“How You Doin?” Sketching as a way of cozying up with design settings.

This is the article I wrote for the Student magazine of GIT Architecture department. I am putting this up on the blog so that those of us unfortunate souls who cannot read the magazine, can access some part of it. (Hint to the editors of the magazine if they read this: you are welcome to make the magazine part of the blog)


I still remember the first time I saw a computer generated rendering of a Zaha Hadid’s building, back when I was an impressionable architecture student. The extreme angle of the perspective emphasized the distortions of the space. It was mesmerizing, almost a seduction of my mind; with me fantasizing an orgasmic feel of walking in the space lost in the splendor of the surfaces, light, materials, etc. It was this ability of the computer-generated image that made it such a popular tool for representing ideas and visions for the architect, for ‘seducing’ the clients, the buyers, etc. But I guess it is time now to stop staring at the sultry seductress, take a step ahead and talk to her.
Throughout my time as a student of architecture before, and design in general now, one question kept popping up. Is the ability to sketch well, means to sketch a ‘good looking’ or seductive image OR does sketching has a more than a skin-deep reason for its existence? Some aspiring students wanting to get into the Industrial Design Center used to mail me asking what is the importance of sketching in the selection, most of them confessing that their sketching is ‘not so good’. I didn’t think much about it and used to reply them just for the sake of encouraging them. I used to say that while the visual aspects of sketching are important, equally important is the ability to think through sketching.
And it is this aspect that I now claim we as students of design and architecture should be more interested than in the final rendered image. Let me attempt now to expand on the ability of sketch as a way of design, touching on what I mean by sketching here and also on the act of designing itself.
Starting with the Pick-Up Line:
Lets take an example, one so familiar with all the students.
It’s the design studio and I am designing a resort on a contoured site. There is a plan of the contoured site over which I have a butter paper on which I draw a layout of a room, orienting it towards the valley for getting a maximum view for the people inside the room. At the same time, on a site model of the contours, I place a 3d box of the volume of the room at the location. I then realize that the slope is too large and there is lot of cutting involved for a rocky surface. Then I push up the room either to a much gentler slope or think of how to support it above the rocks, without cutting the land below. I then come back to the butter sheet and draw the new layout.
I am sure all of us have come across similar such situations, where by the act of drawing, modeling either with thermocol / mount board OR with the computer, we go on arriving at different ‘option’ or ideas as design solutions. Donald Schön, a philosopher, looked at this phenomenon across the architectural practice and termed it as a reflection-in-action. (His book referenced below, though a theoretical book is a must at any library of an architecture school.) Here as I move from one act of drawing to other, the ‘materials’ – the site, my desire to gather the best possible view for the room dwellers, the rocky surface, the aesthetic style I want to impose – all these talk back to me through the act of drawing or modeling. Thereby the act of ‘designing’ becomes a way of ‘conversing with the materials’ – a constant series of modifications and explorations of options and ideas as the different materials give their feedback to my design actions. Note here that by materials I don’t mean the materials like wood, stone or glass, but the materials of design – the site, the settings, the program, the designer’s intentions and theories.
It is this ability to successfully hold such a conversation through ones design actions is what Schon calls as reflection in action. Hence, as design and architectural students, it becomes imperative that we develop this ability to reflect during our design action through the design actions. The good news is our design studios are a good way to start developing this ability! But as students we need to be aware of what is happening ‘behind-the-scene’ when we do our design activities. And to be aware of the importance of this ability in design, we as students have to get beyond achieving the seductive final image, and stress on having a long cozy talk with the materials!
Lets Talk baby!
The practice of architecture has moved from a single genius architect al la Howard Roark, towards a set of smart individuals forming a creative team cutting across different disciplines. In fact for complex buildings and urban planning projects, even the other ‘stake holders’ like the people funding, the government, the people who will be actually using the spaces are also part of the design team. Though one can debate the pros and cons of such involvement, what we cant get away as a future architect is the ability to work in a team, creatively. I will claim that it is here, again the ability to be reflective, to have conversation with materials that will bail us out, rather than the finished, sexy renderings.
Bill Buxton, a principal researcher at Microsoft research has written an amazing book on this topic (in the reference list). Though he mostly talks about a need of shift in the way we design digital experiences, but the core of his analysis holds good for the challenges of the current architectural practice. Moving away from the finished ‘prototypes’ he stresses on the process of ‘sketching’ as a way forward. Looking at he figure 1 below, we can say that from the architectural standpoint, a prototype is very close to artifacts, which we use for specification, construction and representation of the final concept – Walkthroughs, Renderings, Presentation drawings, Working drawings, specifications, etc. These, I claim, in line with Buxton’s argument, come towards the end of the design process. But sadly due to their strong visual appeal, we as students fall in the trap of arriving there before exploring the settings, before having a good and healthy chat with the materials. 

Figure 1: Sketch and a Prototype (Source: Sketching User Experiences by Bill Buxton)
Before we go and start cozying up with our design settings, let me clarify that by ‘sketching’ what Buxton means is not just drawing on the paper, but an activity of design beyond drawing. As in the figure 2, sketching is the process of early design activity and includes drawing, doodling, building models, mock up models, etc. The word sketch inherently means it is not finalized, it is not solid, is easily changeable and mold-able.

Figure 2: Sketching involves various early design activities
So, Lets Cozy Up Now!
A closing reminder, through a diagram again by Buxton, which succinctly shows how a design process should be. I need not mention that it holds good even for architectural process also! 

Figure 3: The Design Process as a Tree (Source: Sketching User Experiences by Bill Buxton)

References: (Books that Ought to be in any School Library)  
[1] Buxton, B. 2007 Sketching User Experiences: Getting the Design Right and the Right Design. Morgan Kaufmann Publishers Inc.  
[2] Schön, D. A., The Reflective Practitioner. How Professionals Think in Action. 1983, New York: Basic Books, Inc.