The Awakening!

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Author Message Ralph Liebing, RA, CSI, CDT Senior Member Username: rliebing Post Number: 1350 Registered: 02-2003 Posted on Wednesday, October 31, 2012 - 08:09 am:    121031 THE AWAKENING by Ralph Liebing, RA, CSI, CDT Cincinnati, OH Sure is a lot of yawning and eye-opening these days. And to think the cause is thoughts that have been tweaked and realizations that have erupted about “real architecture-- in the whole”, design and would you believe, includes technology, detailing, knowledge, teaching, etc. For decades [generally the entire Beaux Arts era, 1850-1968] a mysterious “-darkness” has covered the fact that architects for the most part were ill-trained [except in design] Then suddenly someone snaps on a light that puts the thought out that architects will be extinct by 2025-- whoa!!! More suddenly, and actually before that declaration, CSI had set up a Task Team to develop a basic educational course on construction technology-- possibly for use not only by early-on architectural students, but also others throughout the construction industry—professionals, product- oriented reps. skilled and management construction personnel, etc. Those who simply want more information than they have! Next, NCARB snaps on another flare and sets up an intern “debriefing” in December to find what a good cross section of interns feel about their education and career prospects. [we hope here that the interns present a truthful, complete presentation] Now a third flicker of light in the AIA’s ARCHITECT magazine regarding architects, their registration and whether anyone gives a tinker’s darn if there are architects! YEAH, now we got ‘em going. Let any of these approaches/efforts disappear without an answer and we might see mass confusion and a weakened profession. With a good shot at a rising economy, needs for structures of all types will be needed, and well-advised owners will seek out competent and fully trained architects, his need is reinforced by the fact that most state laws provided for registration of architects with proper credentials and purpose, Hence there is a whole scheme for the state protecting its citizenry via proper construction; and to ensure that architects [and engineers] must be correctly and fully trained-- and design is but one aspect of those requirements. If the whole combine of efforts, noted above, would produce a host of personal experiences and informed data and attitudes we may FINALLY do what, for years, laws have required. It is new era, and has been for decades, but we now should better understand what our profession is about and be better able to understand the need for coordinated and collaborative project documentation. It is generally held that Beaux Arts’ era ended about 1968. So for almost 5 decades we have been operating under the fallacious impression that that was the way to go. But somehow for the entire era of Beaux Arts someone and somehow, construction knowledge and documentation was produced, but apparently [except in a relatively small instances] was not seen fit to teach and prepare students. But then Beaux Arts started in the time of guilds and skilled workers who were the “technicians” of their time. What the architects dreamed forth, the artisans managed to make or construct. The flaw is the passage of time and the new configuration of the construction industry. It is this that needs remedy for now and the future. And perhaps the three “lights” above, if successfully completed and fully coordinated could be the start of the needed reconstruction-- let’s hope so! Robert W. Johnson Senior Member Username: robert_w_johnson Post Number: 220 Registered: 03-2009 Posted on Thursday, November 01, 2012 - 01:48 pm:    "the entire Beaux Arts era, 1850-1968" Where does this come from? Multiple sources that I find say until about 1920. I was in a school of architecture in the late 1950's, and it certainly was not Beaux Arts - it was "form follows function". Ralph Liebing, RA, CSI, CDT Senior Member Username: rliebing Post Number: 1352 Registered: 02-2003 Posted on Thursday, November 01, 2012 - 02:30 pm:    Wikipedia: "The style of instruction that produced Beaux-Arts architecture continued without major interruption until 1968." From reference: Robin Middleton, Editor. The Beaux-Arts and Nineteenth-century French Architecture. (London: Thames and Hudson, 1982). I was in school at that time too, and had a few comments about BA. My comment was not intended to refer universally as obviously not all schools and firms used those principles.