To be or not to be

A question asked by many.

Answered by a few. In case you are thinking to become an architect. Or study a field close to it. Still have doubts if you should or shouldn’t.

Let me make it a little clearer by giving you 5 reasons to become an architect.

1.    You won’t get bored in College.

In India, Bachelors of Architecture is a five year course. It is long and often tedious. However on a brighter side the study of Architecture is so vast and cosmic everyone finds something of their interest. Be it History of architecture, or research in new technologies or just plain design.

If there is a particular topic you are really interested in, you can incorporate it in your design.

2.    You will see the fruits of your labor.

Unlike other professions Architects have the immense pleasure of seeing their dreams to be turned into reality, or should I say… concrete reality.

It is not often that on paper comes to life. And dreams don’t often come true. However once you are one of us. You will have the power to do so.

3.    Architects are passionate.

Architects are very passionate people. Often intensely so. They hold their opinions in high regards but it is not so in vain. They really know a lot of stuff about a lot of stuff. And most of the time they have the tools and hard evidence of making you agree with the point they put up.

4.    You could become either a generalist or a specialist.

So architecture is a very vast field. After all it talks about cultures, times, spaces, art and politics all at the same time and then talks about its influence in architecture because lets be serious, people are shady and they very often influence the built environment around them. So it is really impossible to know everything about everything.

But worry not. You still would have a way out. You could either know a little about everything or still perform well or you could specialize in one specific field and know every detail about it. So even if you like to be a jack of all trades or just master of one. Architecture is for you.

5.    You could touch people’s lives.

Contrary to the angst image of an architect who only listens to himself and doesn’t really considers people’s opinions about him, a good architect is receptive to people’s needs and requirements. After all we build for other people. We get to make a space that will touch lives of other people. And hopefully in some ways improve it for the betterment.

If we can touch a single person’s life and still have the pleasure of watching our vision come to reality. Isn’t that a profession worth following?