Sketching Architecture

Its all Greek to me..,,

2012-02-21T13:09:00.001+11:00

I have been having a break from posting but still trying to do a spread a day in my sketchbook to record the random events of the day. These two pages, from a few weeks ago start a little adventure I plan to have during my evening post dinner cup of tea. I am going to start exploring what I see as essential elements of architecture. Having a knowledge of these things help enormously when sketching architecture.

I am going to start with the classical orders (fancy name for different types of columns and the bits on the top) There are 3 of them: Doric, Ionic and Corinthian ... In fact they became five during the renaissance (tuscan and composite were added) My history of architecture is not to be totally trusted and will be ultra simplified but I will try not to be too incorrect. The 3 orders were codified by the Romans...but they got them from the Greeks. So I am starting with the Greek Doric.

Anyway... Here are my fun, too late at night, sketches of the Doric order. Including the mistakes I made along the way because I drew first and looked second!?!

When I posted the above page on flickr, Maarten pointed out that I was a little narrow in my definition of THE orders. Last night I could find any Chinese, Aztec or Mayan columns easily in my library BUT I found these....
So I hope I didn’t offend any one in this regard?!?! I am very grateful to Maarten for pointing my shortcomings... It is great to get such feedback and to then lead me down a little tangent...so thanks!!!

Sketching complicated roof forms

2012-02-18T18:58:00.000+11:00

This was a very challenging roof to draw! But rather than stressing about getting the perspective perfect, I am starting to be confident that my loose linework and paint can sometimes hide the wonkiness. The question is how much wonkiness can you get away with?

I like to drive around suburban blocks looking for houses that catch my eye. Sketching from the comfort and security of my car!

Many hideously overscaled new houses...so this one stood out this afternoon and it also fits in with the USK AUS monthly theme of Roofscapes. Yes.... we have decided to have our own monthly theme...for more details visit our flickr or facebook.
www.facebook.com/pages/Urban-Sketchers-Australia/29145153...
www.flickr.com/groups/uskaustralia/

I think I will try some more complicated roofscapes in the next few weeks.

Finishing off my week with architecture sketching late at night!

2012-02-14T13:09:00.000+11:00

Instead of my goal of posting once a week... I seem to be only averaging once a month. I will try to step it up again.
I haven’t really had any time lately to be out on the streets sketching buildings and it has been raining a lot, but I still seem to keep up my usual late Friday evening architecture sketching.
This was a sketch I did two weeks ago.... Instead of my often late night Baroque sketching... it was Indian Architecture sketching while watching an impressive performance by the Indian cricket team....
Although I MUCH prefer to sketch on location, sketching from photos is such a good way to practice...and it seems that I find Baroque sketching relaxing late at night.
Here are some other ones (some mid -week!)

If you missed it - I have explained why I like sketching baroque so much here

A holiday from sketching architecture

2012-01-16T13:54:00.000+11:00

I spent my two week summer holidays at home sketching around Sydney as if I was a tourist. I feel I didn't sketch much architecture... but from the look of this post I did more than I realised....

My first day was the ultmiate tourist day ... I ended up sketching that buidling again (the Sydney Opera House)

Between the shells - the door to the left is the loading dock! I drew another two sketches of this building on that day... but won't bore you with them.

On the other side of Circular Quay....

Just up the road from that.

On my second day (which was Christmas Eve) I sketched the tree in Martin Place with the GPO tower in the background. This seems SOOO out of date and old news now doesn't it!

Then a morning in a great museum - The Hyde Park Barracks

Afternoon in the Art Gallery and then I sketched the exterior of the buidling at closing time.
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After Christmas I went up to the BLue Mountians for a few days and although my focus was grand vistas I did sneak a few building sketches in...

Managed to sketch architecture in the background during lunch

And then a few cute buidlings in Mt Victoria.

A shop in Blackheath....

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During my second week I have some days at home, and then sketch meetups with some of my Sydney sketching friends

a quick sketch of QVB

An abandoned sub station with the Harbour Bridge in the background

The Mosque at Auburn - home to the Turkish community... the start of my world tour of Sydney suburbs.

I will leave my final day's sketching for another post!

So.. I suppose I did a fair share of architectural sketches even when I think that I am not...

San Lorenzo Chapels

2011-11-30T20:54:00.002+11:00

I love notated drawings... here is a very neat sketch of mine from 2004 - comparing two chapel in San Lorenzo Florence

More sketches from the archive

2011-11-21T14:21:00.002+11:00

Ely Cathedral

St Stephens Walbrook
Following on from my last post....There is a big difference between sketching from the comfort of your desk and sketching out on location. Here are some of my typical ‘desk sketches’ dating from 2000. These are sketches that I did from photos post trip to the UK. I thought naively that I would be able to do this kind of sketch on location as easily as I could from the controlled environment inside my studio.

I did approx 50 sketches like these of elevations, plans, sections, small axonometric studies and detailed sketches from the buildings that I visited during my first trip to the UK in 2000. These two pages were my favourite....but there were a lot of pages with distorted perspectives and over hatched sketches. I might put them together as an issuu edition one day.....

The passage of time

2011-11-18T13:04:00.000+11:00

A sketch from 2005. Perhaps my first ever on location sketch (ie. where I sat down specifically to do a sketch as opposed to uni assignments or little doodles)This was one single sketch that I completed during my week visit... done sitting down in a bus stop opposite these two buildings.

This is what I wrote in my photo album at the time about this experience

"It was in the sun and so was beautiful temperature wise. The lanes of cars whizzing past was perhaps the least attractive part but I didn’t really notice as I opened my notebook and actually attempted to do a sketch of the two buildings opposite me.The sketch was pathetic - but the experience of actually looking and then recording a building on location was so novel for me that I think one of the highlights of the trip! It was also a bit of a break through in my ideas about how to look, learn, record and enjoy architecture.
I spent more time looking at the Butler building but this one was quite nice as well! I more considered it in contrast to the more elaborate building to the right.
I realised after attempting this sketch that I would be better off sketching diagrams and details rather than try to draw the whole elevation accurately - this is just too hard for me to achieve on location - at the moment anyway, till my skills improve!"

I find discovering these kind of early adventures with sketching fascinating and often strangely ironic! I was a fanatical photographer at the time and this sketch was such hard work.

So of course a few days after re-discovering this sketch...I did a very quick sketch of it....

Of course, these days, I just do this kind of sketch as a matter of course... while there are a few interesting quirks with this facade, I would not call it 'hard' now!

ah... practice practice practice.... anything is possible (almost) when you have desire and dedication to hard work.

Relaxation vs Experimentation

2011-11-10T13:12:00.004+11:00

Here are two versions of the Doge's Palace in Venice (sketched from a photo)
The first one is an example of how I relax in the evening - give me a very complicated building and a good cup of tea (Lu Shan Oolong?)and I am very happy. my hand just seems to do its own thing... and then I have a bit of fun splashing some colour around.

The second version I tried to think before I sketched. As my notes indicate I am currently exploring ways of more expressive sketching. There is a tendency to try to draw every detail or part of the building - so here I was trying to be selective.
I intend to try again as one this second sketch I realised that I need a better view.

While thinking about my time in Venice in Sept 2010- here is a photo that I came across yesterday of me in action during breakfast (one can't draw architecture all the time!?)

I am ALWAYS sketching architecture

2011-11-08T13:12:00.002+11:00

Whether it is out on location....

St Matthews Manly from my cousins wedding on Saturday

An hour at Milsons Point ...having fun sketching the Luna Park gates and then a very quick opera house sketch witn my new 3.8mm pilot parallel calligraphy pen (I never get sick of sketching this buidling!)

..... Or just some relaxation sketching after dinner.Trying different techniques and pen/colours....

.... Or a doodle at work

(from my Italian desktop calendar) while waiting for something to print
This is an example of my standard work sketching style - my bread and butter sketching that I have been doing for 20 years done with an Artline 0.4 black felt pen. Before I discovered watercolour I was totally addicted to cross hatching- it is the way that I think when designing – and it wasn’t until I started drawing my food that I started to restrain myself...now I hardly ever use it.

It doesn’t matter what you sketch as long as you keep sketching. Whilst I much prefer being outside sketching, I find it very useful to be constantly sketching and experimenting from photos in training for on location sketching.

Kedleston Hall Sketches

2011-10-31T18:06:00.001+11:00

Sorry, things have been a little quiet here lately... been a bit busy doing architectural work and no leisure for architectural sketching!

So here are the sketches that i did during a few hours visiting Kedleston Hall last September.As it was sunny when I arrived I went and sat in the grass at the rear and at the front of the house to quickly sketch the exterior.

Then I went inside and was very surprised that I was allowed to paint inside! It was also special chat to numerous staff members including the curator a number of times - the last time all about Palladio!! What a treat!!! If you want to sketch during a great house visit you must work very fast or else you need all day... and I had another house to visit that day.

My final sketch was in the saloon - this sketch which was done very quickly and rather than being a literal view of the room is a distorted diagram which captures the essence of the room -the dome, the pattern of the dome, the alternating trianglar and semi-domed niches and the urns contained within the niches. I can fully construct an image of the room in my head as a result of this sketch.

This kind of abstraction is something I want to explore further - part diagram/ distorted perspective - in order to describe a complex space in a single drawing.

A discussion about perspective

2011-10-12T22:55:00.000+11:00

Last week I posted this sketch to my flickr with the idea of making sketching perspective on location simpler. The main intent is to sketch a simple building on a flat site without having to establish the vanishing points (which are often off the page of your sketchbook) (click on photo to access the explanation)
What happened on my flickr was an amazing discussion about 3 point perspectives... leading to a wonderful method by wernerk - not for the faint hearted but it appeals to the mathematical side of my brain!

and then Gerard Michel (the master of perspective) shared this amazing technique...which has all to do with moving the page of your sketchbook up to your eye (having one eye closed) and drawing parallel lines... took me a while to figure it out....
Click on the photos to go to full explanations.

Meanwhile I have been having fun lately sketching contour drawings and abandoning perspective all together!!!

A quick 'paper' exercise based on photos I took last year in Rome (Borromini is naturally one of my favourite architects!)

Quick sketches done in 30 minutes before going to a sketching event in the Royal Botanic Garden Sydney.

Hardwick Hall Revisited

2011-09-29T13:00:00.002+10:00

The two pages below represent another go at sketching Hardwick Hall. I was there last year and somewhat overwhelmed at the time (in a good way!) by the enormous windows “Hardwick Hall more glass than wall” that I drew the sketch above... Large sketch showing every pane of glass and got so sick of it by the end.

Today I wanted to achieve two things
1. Understand the building BEFORE I sketched it (last year on location I discovered things about the building while I was sketching and wasn’t able to correct my sketch as I was doing it on the run)
2. Find a more expressive way of sketching the building without having to draw every window.
Well I did achieve the first but sadly had a break in time before I sketched the building...so in effect lost the benefit of the analysis...so a number mistakes in the number of panes in the sketch on the first page... This sketch I faded parts of the building according to structure... ie. I started to draw the building from the centreline and faded my linework and colour as I moved out from the centre.

On the second sketch I sketched and painted in response to the light hitting the façade. This was a suggestion of John Haycraft and I am very excited about the possibility of exploring this idea further – following the light across a building.

Visual Note Taking - An amazing insight into FLW's work

2011-09-27T22:48:00.000+10:00

Since starting this blog, I have already had the feeling a number of times of doing a full circle. This page of extremely quick sketches (mainly plans) is one of those occasions.

I purchased the book "On and By Frank Lloyd Wright - A primer of Architectural Principles" edited by Robert Mccarter five years ago and tucked it under my arm as 'light' reading when I went to the airport to pick up some friends...one of whom was 'Eza' the friend that shortly afterwards introduced me to the small WN Cotman Field Sketching Kit... and what a change that moment has made to my life. On Saturday- having a break from my computers and my sketching is it somewhat significant that I happened (after picking up a few other books first) to decide to re-commence reading this book. It made me realise that since I have started sketching regularly I have stopped reading... but also, as I mentioned last week, that the constant sketching is certainly making it easier and quicker for me to take visual notes of the book that I am reading. It is also funny that I am now MUCH more concerned with making the page look nice - through colour and random composition... plus the inclusion of a few silly notes to self and comments about the appropriately themed music I was listening to at the time!

Anyway... FLW is SO famous and SO well known and loved but this book argues that few people actually really study his work. This week I read an amazing essay (towards the back of the book - you can't expect me to read the book sequential can you?) by Neil Levine on the Diagonal Planning of FLW and I have to say that this idea is one of the most amazing concepts I have come across for a while. SO obvious and yet I have never realised it before.... the way that he composed rectangular spaces and more importantly the experience of these spaces is so rich and dynamic because of his use of diagonal axes across rooms and open corner.

Despite this essay being a great read... it only has very small plans and the concepts are described verbally. I REALLY want this principle to sink in so I looked up the plans Neil referred to in my book of every built work of FLW and then drew my own diagrams of what (I think) he was taking about. I wish more architectural books used DIAGRAMS!!!!

I could write more...but I think that is enough for tonight!!! BTW, the other book in this photo is AMAZING too!!!

Sketching is really the best way to understand architecture

2011-09-23T14:55:00.000+10:00

I will try to post more contemporary architectural sketches on the blog (promise!) but as I was recently looking through my travel sketchbooks from last year's trip I just feel compelled to share with you all (again) some sketching that I did where I was totally in the groove.. eye saw, hand drew and the brain understood how the building was put together as the other two were doing their thing together...
(these sketches are also found on the UK sketches page)

The first two are at Seaton Delavel by Sir John Vanbrugh (yeah- more Baroque! This time English baroque... love his amazing use of volumes and rather outlandish heavy detailing!) When I sketched these I wasn't really caring about perspective but just recording in as quick and as loose a manner as possible what I was looking at

These three are details from Blenheim Palace (Vanbrugh and Hawksmoor)
One of the amazing things about posting your sketches online via iphone on the day...is there just might be someone that sees it and reads your silly notes. Someone knew exactly what John Summerson quote I was wanting and typed it up for me so that evening I could read it! Which was
There is a double beat, then [the Doric Order] wheels round. Another double beat: it turns, enters the towers – it disappears. Then out it marches from the near side of each tower, marches forward till it is returned as a formal entry with steps inside and a flourish of arms above. (summerson, The classical Language of Architecture, 1991, pag. 71)

How cool is that.

Architects Sketchbooks

2011-09-21T19:47:00.000+10:00

As I have mentioned earlier, for years I have tried off and on to keep a sketchbook dedicated to interesting buildings, details etc that cross my path so that I can absorb and maybe use (reinvent etc) later in a project of my own. I am also a bit of a magazine/book junkie which has now morphed into an architectural blog junkie (archdaily etc)... is there any one else out there like me? What do we do with all this visual stimulation... do we absorb any of it?
Today, I got my latest copy of Houses magazine so within 30 minutes I had flicked through it and drew a few sketches and (of course) splashed a little bit of watercolour over the top.
I haven't done this for a long while and I was very pleasantly surprised to discover how quick and easily I was able to do this sketches... ie. all my on-location sketching (particularly when on a crazy holiday) is certainly helping my ability to sketch quickly in any situation!

Last year, I tried getting to the office early to sketch these 'inspirational' sketches - I started in my personal daily sketchbook..but I go through them so quickly that I would never have them to refer to at my desk in the office.

Then I tried them in my daily work notebook (which is a moleskine with the thin paper...I kept that up for a number of weeks... but the paper isn't really what I love using...)

So I am trying my A4 size sketchbook dedicated to architectural sketches(which is what I used today)... and I think that this would be a good lunchtime activity (if I am not going out to sketch people!?! hey!)

Just for the record, these are early attempts at keeping such a reference/inspirational sketchbook. These sketches were done 10-15 years ago - on A3 cartridge paper and coloured with WC pencils. Done as research for the second house that I designed... I spent the WHOLE day looking through magazines and books to produce this... so labour intensive! It is amazing to look back and see how my desire to add colour and make images (rather than just scribble notes) was there back then!

SO... to all my architect friends out there who sketch on location do you sketch reference/inspirational buildings/details... what do you sketch them in/on and do you have any to show me????? And what do you do with all your magazines....

Do you need perfect perspective to draw architecture?

2011-09-16T22:14:00.000+10:00

Yes, it would be nice if we could draw perfect perspective like some artists out there... not to name any names but two instructors at the 2nd international Urban Sketchers Symposium certainly know what they are on about - see here and here... yes, it is something that all artists 'should' understand. But I would strongly urge everyone not to be put off drawing architecture because of 'perspective'.
For many years I have avoided drawing buildings in perspective...
in Paris, I tried whenever possible to sit straight on to a building and add people in the foreground to give a sense of space - or if not in a central position I avoided a 2 point perspective as much as possible.
Last year in Portland, on my extra day after the Ist USk Symposium I was itching to do a nice complicated building.... I sat in a cafe and sketched the Dekum buidling. This was not actually the view that I was looking at but an abstracted elevation (front on view) from what I could see. This is a very useful architectural exercise(converting what I see into what it actually is- reverse perspective at the top of the building) and I drew some people in the foreground to explain the fact that I was in a cafe. I was pretty happy with this sketch
Later that day, at dinner, I saw Gerard Michel's wonderful version of the same building! He was sitting on the pavement and actually drew what he saw...suddenly I felt like I had 'cheated'. Silly thought but still seeing perfect perspective has funny effects on people.
So, inspired by the work of Gerard and also Lapin, as I continued on my travels I tried more and more adventurous perspective views. In New York I tried one of this one point facade perspectives and found this was in fact easier than I expected and a LOT of fun!!!
On other occasions I just did what ever my hand and pen wanted to do...
In Bologna... I started our visit doing the classic elevation with some foreground
And then later in the day had fun with 'organic' perspective... my term for when I just do what ever I feel like without establishing a horizon and vanishing point/s
And then the next day I set up a proper perspective.... this was very satisfying. (Having my great friend Eza by my side had a big influence on me as she loves drawing everything in perspective)So anyway... I haven't really answered the question but just rambled away in my usual way... but I do intend to address this burning issue in more detail and in a more structured way in future posts

Why do I love Baroque architecture so much??

2011-09-08T21:13:00.000+10:00

Well... that is an interesting question! I love the fluidity and forcefulness, the bold 3-dimensionaltiy, adventurous complexity and all the fun games that are played with curved vs flat surfaces and all the crazy decoration. Today while tidying up my study/studio I came across a print out of a photo I took in Rome last year of a building that I didn't have the energy to sketch at the time. So I decided to have a bit of fun analysing it before I sketched.

So here are the exploratory sketches that I did in order to understand it. I also consulted the BEST book out there on Roman architecture. Not Built in A Day by George H Sullivan. George was my constant companion last year in Rome. I am no expert in Classical Baroque architecture so I couldn't have told you after an initial review of the facade that the broken pediment was not doing its job properly... but as soon as I read George's opinion I could see what he was talking about.

Not only do I love drawing them, but I get so much mental stimulation out of studying facades like this. I am certainly no advocate for classical architecture in our day...but I learn so much about composition, balancing of various elements, proportions and trust in Le Corb's words on the top right hand corner of this blog. I am still thinking about if some of these characteristics and principles can relate more directly to today....

but in the meantime below are some other more successful Baroque facades that I DID sketch last year when in Rome (most of these were sketched standing up on the street) and I hope you can see how much fun I was having at the time!!!!!

A few pages from my 'book' I made from my first trip to Rome

2011-09-06T12:44:00.001+10:00

Following on from my last post... here is the work that I did prior to becoming addicted to sketching on location. (hope it is not too slow to load!)

Open publication - Free publishing - More travel

All of this was put together after I got home... this was produced during 2004. This was all printed on my Epson inkjet printer and hard bound together by a binding company that mainly does thesis binding.

I learnt so much from doing this research but the most significant part was the notated diagrams, plans, elevations that summarised all that I had read. There is a lot that we can learn from history...certainly I think that my feel for composition has been really assisted by my study of classical architecture. I do wish I knew more about proportion though..

Welcome to my new blog!!!

2011-08-31T20:52:00.000+10:00

Welcome... This post is a little long but I do have a story to tell...
If you want to see some of my architectural sketches from prevous overseas trip please check out the pages above....

10 years ago tomorrow, I started a new ‘architectural sketchbook’ and this was the first page. In essence it summarises all that I learnt from reading Ross King’s great book “Brunelleschi's Dome: How a Renaissance Genius Reinvented Architecture” It took me ages to do this and while I was doing this page I knew that I was only doing what every architect is supposed to do – keep a sketchbook to record inspirational buildings that cross our paths day by day.

I had always wanted to keep a sketchbook but just didn’t know how.... And how could any one ever possible sketch on location while traveliing????? – it was just too hard and no one has that amount of time anymore!!!! But there was NO DOUBT at all that I was convinced that the best way to understand and learn from architecture was to draw it. So I had an idea of trying to record buildings by small analytical diagrams (but even that required effort and seemed too hard)

On the next page of this sketchbook is the following quote

William Curtis in his book “Le Corbusier: Ideas and Forms” says of Le Corbusier
“We do well to take him seriously, when he declares that history was his ‘only real master’. He looked for common themes underlying past buidlings of different styles, and blended these together, transforming them to his own purposes. He sketched heroic and humble buildings in order to extract some essential or remarkable feature, then let impressions soak in his memory, from which idea might emerge years later having undergone a ‘sea change’. He tried to abstract principles from tradition, and to distill those into a formal system with its own rules of appropriateness.”

To which I wrote “WOW- this is exactly what I long to do!!”

During the years 2001-2007 I did a number of overseas trips...sketching on location was of course out of the question. Each time I came home I did extensive research projects on various buildings I had visited. The end result was a notated elevation/plan/section (often traced!) and some analytical diagrams summarising all that I had read in heavy architectural history theory books. I put these all together in collage type photo albums. Here is a page from my 2004 trip to Rome and a page of my favourite building San Carlo alle Quattro Fontane by Borromini. (a few more pages of this book can be found here)

Then in 2007 I discovered watercolours and just wanted to paint.... With A LOT of practice and practice, an amazing amount of inspiration online through flickr and groups like Everyday Matters and then becoming part of Urban Sketchers... I suddenly realised that what I thought was IMPOSSIBLE I was now doing. Here is my sketch of the same building, sketched standing on the narrow pavement in Rome.

Not only that, but subsequent to a conversation that I had with a professor of architecture that I ran into in Rome in Sept 2010, the idea of simply extracting principles (as per Colin Rowe), such as the grid, from classical buildings was missing half of the fun... All the tricks with the Orders, ornamentation, games with wall surfaces and the effect of this on light and shade on the façade.... This is what I love to paint!

And only a few weeks ago I realised that when I do my little details and partial studies on the side of my page (such as this study of a building in Lisbon I did recently) that I have been doing these little analytical diagrams in my head before I sketched the buidling as a whole.

This LONG post has only scratched the surface of some of the ideas that are in my head...and therefore I have created this blog. It is going to be free of cups of tea and Borromini Bear (but not Borromini the architect)...there will still be plenty of that stuff going on at my Liz & Borromini blog...

The integration of sketching and architecture is the big focus here!

And the post below is all about sketching and designing....

To sketch or CAD?

2011-08-31T11:02:00.000+10:00

I posed this questioned on my main blog and my flickr back in Jan 2010 and got some interesting responses. This is a question that I grapple with all the time at work...
I got some very interesting responses which are included below - but would love for the discussion to continue!

For all my online friends that are architects (or designers) ....I am curious as to how you design. (I have also posed this on flickr - click on the image to go there and see the comments.

I find myself in a constant state of flux between the computer and the drawing board (believe it or not I still have a drawing board in my work space but never use the parallel rules- I just find the angled worksurface better for my neck- plus I just like having a board next to me... A remnant of a former age when I started as an architect).
..but back to my question... I find at the early stages of a design problem I keep asking myself should I be working this up on the computer when I am doing rough sketches but then when I try to design on the computer I find that I just sit there looking at the screen. For me design solutions so often come as soon as I print it out, rip some yellow trace and let my hand to its thing... I just don’t think as well looking at a computer screen. I think with a pen in my hand. Plus I much prefer scribbling than moving a mouse!

I would love hearing other peoples thoughts – methods of design. I end up using lots of paper : rough sketch – computer- printout – refinement on the drawing board – back to CAD – printout.... Etc.
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Some of the responses I initially received are below... but would LOVE some more.....

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Anthony Duce said...

I always start with tracing paper overlays. I draw freehand over a scaled grid. I do this for initial design and the development of the plans as well as elevations, wall sections and the details for original ideas. Later in my career I did move to cad after the basic design and major details were figured out. By then though I was one of the owners and usually had less less experienced architects in the firm doing the cad work, sometime putting the design into cad while i continued to work on trace. Before retiring the Form Z and other BIN programs were being used by those who grew up with them. More and more of the design work was being started from scratch on the computer, by those who were comfortable. I still have to draw to see.
January 14, 2010 5:13 PM
Janene said...

I am a landscape designer and use tracing paper overlays too. The organic connection of mind, hand, pen and paper is important to my design process.

Matthew-1 on flickr

Great question Liz.
I'm an architectural technologist so much of my design is the detailing. I have to start with rough sketches and trace to arrive at a solution. Then I can take it to cad and maybe send it around to consultants for feedback and coordination if required (mostly structural). Like you I just can't begin with cad. But perhaps it is my age and when I was initially trained (infancy of cad and primitive at the time) plus my natural affinity and love of drawing by hand.
I had a job interview this morning and the guys were most interested in my hand sketching and travel sketches and these provoked the most discussion and really "broke the ice". Both of the guys interviewing me were natural hand sketchers themselves though (a bit older than me).
We did discuss how young people are very fluent with the new computer tools (especially 3D). The partner in the firm mentioned that at the local university they actually no longer allow work to be presented as hand drawings. We agreed it was a mistake.
But you know, the new "blobitecture" and "Gheryesque" stuff probably can't be (easily) conceptualized by hand.
At any rate, I need to learn sketch-up to compliment my hand drawing ability, it's become almost a "must have" skill.
But hand sketching ? no substitute for me.

Matthew Brehm said...

Great question, Liz! I finished undergraduate architecture school (University of Notre Dame) just as computers were becoming available, so my training was almost entirely analog rather than digital. I practiced for several years and used digital tools almost exclusively during that time. For the past 10 years, I've been teaching architecture (Universities of Oregon and Idaho), including graphics courses (both analog and digital) and many design studios at every level. My research has been focused on design communication, and especially on the juncture between analog and digital methods for design. Based on all these experiences, I prefer a hybrid approach that uses the best tool for a particular set of tasks - sometimes sketching, sometimes digital modeling, sometimes physical modeling, etc. (I would argue that CAD might be best for drafting, but that drafting is not the same as designing!) Freehand sketching is the most direct way of getting ideas to paper - there is virtually no 'interface' (menus, commands, preferences regarding scale or view, etc.) to get in the way between idea and imagery. Combining analog and digital techniques offers the greatest flexibility, clarity, and opportunity for development ... but most students are overdependent on digital tools - they feel safer or more professional or they feel self-conscious about their sketching skills, etc. So my emphasis as a teacher is on sketching, and the students in my courses who really embrace sketching ALWAYS thank me later.

suzanne cabrera said...

I find the computer is terribly limiting in the first stages of the design process. This is even more the case with students who are just learning the programs and restricted by the tools. Rather than designing the spaces of their dreams they are forced to do only what they feel is possible in the program (i.e. straight lines, 90 degree angles).. I'm sure this can all change with experience...but for now it is easier for my students (and ME!) to get out the trash paper and go at it!

Great question...I look forward to reading others thoughts!

Ed Brodzinsky on flickr ....

no contest for me -- it's pencil in hand and a roll of yellow trace. . . . and a soft pencil (2B or softer), at least to start. . . . if it's a complex design, I might add layers of pen or colored pencil. . . . this is as true for the trickiest tiny window detail as it is for a broad town planning conceptual layout. . . . perhaps it's a generational thing, going back to training (arch'l school in the early 60s), but I really can't think without a clutch pencil in my hand. . . .

Jmurdockphoto on flickr....
I am a landscape architect that deals mostly with town planning and conceptual design. I am a younger generation LA (I am still in my 20s) and love working in the computer. That said, my design process looks very similar to Liz. I start by hand sketching ideas and concepts, plug them into the computer, print out, sketch more..so on and so forth. I find that alot of new designers and design students rely way too much on the computer. This is sad to me and especially MC_BDS's story about not allowing hand drawn documents. That is a huge mistake!!

I also use SketchUp, but only as a base for hand rendered final graphics. I find that most clients relate to the softness of a hand drawn image moreso than a cold, crisp digital graphic. I am not an employer, but I feel that most design firms would much rather have a student/new employee that could get design ideas on paper quickly (time is money) than a proficient CAD jockey.

I went to a workshop last year where an LA said that he gets the most respect from clients during the initial meetings when they tell him their ideas and he quickly scribbles a sketch on a napkin and the client can say...."that's exactly what I am talking about!"

Honestly, in the long run, I don't see the "hand to digital to hand" process changing anytime soon. Hopefully anyway!