In the last country I worked in, the teams focused on 3D architectural visualization. I remember my journey into professional practice. I started as a junior architect working in design. Other people did the 3D architectural visualization. Later I moved to site construction and worked on the construction side. Even there, site visitors such as […]
Church Bell Tower Architecture in Europe: A Story of Evolution
The world’s most famous bell tower is famous for something nobody designed. Pisa’s campanile leans because it was raised on soft ground, not because anyone wanted a tilt. Chartres has two unmatched spires because a medieval fire spared the old towers and lightning later destroyed the timber spire on one of them. Yet other towers […]
Architectural Reports in Practice: Types, Building, and Purpose
Introduction Many architects in practice write reports. Most of these reports deal with design work, site supervision or construction. So, some architects are surprised to learn that a report about a pay rise also exists. Here is how it often works. An employee asks to meet the HR manager. They sit down together, and the […]
Deconstructivism Architecture: Criticism and Dispersal
Introduction Few architectural labels have been as influential as “deconstructivism.” Few have been so disowned by the people they described. The term became public in the summer of 1988. The Museum of Modern Art in New York showed the work of seven architects. Their work seemed to share a restless, fractured and distorted feel. Within […]
Regional development agencies: abolishing, modification, rename implications for planning practice
Some years ago, I lived through the creation of England’s regional development agencies, and I watched them abolished after little more than a decade. The stated aim was to reduce public spending in urban planning practice, yet I could not shake the thought that the decision was also political, and that something more than a […]
Amazon Platform and Amazon Ads: The secrets of modern publishing
Amazon platform bot mechanisms change from time to time, and that affects Amazon Ads performance. The following is a demonstration of what really happens on Amazon, so don’t be surprised. I will go through this in detail later on. The snapshot of the Amazon system shows what the search term I have put in the […]
Real Estate Market Cycles: 3 demand growth-change scenario
Real estate market cycles do not move alone. They follow the wider economic cycle, and the three scenarios below are built on economic cycle data. Real estate market cycles include four phases: recovery, expansion, hyper supply, and recession. Recovery is the phase following a great recession, when occupancy and rents are low and construction slows, […]
Rational Planning in Practice: Dead in Theory, Still at Work
Origins, application, decline and survival of the rational planning paradigm, with a Dubai case from practice and a comparison of planning systems Few ideas in planning have been declared dead as often as the rational planning paradigm, also called the rational planning model, and few have survived so well. Theorists buried it in the 1970s. […]
AutoCAD vs Revit: Learning, Development, and Lessons from Practice
What a consultant’s career and a wide range of real-world users reveal about choosing between two design tools Introduction Few questions divide architects and engineers as reliably as AutoCAD vs Revit. Search for it and you will find thousands of forum threads, vendor case studies and opinionated blog posts, most of them trying to crown […]
Green Belt in Practice: Origin, Development, and Outcomes
Introduction The green belt is a term that students of architecture, urban design and planning meet early. It comes up in undergraduate planning courses, and anyone who works in an urban design or planning firm will come across it often. My own experience was different. In my earlier professional career, I did not come across […]