INNOCENCE LOST

The more that I work on this project, the more I think back to my educational experience in Architecture School.  And I continue to ponder on how we generate the forms that we create.  My impression of my experiences 35 years ago was that the forms that we generated were random, in a hit or miss way.  I have seen my architectural students approach their designs in a similar manner.  And I continue to wonder if there might be a more programmatic method so as to heighten everyone’s form generating abilities at the beginning.

I guess what I am saying is that we were not given any sort of form generation method, or set of tools.  Rather, we simply responded any way we could, with any means that might be at our disposal.  Some were better at it than others.  The ones that were the “best” were the ones that could draw with the most conviction.  As we have touched on, the most convincing drawing was not necessarily the best solution.  The most convincing drawing simply sells the idea better.

Yet no matter how well we drew, we were at best flailingly searching for truth with our first designs.  Frantic paging thru the magazines and looking for the latest and greatest idea was one “method” that was open to us.  I certainly am guilty on that count.  Or we might have based our concepts on something that was in our history books;  possibly an iconic classical or modernist design of some sort.  Or we might base a response on one of our personal hero architects.

I remember working very hard to try to put together the plan, elevation, and the elusive at least for me section.  The plan might have been taken from one example, and the elevation might be culled from another source.

But what if we had been given a more holistic methodology, right from the start?  What if we had been tasked with the exercise of making three dimensional analogue drawings that immediately synthesized the plan, section and elevation?

We have touched on the concept of the innocent mind.  We have mentioned how when we first start to draw, we draw heroically and innocently.  I submit that our minds at the beginning of a design education are equally innocent.  Our minds are not precluded or occluded by isms or the last thing that was published in a magazine.

So what if there were a methodology that harnessed this innocence?  What if there were a form generating method which allowed the power of innocence to seize the moment?

Transparent Drawing is the best method that I can come up with to provide this method.  But that’s just me.  Do you have any other method which might be as powerful or quite possibly more so?