expecting computer generated images or drawings. So it really depends on the client you work with. But I believe in really engaging them in the process, and solving problems together with their feedback and comments on the sketches is just one of an array of very valuable approaches in how to market yourself.

It’s all about the communication, and how the client feels. The client doesn’t just want, for example, a home they would love to live in, but they also want to feel assured that you, as an architect, will accompany them through the process safely and professionally, guiding them along the way, and that you’ll take care of any issues which need resolved in order to successfully make their vision a reality. For the client, it’s all about feeling safe and in good hands.

So I think using architectural sketching as a tool for communication and a way of engaging with the client on a more human, relational level is very important. Architectural projects are usually a very long process and can be very challenging, and I think we as architects need not only to educate our clients, but, just as importantly, to show that we are there for them. We are serving them. We are providing a service. So, in an ideal world, the proceedings and communication should be as smooth as possible.

You represent a new generation of young architects. What are your thoughts on the profession in general? How would you like to see change in the future?

It’s a very big question. From my perspective, and particularly with reference to where I live, in Prague, I think we should be focusing much more on sustainability, on having a very environmentally aware approach. There are three pillars – environmental, social and economic, and I think focusing on all three of these aspects is an approach that we should be taking today. We need to be thinking more about future generations and leaving the Earth in a better state than we found it.

So that’s one thing. I think the other, which is connected to that, is about how we approach building altogether. When I was in school, we were mostly focused on designing new buildings, but what’s really in demand right now is reconstructions, refurbishments, taking care of old buildings and doing conversions and adapting them. I think this is a very healthy approach – taking what we already have and thinking about how best to work with it, because demolition is not always the answer. I feel that that’s a very necessary approach, and a healthy kind of architectural practice in the modern world.

Do you have any advice for Archipreneurs who want to start and build their own business?

It might be a little cliché, but clichés are based upon some truths, after all. I’d say that self-awareness is key: knowing what you are, who you are, what and who you want to be, what your weaknesses and strengths are, and where you can help other people, how you can be valuable to the world. Zone in on those things and find your niche, and be very specific about your target audience, the people that you want to serve.

What I’ve found along the way is that it’s always an ongoing process. I really want to help architects, designers and hobby sketchers, so those are the main groups I try to serve. These can be split into two rough groups: on the one hand, there’s a professional element to it, architecture students and professional architects, and professionals in neighboring areas such as interior design, landscape architecture or even civil engineering. Then there are the hobby sketchers, which is the non-professional group. Urban sketching is actually a hugely popular pastime. So upon discovering that, I realized I could potentially really help those people, too.

I didn’t realize how lucky I was in the beginning to have found my niche, and that this niche, architectural sketching, is kind of a mixture of architecture and drawing, and it’s actually quite narrow, as is, of course, the nature of a niche. It’s focused. But, at the same time, this particular niche is very fruitful, and there are plenty of people engaging with it. So in terms of business, it’s actually very sustainable, and this concept, this model, can work.

So, yeah, I think those are the two most important things to focus on: knowing who you want to serve and providing those people with value. And it’s important to remember, of course, that providing value usually involves providing useful, interesting content for free, on a consistent, regular basis.

You have to put yourself out there. I recently read a quote. I don’t know the author, but it stuck with me: “It’s not about being the best. It’s about being the best-known.” So you have to really market yourself and put yourself out there, which can be a daunting thing at first. But you have to take the plunge and go for it, because you never know what might come in return.

How do you see the future of the architectural profession? In which areas (outside of traditional practice) can you see major opportunities for up and coming architects?

I think it actually depends on how society perceives the role of an architect. It differs from country to country. What I really love about this profession is the very universal skill set that you have when you graduate from school. As an architect, you are capable of much more than just the production of architecture, producing drawings and bringing them to life in the physical world.

Our skills are, in part, very artistic, which lend themselves to areas like graphic design, video production, 3D modeling and rendering, and so on. We also have a wealth of very technical knowledge in terms of things like civil engineering. I thought about this myself a lot when I was looking for a job and trying to build my professional profile. I personally found myself much more interested in visual communication and visual presentation of architecture beyond just producing some drawings in AutoCAD.

That’s also the reason why I left my first job. I left shortly after my probation period was over, because I felt like it just wasn’t the direction I wanted to go in. I spent all day drawing in AutoCAD, clicking away on my computer, and I felt very unfulfilled. After leaving this first job, I decided to focus my professional profile even more on visual presentation of architecture, and I learned that there are actually at least three areas of architecture, in a broad sense. I’ll explain:

What I mean is that there’s the production phase, production area, which we’re trained to do at university. But there are at least two more equally important areas, which come at the beginning and at the end of that process. At the beginning there is inspirational phase, where the initial ideas and visions are born. So, there’s inspiration, there’s production, and afterwards, when production is completed, there’s the marketing and promotion. This means thinking about how you promote existing and new architecture, and the new developments of architecture, the urban themes of cities, stuff like that. And actually, in these two areas, the initial inspiration and the promotion at the end… there aren’t many people specializing in this kind of work.

I feel I can bring more value to those two areas than to the production, because the production is already somewhat oversaturated with architects. There are plenty of people producing architecture. But there are not that many people who provide inspiration at the initial stages of the process, and also who promote and celebrate what has been done following its completion.

I’m trying to talk quite broadly about the many different options and possibilities for architects, because as I’ve said, these are the areas where architects have the very broad skill sets required, but aren’t necessarily using them to their full potential.

I myself am still very young for an architect, so I can’t speak from decades of experience, as I don’t have that yet… so I can only speak from where I stand right now. And what I can say is that, when I was studying architecture, I only saw one path: to become an architect and to produce architecture, to design, to do the drawings, to see it through to realization. But there are so many more paths you can go down as a trained architect. That’s been a huge relief for me. I think it’s fantastic that I can take my skills as an architect and use them in other, neighboring areas, and not just directly in architectural production. I truly believe that the career possibilities for architects in the modern day and age are richly varied and that young architects today have, in many ways, broader horizons than ever before.

About David

David Drazil is a young architect, who loves to sketch. With passion for visual presentation of architecture, he’s sharing freebies and educational resources on how to #SketchLikeAnArchitect.

During his architectural studies, both in the Czech Republic and Denmark, David found his passion in the visual presentation of architecture – namely architectural sketching, visualisations, animation, and virtual reality.

In 2016, David graduated from Aalborg University in Denmark with a Master of Science (MSc.) degree in Architecture and Design. David has gained working experience from both Czech and Danish studios, such as Cigler Marani Architects, KHR Architecture, and Danielsen Architecture.

David has a successful online presence on his website SketchLikeAnArchitect.com and on Instagram – by sharing daily tips & tricks on architectural sketching, David has built a community of over 100k fans.

Today, his work includes online and live teaching, speaking at universities and conferences, architectural and graphic design projects, and multiple collaborations including sketching apps for iPad called Morpholio and ShadowDraw.

*Some of the links above are affiliate links, which means that if you choose to make a purchase, we will earn a commission. This commission comes at no additional cost to you. We are a participant in the Gumroad and Teachable affiliate program, affiliate advertising programs designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to affiliated sites and products.

The post Architectural Sketching: Teaching a Skill and Building a Business with David Drazil appeared first on Archipreneur.

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The last time we spoke, you were based in Beijing, China. Since then you have built your own studio in the mountains of Austria. What inspired this change?

Yes, quite a lot has changed. Before we were surrounded by skyscrapers – now we are surrounded by mountains. The short answer is, I relocated because I get distracted in the city, and I find it’s easier for me to focus on my work in a studio far off the grid. But that is also a bit of a superficial answer…

What’s the long one?

I’ve been thinking a lot about this question recently. I think it starts with my dad. He was an extreme free-climber: no ropes, no security, just him and the mountain. He had a very direct connection to our natural environment. The more I climb and hike, I feel that my dad’s determination to climb is similar to my determination to be an architect.

My dad was always fascinated by how small he felt at the bottom of the mountain and how humble he feels on top of it. It is a change of perspective. You become insignificant and surrounded by millions of years of evolution. You become part of a larger story. The same is true for architecture. It can become this transmitter of history and culture and this can create something long-lasting in times that are driven by nearsightedness and short attention spans. As architects, sometimes we need this change of perspective.

When my dad fell from the mountain and died three years ago, some said that my dad had achieve the creation of his own universe, his own reality far away from the real world. However, when I go to the mountains, I feel there is nothing more real than being up there. You with all your emotions and senses, with your fear, your joy, your strength and your weaknesses. And you are with nature, with all its beauty and danger. I don’t think that my dad created his own reality, distant from our reality in the cities. I think he was as close to an objective reality as possible. This direct connection to our environment is more ‘real’ to me than what we consider to be ‘the real world’ with our invented stories of consumption, consumerism and capitalism.

Yuval Harari wrote in his books that our being and doing is shaped by fictional stories that we invented, which only exist because we all agree on them. Stories like money. A dollar bill is in the eyes of a chimpanzee a worthless piece of paper. Further stories are political systems, the economy, religions or nations. Our lives were shaped by those stories.

The same is true for architecture. For most of history, those stories shaped our buildings. We built pyramids for gods, churches for religions, palaces for kings. We built in different architectural styles for different eras, for different political systems. Now we mainly build skyscrapers for the economic system. We mainly build expansive real estate. Architecture was shaped by those stories. We care about those stories, but our planet doesn’t.

The countryside connects me more to an objective reality. For example, growing and harvesting my own food reconnects me to my senses. This is something I really missed in Beijing: to breathe in nature, to taste self-grown vegetables and to touch haptic materials. I would like to base my work as close to this reality as possible. How can architecture increase the health of people? Do we find strategies to build without harming other species or the environment? How can buildings give something back instead of just consuming from their environment? How can buildings reconnect people with their senses?

I think those are important topics of the future. If we lose our connection to our environment, we won’t be able to solve the problem of our generation: climate change.

Are you still working with Penda or do you pursue your own practice from your new studio now?

Yeah, we relocated our studio to the Austrian mountains two years ago and we rebranded our studio as ‘Precht’ at that time, for a couple of reasons. The main reason was that I wanted to work closer with my wife. Projects from the last couple of years like the Toronto Tree Tower, the Tel Aviv Arcades or the Indian Projects were already done by Fei and me. However, Fei wasn’t a partner of Penda and it was about time that she gets a proper recognition. Another reason is that we are working on the countryside and authenticity is here very important. It makes a difference if you stand with your name for your projects or with an invented synonym. So there are a couple of reasons, but we are very excited about the path ahead and all the feedback we are getting.

You represent a new generation as a aspiring young architect. What are your thoughts on the future of our profession? How do you think we need to change and be ready for the future?

We live in uncertain, fast changing times. What will artificial intelligence and machine learning do to architecture? Or does it something for architecture? No one knows what the future of architecture holds, but I will put forward two possible scenarios, one optimistic and one pessimistic.

Optimistically, we will introduce nature back into our buildings and connect residents with their senses. There will be sensible architecture with materials that you want to touch, with plants that you can smell and eat, and birds and bees that you can hear. Buildings will be healthy for the residents and for the environment. There will be buildings that people care about and get inspired from. We will find a way to reinvent the building industry and our sector will detach from the notion of economic growth and our towers will become more than vast real estate.

A more negative path could be that architecture will be based on fictional stories, but it won’t be a political system or the capital market. The currency of the future is not Dollars, Euros or Renmimbi. The currency of the future is data, and architecture won’t be an exception. If that is the path, the capital for buildings won’t be money any more, it will be data, and the developers won’t be Soho, a fund or an investment group. The developer of the future will be called Google or Amazon, and the architects will no longer be Rem or Bjarke, they will be called Apple, Baidu, or whatever comes after those tech giants.

I am neither an optimist nor a pessimist. I am a possibilist and I am excited to be a young architect in our time. The challenges that are ahead of our generation are enormous, but so are the possibilities. In the end, it is up to us to determine the future we want to shape.

What are your further thoughts on technology and architecture? Around the world, venture capitalists are excited to disrupt the built environment. What are your thoughts about that as a young architect working and living in times of change?

The question is whether the change is coming from within our industry or from the outside. At the moment I see our architecture too occupied with ourselves to change anything. We are still driven by intellectual, theoretic and academic statements, but there are more urgent problems than form and styles. As we remain distracted, most likely the change will come from the outside, but maybe that wouldn’t be as negative as I previously described. In recent years, the tech companies have revolutionized other sectors that were highly insufficient, such as the mobility and transport industry. For years, innovation in that sector stagnated and it needed Uber, Hyperloop, Tesla and Google to bring change. On one hand there is a lot of place for innovation, on the other hand there is possibilities to collect data and make a profit. This is true to architecture. Our sector is insufficient and there is a huge potential of innovation and profit.

In my mind, two things are certain: The business model of architecture will change and the architectural bubble will burst wide open.

Perhaps investors and large technology companies will use their collaborative resources to create the most coherent and sustainable buildings systems. Perhaps they will use their greed to collect data in exchange of cheaper real estate. It’s very hard to predict. In my mind, two things are certain: The business model of architecture will change and the architectural bubble will burst wide open.

At the ASA Forum Bangkok you said that the era of the Star Architect is over. Could you elaborate on that?

There will still be famous names in architecture, but I think the era of the ego is over. The era of the Vitruvian man is over. The celebration of the individual will be replaced by the power of
collaboration. I am inspired how Danish architects are working on collaborative projects. From the outside it looks like couple of bands who are jamming together from time to time. I think that is a path to a future.

I used to do ski-jumping and I have to say that in sports there is less competition than in architecture. There is a lot of elitism and egoism and I hope that a new generation of architects will find ways to work together, learn from each other and lift the quality of our industry.

You are very active on social media and you have built a personal brand among young architects. Is social media also a channel to attract projects for you?

As an architect I have two goals: Create good buildings and inspire others to do so. I use Instagram mainly for the second goal. Being active on social media certainly creates opportunities, but it takes calls and meetings to establish trust. A project will never happen without trust. Similar to a dating app, social media might get you in contact, but getting married requires more effort.

Social media does something else to our projects: it’s now very common for clients to ask us to design an “Instagramable spot”. They want one shot that will make the project viral. That’s an interesting part of the brief and I am not sure if that is a particular request for my studio since I’m active on Instagram and they think I have a clue about viral marketing of spaces. I don’t know, but I find it interesting. One can say it’s superficial, but maybe it adds another dimension to the design, because it lets you also think in stories.

You also just started a food startup based in Tel Aviv and Toronto. Could you tell us more about that? What inspires you to look into the startup world?

The startup culture is a beautiful part of our time. The playing field for creativity is wide open. You don’t need to study architecture to be an architect and you don’t need to work as an architect after studying architecture. We are trained with a unique skillset that is also needed outside of our industry. We combine business with creativity. We combine history with a future vision. We combine craftsmanship with cutting edge technology. We are strategic dreamers.

We are trained with a unique skillset that is also needed outside of our industry. We combine business with creativity. We combine history with a future vision. We combine craftsmanship with cutting edge technology. We are strategic dreamers.

I try to make use of this skillset and combine it with opportunities of our time. With that in mind, I’m part of a couple of startups like Halvana (a sesame seed business), Tmber (a startup for wood distribution) and Baumbau (a startup for prefabricated structures).

As much as I am in love with architecture, the business side of it is horrible, so I try to stand on a couple of more legs to create a stable future.

What are the bad parts of the architectural business?

As Koolhaas put it, “We are in the business of uniqueness” I think that’s a pretty stupid business model. We create always a unique prototype, but we never ship. Architecture is not scalable. If you design a small house, you need two architects on your team. If you get an airport, you hire 30 architects, but your margin stays the same. This is unlike other creative industries like product design, where if you design a chair and you can sell it a million times and have a scalable business.

As Koolhaas put it, “We are in the business of uniqueness” I think that’s a pretty stupid business model.

What are your thoughts on the future of the built environment? How can it improve, and what continues to inspire you as a young architect?

I am now a five-year-old architect. An architectural toddler. As a toddler, I ask a lot of questions about our profession and try to find some alternative answers for the status quo. How did we end up with a building system that is highly insufficient, inefficient, damaging and harmful for us, other species and the environment? At the same time, less than 5% of buildings today involve an architect. Did 95% stop listening while we were busy talking to ourselves? Do we have the wrong message?

The challenges that are ahead of our generation are enormous, but so are the possibilities. In the end, it is up to us to determine the future we want to shape.

I think architects can have an important message for the problems of our time. The biggest one for our generation is climate change. But for that, we need to get our message straight. Does the world really need another glass-tower filled with ACs? The international style of a concrete structure and curtain wall killed thousands of years of building intelligence, and it makes our cities look undistinguishable. The urban fabric dies in conformism.

Maybe we have to look back to build in a location appropriate way: culturally and climatically specific. Climate change won’t be solved with new technology. It will be solved with empathy, and architecture has a lot to offer here. We should try to create buildings that connect us to nature. and to our senses. Because if buildings isolate us from our environment, we become numb to it, and if we become numb, we won’t be able to solve anything.

What continues to inspire me? Well, I am a toddler. I am naturally inspired. Wherever I look I see excitement and possibilities. If I wouldn’t be inspired as a young architect, how could I ever keep up my passion. I believe the best time for me comes in my 60s and 70s. Everything until then is learning. —

Climate change won’t be solved with new technology. It will be solved with empathy, and architecture has a lot to offer here.

About Chris Precht

Founder of Studio Precht & Penda

Chris is a young architect from Austria and founder of Penda and Studio Precht. Together with his wife Fei, his team and 2 cats, he is working from a remote place in the mountains of Salzburg. From there, they are working on projects worldwide, which range from ecological High-rises to Bamboo-buildings. Chris is an advocate for a new generation of architects that finds meaning in their work and that is a leading voice to design an ecological future.

The post Transforming Practice: Chris Precht Represents a New Generation of Design Entrepreneurs appeared first on Archipreneur.

Why did you and your husband Alun want to start your own practice?

We met as architecture students. We were both on the Master‘s course and I think we felt very quickly that we had a similar way of thinking about things, and we started the conversation that‘s still going on today.
I had a clear set of role models of working couples who had architectural or other creative practices. That was really helpful because it was a way of thinking about how you could live your life and do this job and make it work in all aspects of life. The ­famous ones like Charles and Ray Eames and the Smithsons and Lucienne and Robin Day combined creative practice with living working together. That was my inspiration, really.

How did you start?

We were both working for other practices, and then a combination of things happened. One was that I became pregnant, and we also were given two really great projects through a family member. And so, I did a year of working part-time at my job, and part-time starting our office, and then when our first child was born I did our projects in the time I had. I think it was that change in my work, on maternity leave and deciding not to go back, that gave me the opportunity to take the risk as it were. Two years later Alun joined me. We always sort of told ourselves if it didn‘t work, or if we ran out of work, then he would get another job or eventually we‘d both get another job. But luckily, that didn‘t happen. I think that‘s how we sort of cushioned ourselves, by telling ourselves we‘d see how it went.

“We always sort of told ourselves if it didn’t work, or if we ran
out of work, then he would get another job or eventually we’d both get another job.”

Why did becoming an entrepreneur appeal to you as a new parent? How does running your own practice make it easier to balance personal and professional life?

I found it very freeing. I felt that lots of new and exciting things were happening to me and it gave me a great sense of conviction that was liberating.

I was really struck by the Women in Architecture Awards shortlist this year, in that all four of us work with our life partner and I think most of us have children. It‘s not a very fashionable thing to talk about, but I thought it was quite revealing of the innate problem that it’s hard combining parenthood with a working life which is demanding of your time.

I think that working together and making it a kind of a shared enterprise is really helpful because you have somebody who shares your greater interests at heart, which is harder to do if you‘re representing yourself individually.

Certainly as being a parent running my own business, it has given me the freedom to decide when I need to be at home more, and when I need to be in the office more, and be in charge of that decision.

How did you go about finding clients at first?

At the beginning, it was a word of mouth. We did quite small-scale things. One of the first two jobs that we were given was a new house in Suffolk, which was a really amazing job and we didn‘t realize how few of those would come along in terms of being completely new-build projects. We then did a refurbishment of a large London house, and they were both projects for my sister. We were incredibly lucky and they were very supportive of us and generous in trusting us to do it.

While we were doing those, we did much smaller things as well. They were quite lean times at the beginning. There was one year before Alun joined me, when we designed three bathrooms and a kitchen. That wasn‘t such a good year! But the work sort of slowly built up.

Then, we started looking for public projects and responding to competitions as well as doing lots and lots of domestic projects. Our view is you can learn from everything. We saw everything as a potential way to develop our language and to build up our experiences.

“Our view is you can learn from everything. We saw everything as potential way to develop our language and to build up our experiences.”

In 2007, we won the Garden Museum (Phase I) pro­ject which was an invited shortlist and it opened in 2008. That was really fantastic and was a step up and really changed things for us.

When we started our practice, you had to complete work and have it published in order to have any kind of voice, but I think an advantage for young practices now is that you can use social media as a way of being part of the debate, which I think is very liberating. You don’t need anyone’s help to make that happen.

Did you establish your practice with business goals and a plan for growth? Was that important to you?

We‘ve always seen our practice as a long-term project rather than something that you immediately want results from. My experience is that generally architecture is like that. The sorts of projects that we want to do more and more are public and cultural projects which take a lot of time to develop, take a lot of time to fundraise for and get stakeholder backing for. They‘re not being done on a purely commercial basis where it‘s about speed of delivery. I find taking that time with a project really satisfying.

I think we‘re lucky that our pre-conception of our business model is that we can spend time on things. Of course, it would be nice to be more commercially successful, but for me that‘s not the only measure and in terms of creative satisfaction, we‘re very happy.

How have you grown your team and shaped the office culture?

We‘ve fairly deliberately kept ourselves quite small, so we‘re eight people at the moment. For a while, we worked from home just the two of us and we didn‘t have any staff. Then we had one member of staff – James Grayley – who stayed with us for 10 years and he was great. He then went on and started his own practice.

I think we particularly felt when we had our office at home that we had to have boundaries, so we always stopped work by 6:30. That was nice for us, but important for our staff as well. We‘ve always felt that working life should be nice and it should be hard work, but then you stop and you go home and you have other parts of your life. I think that‘s always been an important boundary for us.

When we worked from home, we always made lunch for everyone and ate together, and I think that was very nice. Now, our office is down the road from where we live. That‘s fantastic because we don‘t have to commute and most of our staff live nearby. We still don‘t work long hours; the working day stops at 6:00 or 6:30. We just try and make it a nice place to be and give people responsibility as well. I think what‘s interesting is that nearly everyone who has worked for us has since set up their own practice.

You and Alun remain actively engaged as design and pro­ject leaders, but you divide your responsibilities and lead projects individually. Why?

That was something we learned really early on. When it was just the two of us and we had small projects, we both used to work on everything together. One time we made a silly mistake, in which was one of us agreed one thing with the client and then forgot to tell the other person, and it had more serious repercussions and so after that, we decided that in terms of design, the conversation would be between both of us and that would happen in the office, but only one person would be the point of contact with the client. That meant that there was a clarity about what we were saying and what the client was saying to us. We‘ve always stuck to that since then.
In addition to your responsibilities leading the practice, running projects, being a parent, you have also taught. Why was it important for you to educate?

As new parents we were both working part-time in the practice, and Alun taught for a long time at various schools. I joined him teaching for a few years and we loved it. It gives the opportunity to have a much wider conversation, without the constraints of a real project. I find it incredibly stimulating.

I also was amazed by discovering how much you learn from your students – that was delightful. I remember my first-year architecture teacher saying that, and I thought it was kind of nonsense, but it‘s astonishing. I suppose it‘s not surprising really because all of these things are conversations and you learn from everything, but I wasn‘t expecting it in such a tangible way.

Then we had a year with three big projects to develop and we decided that we had to focus on the practice. Since then we‘ve been external examiners, both of us at different places, but we haven‘t yet returned to studio teaching.

What are your thoughts on the future of architecture? How can it improve, and what continues to inspire you?

I think we always try to not specialise, to be open to new projects and not see ourselves just in one bracket. What we have found to be increasingly the case and frustratingly limiting is that so many projects that we‘re bidding for now are for clients who want to see examples of something we’ve done which is exactly the same thing. It‘s as if the risk management world is limiting what you‘re creatively capable of. I think that‘s a disappointment because I think we could all be doing, learning and contributing to more things than those which seems practically within our reach. But I suppose what Alun and I always find most interesting is the idea of what culture is and what it comes back to do. That‘s always evolving and it‘s hard to know where that‘s going. You just always want to be able to be part of the conversation. —

About

Biba Dow

Biba Dow is a director of Dow Jones Architects. Current projects include a new building for Maggie’s Cancer Care in Cardiff, St Mary Magdalene Living Heritage Centre in Paddington and the redevelopment of Bevis Marks synagogue in London. She writes about architecture, is an external examiner at Kingston School of Architecture, a design review panel member, competition judge and was shortlisted this year for the Architect of the Year in the Women in Architecture Awards for the Garden Museum.

The post Design for Life: How to Balance Your Creative Practice appeared first on Archipreneur.

One of these aspects relates to the an ever-shifting flow of different occupants in office spaces: employees, temporary occupants, partners, customers, suppliers, clients, etc. Over the last few decades, it has become obvious that, in order to stay competitive and increase productivity, companies need to embrace the idea that physical spaces have to adapt to the concept of fluidity. This flexibility has already become a staple in the organization of many forward-thinking enterprises which created workplaces that facilitate a way of operating in which team sizes and way of collaborating vary from project to project, and depend on specific tasks and project stage.

Data collection to analyze the use of office spaces

Deloitte’s new HQ in Amsterdam, named The Edge, epitomizes this smart utilization of new tech which affects office design in terms of organization and energy efficiency. Designed by PLP Architecture, the building is described as the world’s greenest, most intelligent building. The project, which promotes a new way of smart-enabled agile working, has also received the highest sustainability score ever awarded by the British rating agency BREEAM. It provides 1,000 desks for 2,500 Deloitte workers who interact with it – for anything from parking to desk allocation, instant locker access and food ordering – through a dedicated app which connects with 30,000 sensors embedded in the building’s LED lighting system.

As a result, Deloitte’s talent attraction and retention has rocketed, with a four-fold increase in job applications and 60% fewer absentees. Data collection allowed company to analyze the use of their office spaces and helped push forward the concept of hot desking–using desks only when they’re needed. This greatly increases occupancy efficiency and boosts productivity. Meeting rooms may be moved, merged, or eliminated entirely, providing a more efficient use of any available office space.

It is only a matter of time before the new standard for meeting and presentations is immediate interaction. Presenters will be able to send information directly to participants’ personal devices or collaborative interactive displays such as smart whiteboards. Telepresence is already here and will be further advanced through the proliferation of virtual reality. VR allows companies to hold interactive presentations and get fast and accurate feedback on their products and concepts. Attendees can “travel” to remote locations with their colleagues or customers, with motion controllers and positional tracking of the headsets bringing hands and body movement into long-distance meetings, making communication more natural and effective. The increasing use of VR in meetings reduces the need for physical meeting and conference rooms.

It is only a matter of time before the new standard for meeting and presentations is immediate interaction. Presenters will be able to send information directly to participants’ personal devices or collaborative interactive displays such as smart whiteboards. Telepresence is already here and will be further advanced through the proliferation of virtual reality. VR allows companies to hold interactive presentations and get fast and accurate feedback on their products and concepts. Attendees can “travel” to remote locations with their colleagues or customers, with motion controllers and positional tracking of the headsets bringing hands and body movement into long-distance meetings, making communication more natural and effective. The increasing use of VR in meetings reduces the need for physical meeting and conference rooms.

Sharing information and knowledge

Another important aspect of the use of IoT in office design is its contribution to sharing information and knowledge. The future of modern workplaces lies in seamless collaboration across departments and continents. Studios, incubators, pop-ups are just a few new workplace types that evolved with the emergence of digital technology. These new spaces reflect the fast-paced economy that is pushing out the old concept of hierarchical structure manifested through space. The anachronistic model of centralized decision-making is being replaced with a more transparent setup that reinforces different cultural values and caters to a whole new generation of young professionals that put great value on well-being and at-work comfort.

Large companies build their office buildings equipped with smart sensors and heating systems that can regulate micro-environments to suit individual employees makes the occupants of the building more comfortable, and they can do their work more productively. This ability of the workplace to boost user satisfaction is particularly important with millennials. Tech giants like Facebook and Google are leading examples of companies that embraced campus-style workspace aimed for young talents.

In designing Apple’s new spaceship-shaped campus in Cupertino, California, Foster+Partners included a 100,000-square-foot fitness center, 300,000 square feet of research and development facilities, and two miles of walkways and running paths for employees at Apple’s new spaceship-shaped campus in Cupertino, California. They also included an underground parking, as well as an orchard, meadow and pond. The staff can also navigate the campus on bikes, electric golf carts and commuter shuttles. The use of environmental sensors tracking the interior temperature, humidity, air quality, barometric pressure, ambient light levels and occupancy turns a building into an intelligent ecosystem that is both cost-efficient and increases productivity.

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Intelligent office design is already embraced as cutting-edge innovation and a smart business investment that improves workplace dynamics. How do you see your workplace evolving in the future?

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