From Fiction to Fact

Bjarke Ingels brings up this point of “bigamy” meaning the combining of 2 different ideas and weaving them together forming a hybrid. Architecture is great springboard for this kind of tension and way of thinking. Often times in my architectural education I have taken two totally different ideas and have blended them resulting in a unique and super intriguing idea. Ingels continues how architecture allows us to make friction into reality, which then turns into a fact upon completion.  Much like the example he gives of the powerplant which is also utilized as a ski slope using one idea to lead to something unconventional giving a unique spin to the norm. This ideal also allows the architecture to have more than one function helping it adapt to our ever changing world.

In design, often times we look to what’s been done to glean ideas from. Though, sometimes that can be dangerous because we can be too influenced by that design/style and end up just replicating what already exists instead of inventing something new as Ingels warns. It is so necessary to research these precedents, they are what help our projects become stronger and more complex.

Bjarke Ingels said, “architecture is the canvas for the stories of our lives”. I have never heard anyone say this about our field and I think there is some truth to this. We tend to design according to the experiences we have had and to our ethics and principles. For example, one may have a strong passion for academia/teaching and thus they maybe led to design and improve k-12 architecture. If we are passionate about our work it will show in how we present it, as well as the level of detail and depth.