Ok, Shane, Steve, SofMM, and Csus.....let me put this in perspective. My perspective, because I'm the one that caused this. You may not like it, but I've EARNED my opinion, so too bad.
First off, I DON"T hate architects. On the contrary, architecture was my first love. Untill I found music. I spent a good portion of my life as a WORKING musician. Not a hit record chasing life, but an honest down in the trenches ...woodsheding, playing 6 and 7 night a week, and sometimes twice on Sunday working musician. After 20 years, and still making $50 a night, I decided that something is wrong with the system. After meeting european musicians, I was enlightened to the fact that our culture has its proverbial head up its ass. A pop music and fast food society places little value on experience. Or quality. But great value on a document that says you have learned something, whether you did or not. Once I understood that MUSICIANSHIP is NOT valued here, at least in working wage perspective, I was able to "relieve" my ambitions towards jazz. Jazz feeds and cloths no kids. And my kids waited forever. THAT was the real problem. Coming to grips with music as a vocation, was disheartening at best, heartbreaking at worst. But I bit my lip. Besides, I had a lot of great times as a musician. Times I wouldn't trade for a degree in architecture.
When I was 35 years old, I had very few marketable skills, other than working for the military for 3 years. Nothing I learned there was of any potential wage earning. But I did have one ace. I was creative. I tried to enroll in a local city college, hoping to aim at a degree in Architecture. One enlightening meeting with a school administrator ended that pipe dream. How does one pay for school, go to school, and earn a living to feed a family, at minimum wage at the same time. Ha! Reality check.
This was at a time, when the country was in recession, and there were NO jobs. At least not for people like me. And with no income, eviction and starvation was becoming a very real affair, whether you believe it or not. I lived it. Enough said. So, what to do. Hunger rationalizes a lot of pride.
I had seen some crafts shows, and a huge flea market went on every weekend in the city I lived in. I decided to build some wood craft items and see if they would sell. I had built a couple of electric guitars in the past, and had a few hand tools and a router, drill ...the usual home tools. What I DIDN"T have was a way to cut wood. So I sold my pride and joy...my 1962 original Strat. Got enough to buy a used craftsman table saw. Spent a few days gathering materials from anywhere I could. Construction sites, fence companys, local cabinet shops etc. Had no money to buy materials so I had to learn to use what I could, to make interesting and unique crafts. And you know what? It worked. AND it was funner than hell. I had a ball. And it sold like hotcakes. I was amazed. I look back now and roll my eyes. Ha! What gall!!
One thing led to another, and within a year, I had a shop, full of GREAT tools, and had a craft store, right on the corner of a busy street in Sacramento. I called my shop "Environmental Woodcraft", kinda after reading an architecture book called Environmental Design. The nerve. But at least it was truth, because I only used recycled wood, old hardware, and unique accessories.
I had a great sense of design, unlimited materials....not great, but I knew how to get the best out of it. Good design always sells. Even if its a toilet seat.
During this time, I had a chance to design....and build, a local downtown artsy fartsy coffeehouse/restuarant/bakery hangout. I knew nothing about that level of design or the ergonomics nor the legalitys of commercial interior design. I didn't care either. I just did it and it came out fantastic. I built EVERYTHING. From counters, tables, chairs, booths, displays, art, lamps, kitchen and fixtures, Signage, bathrooms...from back door to the front door and windows. It took 6 weeks working 20 hr days. But I did it, AND came in at $15,600 below his lowest bid. Not only that, from the day it opened, it was standing room only, for a good 15 yrs.
2 days after it opened, the Sac Bee did a half page article on my work. From that point on, for 2 years, it was nothing but kicking ass freedom.....3 restaurants, a music store, a couple of high end men and womens hairdressing boutiques, a gift store, record store, 2 tourist bars, a local rock music bar, home and business fixtures, fun rooms..and tons of CRAFTS........UNTILL...I met an architect.
One day, a local well known architect came in. He had a set of plans and asked me if I would be interested in bidding on a project for a chain of small hotdog and hamburger restaurants. Custom booths with a 19th century design. I said I'd be interested, so what do I do? Bid, that's all there is to it. Ok, sounds easy. I looked into the plans, looked simple enough. So I did. Took a day, and I submitted it. A week later he called me into his PLUSH office, and proceeded to tell me I had come in at $500 over the lowest other bid. He wanted to know why? WHY? I should have told him I don't read minds. How do I know why, I bid it and thats all there was to it. WHY
indeed. Why does the wind blow? Ha! He proceeded to tell me that ineffeciency would be my downfall. I wouldn't be able to compete. WTF!! Compete? FUCK YOU! I don't NEED any stinking competing. I'm doing perfectly fine with NO competing bub. So take your plans burn them for all I care. Fine. OF all the nerve. So much for first experiences. Besides, his design sucked. A degree in architecture does not guarantee great design.
On to the business at hand. Having fun, making a living doing what I WANT to do. Not grovel for some hotdog job at the lowest bid. FUCK THAT. Right then and there, it dawned on me. I had a good sense of design. I had a business. I owned my tools, and I was makeing a living. Not great, but a free, honest living, selling MY design. NOT building others. Little did I know, progress creates potential for disaster. During the time I was in this building, it was becoming kind of a local crafts and antique "mall". The building was the oldest concrete building in Sacramento. It was an old DAIRY. When it was built in the early 1900's it was farmland. Now it was right downtown. Ha! What a history. It was a speakeasy, and brewery during the prohibition. Local old farts would come by and spend countless hours telling me storys. One of them happened to be a retired architect. He came by at least once a week while out on a walk.
He told me he admired what I was doing. I told him I admired architects and I'll never forget what he said. He told me to take pleasure in using my hands. What I do with my hands, can never be duplicated on paper. He said architecture had become an experience in design by commitee. And approval. By the government as well as "design review" boards. Free design only comes from your hands. No matter how small. or large. I still believe that.
What a great time. Great old building too. 3 storys, with all kinds of rooms, and one 3 story room lined with white tile. That was the shop. Would have made the best reverb room known to man!
It also had a series of gravity rooms for cooling the coils. These were fucking great. Lined with 12" thick cork. Talk about anachoic. AND every wall in the building was 14" thick concrete. Perfect studio rooms. If only I had the money at the time, I could have made a studio designed in heaven.
Slowly but surely, other craftsman came in and rented space from me. I didn't own it, but rented 12,000 sq ft for $300 per mo. What a steal. It was a wreck when I came in. It was unique as hell when I left. What I didn't realize, was property values were shooting up at a phenomenal rate during that time. That was my undoing. One day, the owner sent me an letter stating I had 30 days to move. He had sold the building. I later learned he sold it for a WHOPPING $5 mil. Crap. So much for my second dream.
So....what to do now. Well, I decided to go to work for other shops for a while. Till I could regroup. Never happened. One thing led to another and 20 more yrs went by. BUT....during this time I gained some hard earned lessons, skills, and knowledge. This is where the attitude comes from. While I'm no expert at anything, I'm also no fool, and when it comes to my area of expertise, I'm one of the best. Thats why Macys, or Federated Dept. Stores routinely used my details in their project scope and detail books for issuing to other contractors for large store fixture projects. But I didn't work for them. The architects simply TOOK the details I submitted. and used them as thier own. Fuck them. One dickhead had the audacity to claim they were his details, not knowing I was the one that drew them. The series he took had one mistake. I fixed it in a submittal and the prick redlined it. What a fucking moron.
Over a 15 yr period, I had the unfortunate although enlightening displeasure to interface with countless hundreds of snotnosed punk architects, who, although working for a design department for a department store corporation, thought they were gods gift to the design world and knew everything. Little did they really know. I had countless sessions with arrogant, condencending shitforbrains idiots, who's only claim to REAL design, was how to interpret REAL construction documents, and then redline them. Ha. Untill they got mine. Out of 15 yrs work, I only had four or five drawings with red marks on them. Most of the time it was ME, telling them they couldn't build thier assinine designs, the way they had them drawn. Time after time, I had to relay detail after detail, to the point their original design was useless, only to change into what I designed by detail. THAT my friend is the REAL point. If it weren't for the fact, that it is the TRADES and CRAFTSMAN that DETAIL designs, architects would have NOTHING. It is this pure fact, that tells me design is USELESS unless you can build it. And if you rely on other people to tell you HOW to build it, then your design is bullshit. Take a look at ANY set of architectural documents issued for construction, and 90% of it is DETAILED by prior TRADE STANDARDS, and or specialty expertise. Design my ASS. Its only as good as the peoples expertise who are destined to build it. THEY are the ones who ultimately design it. Not what some pencil and mouse pushing designer thinks they are designing. Yea, look at a city. Every building, and detail is different. BUT, if it weren't for the people and companys that design the products, materials, processes, tools, and skills, thier design wouldn't be worth the paper its drawn on. Besides, modern citys SUCK. BIG TIME. So do malls. So do residential "villages". Ugly fucking brain farts. Drive through the Sacramento Valley and you'll see thousands of acres of em.
So give me a break. Architect smarkatect. Your only a thought arranger. I have more respect for the painter that flicks his bush full of paint up the back of your $2000 suit. At least he talks
decent to me.
And let me say something else in regards to architecture. I worked in a high rise office building in Sacramento for 3 months. TOTALLY ASSINE. Couldn't open ONE window in the whole damn 20 story building. What kind of fucking drugs was this architect on? Within a year of opening, over 500 people had become ill because of the design of the building, forced the nature of the HVAC, curtain walls, and working spaces. Fuck. There should be a law. Architects should be required to WORK in their dumb ass buildings for a 6 month before a certificate of occupancy is issued. Design indeed. Kiss my ass. How many people died because of the design of a building. Lord only knows.
And how bout city planners. There's an oxymoron if I've ever heard one.
One other thing. I asked an architect who designed a local high end boutique restaurant, what methodology he use in designing the commercial kitchen. Thats easy he said. He learned to cook the menu. Now there is a brilliant thought. By the way Shane, do you EVEN record?
So, I hope this illustrates what I DON"T hate. What I do dispise, is people who think that just because they have a few years of education in architecture, they have the expertise to design the complete hiarchy of thier design. And the right to talk down to the people that GIVE them the knowledge via documents, that make their complete document package look as though they did it all themself. And I've had MORE than my share of those assholes. Take a look at ANY bid package to the trades and you will find this statement. SHOP DRAWINGS will be submitted to the architect for approval. And do you REALLY think that the architects write specification books by inventing THEM. Ha! My ass. How the hell do you think they learn how this stuff is done. Make me puke. Why do you think the Masons had secret associations. To this day. The history of construction idea thievery is from the time of the Pyramids. Not only that, but without the slavery, they wouldn't have been built. It may not be slavery today, but compared to the same hour of work a tradesworker gets, an architect is WAY overpaid. Just because he spent a few years getting an education, a tradesworker works the same amount of time to gain the skills to work that SAME hour. So you tell me.
Like my dad says, "a doctors mercedes engine rebuild will cost him the same hourly rate that the doctor gets. PERIOD, or I won't do it. AND he has to make an appointment with me.!" He rebuillt a lot of em. And farraris. And Corvettes. You name it, he rebuilt em cause he was the best. Now he builds aircraft for doctors.
Time marches on. I'm 59 yrs old, newly moved to a place where work as a CAD draftsman is hard to come by, at least in my area of expertize. I've found a job at a high end cabinet and millwork shop, that is the only one on the coast of Oregon, steeped and tooled to do the type of woodworking we do. Since I've been working there, I have met no less than 6 architects, who specialize in EXPENSIVE homes. I'm talking million dollar homes. You would think that someone who is educated in architecture would have some kind of clue as to what a customer wants, and willing to listen to their wishes. Ha! Couldn't be farther from the truth. Not only do we deal with the architect, we deal with the client. Without fail, the client comes in and tells us to IGNOR the kitchen that the architect has drawn. They show us the SAME pictures that they show the architect, and I just have to wonder where the fuck the architects head was. Then WE design it. Never fails. They love it. Cause we LISTEN. We give them the solutions to what they need. Not delusions of granduer and preposterous design that solves nothing. One architect proposed putting the refridgerator in another room, cause it just didn't FIT IN to his design. Give me a fucking break. We simply suggested another brand of fridge called Sub Zero that allows you to put any cabinetry panels ON the fridge, doors and sides. Looks like part of the cabinetry. Came out great and the customer loved it. But that is not the issue. What is, is how the architect comes across. Without fail, like a prick. FUCK THEM. No, I don't hate all architects. Only the ones that think thier shit doesn't stink. I got news for them. They have an asshole just like me. And I won't put up with them ever again, job or no job. They can go fuck themself.
fitZXarchitecturelover
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