Crossroads

It’s been a while now since the last time I blogged, I had been quite busy with looking for work as an architect, going to work till late at night at the store, and on other days, running to engineering class. After all the job searching and some surprisingly good results, I find myself in a pretty tough position. I now have to make my choice between a Volkswagen Golf and a Ferrari.

I was offered a job at a relatively new all-in-one, architecture, engineering, urbanism, and construction firm, that has recently expanded its practice to the United States and China aside from its local projects in Spain. To make things even better, they made me a pretty good offer, and something more; a shiny new contract. Something I learned that is pretty hard to come by with here in Barcelona (80% of architects here work as free-lance). To make things even better, they are almost literally just a stone throw away from my place.

Then there was this last office/studio of two young architects a few years into their practice. They make your most typical projects, apartment buildings, houses. As with smaller practices (or at least those who care enough to try), there is more attention paid to design. From what I saw, there was enough imagination; it was evident that they valued that extra quality that makes a difference between a roof over your head and architecture. The office felt like a workshop, the kind of environment I like working in. But the job is offered for free-lance architects starting out, and being one has less benefits then a contract.

And so there I was, confused, torn between practicality and idealism. I had coffee with a friend to get some air, let my thoughts out, and for him to understand, I compared the two offices to a Volkswagen Golf and a Ferrari. The studio type office would be the Golf, basic, straight-forward, efficient, classic. No fuzz no frills. And then the big office, a Ferrari, fast, flashy, and turns heads. For some strange reason, fast and flashy never really impressed me. Not in cars, not in clothes, not in people, not in my work.

Then my friend responded to my analogy saying, “I think it’s actually the other way around.” You want the Ferrari. The small office is a Ferrari. The big office is the Golf, it’s the more practical option for your situation (with the contract offered). And then I was lost for words. I never looked at it that way. If I choose the Studio type office, I would be chasing after a dream, a “Ferrari”. While the big office would be the safer choice, the Golf.

So then I came to thinking, realizing, and waking up to the realities of the world that start staring you in the face as you get older. The simpler, more quiet, design/quality oriented practices/work just don’t fit in the picture of the present-day world’s demands of ‘practical, simple, beautiful’. Instead, it is classified as ‘expensive and impractical’. And the ones that jump in the race for success, and money are deemed of as ‘safe’. It makes sense if you're just trying to survive, start out a life for yourself as I am, but then will I be happy?