The resourceful architect
What else can architects do?
Resources
Below are some examples of interesting and successful architecture-related businesses and projects. This is just a snapshot and not intended to be comprehensive. It is for you to develop your own response to the brief
Host practice
This is a recent initiative by the RIBA, addressing the redeployment of skills and resources in a time of recession by establishing networks between architecture graduates and architectural practices and universities. In these networks, professionals and researchers nurture the skills of graduates by offering physical spaces and mentoring support, rather than employment, for the development of experience in areas such as competitions, research, private commissions, etc
Architecture Network
The Open Architecture Network is an online, open source community dedicated to improving living conditions through innovative and sustainable design, and to making ordinary builders everywhere into master builders. Here designers of all persuasions can share their ideas, designs and plans, collaborate with each other, people in other professions and community leaders, manage design projects, protect their intellectual property rights and build a more sustainable future
The Network grew out of collective frustration in sharing ideas and trying to work together to address shelter needs after disaster, in informal settlements and in our own communities. Architects, designers, engineers and anyone else involved in the building trades is welcome to share their ideas on the Open Architecture Network - but it’s not just for professionals. Community leaders, non-profit groups, volunteer organizations, government agencies, technology partners, healthcare workers, educators and others are invited to collaborate and share their expertise. Far from replacing the traditional architect, the goal of the network is to allow designers to work together in a whole new way, a way that enables 5 billion potential clients to access their skills and expertise. The network has a simple mission: to generate not one idea but the hundreds of thousands of design ideas needed to improve living conditions for all.
www.openarchitecturenetwork.org
Wordsearch
Wordsearch acts as the communications interface between architects, their clients and the wider public. It writes, directs, designs and publishes a range of material that explains architectural projects; produces branding and design strategies that create identities for places; and helps explain what architects do. The media Wordsearch works with is fundamentally digital but can be used to produce books, brochures, websites, presentations, exhibitions and movies. Its clients are architectural firms, developers, public bodies, and cultural and educational organisations.
Peter Murray, Chairman of Wordsearch, trained as an architect but went directly into publishing and journalism. Wordsearch evolved over 20 years ago from his frequent frustration at seeing good architects failing to deliver projects because of their inability to explain their work outside their peer group. The company works on major projects all around the world - Moscow, Mumbai, Abu Dhabi, Hong Kong and Shanghai, as well as London, Birmingham and Edinburgh. These include Battersea Power Station, Masdar City, ICC, and The Russia Tower. A diverse range of clients has included the London Architecture Biennale, CABE, Taipei Financial Corporation, Max Fordham, and exhibitions such as Cities of the Future.
Malcolm Reading Consultants
Malcolm Reading Consultants provides independent advice and hands-on support to clients involved in capital projects. This can range from drawing up feasibility studies and business cases, to resolving project problems, master-planning and acting as the client’s representative throughout the course of the project. The advantage for the client, who may never have commissioned a building previously, is that they have someone at their side who is focused on their objectives. MRC specialises in cultural, educational and regeneration work and was one of the first consultancies to work with the Heritage Lottery Fund, securing nearly £60m of funding in the last twelve years.
SEED Foundation
This is a social enterprise that explores and promotes new design approaches to meet the challenges of sustainability. SEED believes this encompasses the responsible design of objects and services, but that designers need to go one step further: learning to work with other professions, considering infrastructure, and collaborating with communities. The new role of design must explore how the combined design of innovative products, services and partnerships can impact on lifestyles and behaviour. In a context where designers must always respond to the needs of a client however, how can this be done? SEED thinks that current economic scenarios offer business opportunities for designers who are prepared to adopt new entrepreneurial skills and new ways of working. They are currently piloting their first enterprise as a demonstrator of their ideas, to see if it is possible for a designer to take on this new role, break out of the traditional client/designer relationship and earn a living by solving social and environmental problems. Working with Camden Council, this new enterprise is exploring the value in food waste.
Fifth Floor Gallery
This gallery in Los Angeles recently held an exhibition called ‘Looking For Work’, featuring furniture by architects. A response to the pace of construction slowing drastically, the show was work by many architectural designers who have turned their attention to smaller objects to satisfy the impulse to design as well as cope with the economic downturn. Some have forged out completely on their own while others supplement their time in the spatial design field by creating these beautiful but useful objects.
City repair
The City Repair Project was formed in Portland, Oregon in 1996 by citizen activists who wanted a more community-oriented and ecologically sustainable society. Born out of a successful grassroots neighborhood initiative that converted a residential street intersection into a neighborhood public square, City Repair began its work with the idea that localisation (of culture, economy and decision-making) is a necessary foundation of sustainability. By reclaiming urban spaces to create community-oriented places, the projects seeks to engender greater neighborhood communication, empowerment of communities and nurturing of local culture.
EXYZT
Initiated in 2003 by five architects, EXYZT is now a multidisciplinary collective of about twenty people: architects, graphic designers, video artists, photographers, horticulturalists, builders and a DJ. The collective has made a speciality of temporary installations governed and nourished by the contexts of time and location, including the Southwark Lido at the 2008 London Festival of Architecture, Dalston Mill for the Barbican Art Gallery’s 2009 exhibition Radical Nature, and the “occupation” of the French Pavilion at the 2006 Venice Biennale of Architecture.
Also interesting and potentially useful
The Young Foundation pamphlet on social venturing