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 t’s the start of another school year, and pretty soon many of you academia-inclined architects may be asked to participate as a jury in a crit.
While the chance to imbibe cheap booze and ruthlessly crush the aspirations of impressionable young students may be too tempting to pass up, some of you may back down for the fear of not having anything ostensibly worthwhile to say.
You’re worried that you will not seem to have anything insightful to say.
(After all, you have to appear to look smart to all your professional peers, which incidentally is not necessarily the same as being smart.
Everybody knows that true insight and profound observations are the last things to be found at architecture schools.)
Well, fear not, my FREE-booze-and-brie-seeking comrade!
During the Architecture 100a undergraduate studio of fall semester 1993 (led by Stanley Saitowitz), many students and I decided to record some of the most memorable comments recently heard during crits.
Remember that your goal is to sound more like Simon and less like Paula Abdul on American Idol. Try these on for size:
NEGATIVE COMMENTS:
- “You might like to check out the work of ___________.”
- “I’m not convinced about this.”
- “It’s too literal. You have to make it architectural.”
- “I don’t understand where you’re heading. You need to narrow your focus.”
- “You talk about ____________, but I simply don’t see it.”
- “It doesn’t speak to me.”
- “It looks a bit willfully arbitrary.” (Roddy Creedon)
- “More Mies, less Morphosis.” (Stanley Saitowitz)
- “[Your final scheme] lost something from your original concept.”
- “Call me old-fashioned, but giving us a plan or section may help.”
- “What about materials and tectonics?”
- “Have you considered factors like gravity?”
- "Is Zap-a-Gap your structural system?"
- “Here’s a stupid question: where’s the door? How do you get in?”
- “There’s a difference between minimalism and sensory deprivation.”
- “I see a future for you at Disney.” (These are fighting words, and may be hitting below the belt. Proceed with discretion.)
- “This just looks way too busy. Do you remember your concept?”
- “You didn’t do what I told you to.”
- “Either change your reasoning or change your concept.”
- “It bothers me that architects are always so arrogant as to ________________.”
- [Boldly go up and remove a piece of the student’s presentation model.] “That piece just doesn’t belong there.”
(Lisa Findley, currently of Architectural Record, actually did this to me at the final crit for Arch. 100b.
I forgive her since she's such a hottie.)
- “How does your project integrate itself into the urban fabric?”
- “Doing ___________________ simply is not going to be enough.”
- “I'm not feeling it, dawg.” (Y'know, like Randy Jackson)
- “Have you thought about political science?”
POSITIVE COMMENTS (use sparingly!):
- “This is promising. Now you have to take it to the next level.”
- (To the other jurors:) “Hmm, what do you think?”
- “It’s a good start. Keep pushing it.” (Never mind that it’s the end of the semester.)
- “I don’t know what it is, but there’s something magical about it.”
- “It reads well.”
- “It sings.”
- “It’s really quite poignant.”
- [While the student is talking, just go up there, and silently, deliberately, and intensely scrutinise his drawings and model, preferably from weird angles.
If possible, pick up the model and turn it a bit. Act concentrated, and never pay any attention to the student, let alone giving him eye contact.
Pretend that you’re in the process of formulating a profound understanding of his project.]
01 September 2002
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