Lofts - dark and dirty warehouse or nice and tidy place to live?

Today I want share my love for lofts. I always thought where I am going to live when I will be older and I imagined having a big, modern and luxury house somewhere far away from 'urban noise'. But I'm growing and my 'taste' and understanding what and why I want it more also changing. 

So I want to say that, once my eye saw a beautiful place, maybe apartment (can't find correct word to describe it) but it just catched my eye and it looked so good for me. So I wanted to find out more about that type of buildings maybe houses or just places. So one time I was looking through interior design's magazine and I found something looking similar to that place I saw before. LOFT, that was the word which was in that magazine next to those amazing pictures of lofts. 

This is one of the examples how loft interior looks like.

So now move on! If I just say I like it, it's not enough because you have to know why you like it or what do you like about it. 

So for example, I like lofted places because it reflects my personality which is that I am really orderly person. I don't like really like 'crowded' or 'messed up' areas, so that means that loft is really good place to live for me. 

In the picture above is a loft building.

If you don't really know and still not really imagine what loft is, I will try to answer to this questions  based on really good answers which I found in the internet. 

What LOFT is? 

• A loft can be a storey in the building, directly under the roof. Alternatively, a loft apartment refers to a large adaptable open space.
• Later lofts been converted into living spaces known for incredible space and light very different from available apartments. First they have been converted by an artists who used the space to live in studio and later developed by builders.

This answer you are going to read now is not from a very good 'side' about lofts, but it's also good example:  

"One apartment would take an entire floor with no room separations, except for a bathroom. Meaning your bed is out in the open with your kitchen and living room. They are usually huge spaces and have a very industrial look with exposed bricks and pipes and lots of industrial windows."

So yeah, it says: "...they have a very industrial look with exposed bricks and pipes and lots of industrial windows", but that is one of the things I really like about lofts. So how I said it depends on personality.  

• The other use for loft is when you have an area of your house or apartment that is upstairs but it isn't as big as the downstairs. It's sort of like an indoor balcony - you can look down and see the floor below you. You can have an office or even a bedroom up there, although the bedroom would be 'open' to the rest of the house, your privacy comes from being upstairs from everyone else.

Also I want to share with you the characteristics you may see in loft buildings or inside the lofts:

• Usually lofts are located near downtown
• Very high ceilings 
• Exposed pipes and ducts in the ceiling 
• Floor to ceiling windows
• Exposed interior bricks
• Modern
• Open and airy
• No yard or garden

I think that's it I wanted to share with you today, about my love for lofts. Hope this post will inspire you and might you will start like lofts! 

Happy Easter! - Egg shaped buildings and Easter egg designs

Today, the second day of Easter, I want to take the opportunity and share amazing photos of egg shaped buildings and Easter egg designs which been created by architects. I was looking for something interesting to share with you about Easter and I found exactly what I was looking for! 

Let's start from - Easter egg designs. 
Architects took the opportunity to create something interesting and unusual for Easter time. Have a look at these amazing designs of Easter eggs.

    

                           

   

Here they are! These designs are amazing, aren't they? 

Now, move on - Egg shaped buildings!

Hope you have a really good Easter time with your family and also I hope these designs and buildings will inspire and provide you of Easter spirit!

Lot of ideas all around you, but they still didn't come to your head?

Today we're taking a new topic, which is about ideas and where good ideas comes from. Also you will find some really helpful advices! 
So I am going to be a bit selfish and look at this really serious problem for me and might for other people.
So I searched the internet about the ideas and where are they come from? And after a few articles I realised that a lot of ideas are hiding near me!

What do you need to do? Answer is very simple - just concentrate on what you are working on, look everywhere around you! Even a plastic bottle that you're 

going throw to the bin could become a brilliant idea! 

Also these days are so much social networks, where you can find an inspiration, ideas and other people! You can talk with those people, ask them a questions. Maybe they can help you by - knowing that only one thing that you need to finish your idea, project or work with.

Before I realised what real ideas are and where they come from, I was looking at the pictures or drawings which I found on Google by typing that single word - IDEAS. All I want to tell you by saying that is - it is not an idea if you just copy that drawing into your sketchbook, it is just a copied work from someone else. But you can make a new your own idea by adding or changing something. Also it could be an inspiration for you but no ways an idea. 

Continue on point, that if you you're making an idea from someone else's work just call it - developing ideas.

I read one post which was about ways of developing ideas and there I found really good advices how you can develop your ideas or make them look better, it depends what work you are doing - if you are writing something, you can make it more interesting by developing your idea you are writing about. You can find examples of ways you can develop your ideas in this link:  http://www.bang2write.com/2013/05/7-ways-of-developing-ideas-by-daniel-hartropp.html

Also I want to share a really inspiring video on YouTube, which is about - Where good ideas come from.

http://youtu.be/NugRZGDbPFU

That's all I want to share with about this topic - IDEAS. Hope this post inspired you and also I hope that this post will help your ideas become amazing things!

Drawing like an Architect

Today's post is a part 2 of topic - How to sketch like an Architect? Title of today's post is very similar to our topic. So today we again going to look at really good example of Life of an Architect's article - Drawing like an Architect. Bob Borson (creator of: Life of an Architect) received an email of his website's follower, which says: "How can I be an architect, I can't draw". The answer is very simple - You don't have to draw well to be an architect!

Architects communicate through drawing – they aren’t making art. Drawing – or sketching in the case of what architects need – is a skill that anyone can develop with a little training and some practice. 


Here is a page scanned in from Bob Borson's sketchbook. This is where he was sketching out some ideas – none of these are drawn very well but you can probably tell what most of them are – that’s the communicating part of drawing.

I will copy a picture from his post and I will put it in this article. It's a really good example which you can use!

• First thing he does is - sketching a wire diagram, where he blocks out a rough shapes.
• Second thing - lay a tracing paper over the top and go over the shape with a single line to clean it up a bit.
• Last thing - it is not needed if you sketching something not for t-shirt (as Bob Borson does with this picture) he uses photoshop in the last picture, you can just finish it in other way you want. 

One more thing that inspired me from his article was: " I am able to sit down with a client and with a pen and piece of paper draw in real-time in front of them the ideas and concepts we are discussing. It is a powerful communication device and one that I spend a bit of time working on – just so I don’t lose my 

touch."

That's the main points I want to share with you. Hope you will be inspired the same as me.

Link to full post: http://www.lifeofanarchitect.com/drawing-like-an-architect/

Got Inspiration, Let's go to update a blog!

Yesterday, new post from Life of an Architect was very inspirational for me so one idea 'pop up' in my head - this term I'm going widely look at the topic of sketches. That means that I am going to share really interesting and helpful posts about sketches, or how to improve your sketching? or how to sketch like an architect? 
The post about How to think like an Architect? was like the start of this topic about how to sketch like an architect < that's really good idea for calling this topic like that!
So today I want to share that post with you! I hope it will inspire you!

Link to the full post: http://www.lifeofanarchitect.com/architectural-sketching-or-how-to-sketch-like-bob-borson/

So I am going to look at 5 tips and techniques that should improve your sketching.

TIP #01: “The Hit-Go-Hit”

The ‘Hit-Go-Hit’ tip is a way for you to pick up and set your pen back down on the page as you’re drawing in a purposeful manner. Why would you need to do something like that you ask? Well, tip #02 will elaborate a bit more (come to think of it, Tip #02 should really be the first tip in terms of importance but I’m not going to remake the graphic) but whenever you are drawing a straight line, you’ll frequently find that you need to reposition your arm, or the paper, to continue drawing. Make that reset look intentional and add some graphic flair with this technique.

TIP #02: “Don’t Move your Pen/Pencil by Bending Your Wrist or Elbow”

I should also point out that you shouldn’t “push” your pen across the page, you should always “pull” it. Lock your wrist and elbow into a comfortable angle and only move your entire arm when sketching. As you get more skilled, this tip can be relaxed and you can first bend your elbow and ultimately your wrist. In the beginning, by limiting your movement to the entire arm, you’ll end up with straighter lines. And since you can only move your arm so far, that’s when the hit-go-hit technique comes in.

TIP #03: “Incorporate the Use of Pen Weight”

This technique is a biggie … you have to use line weight to help convey depth to your sketch. More gifted sketchers and take care of depth using hatches and shading techniques so eventually that’s something you can take on. In the meantime, use two pens and get some profile lines into your sketches.

Another benefit to using a heavy pen is that it can help show you what you should be looking at – what the point of the sketch might be. Multiple pen weights help the viewer understand the order of things within the drawing, and through proper technique, they can also show to the viewer what’s not important in the sketch.

TIP #04: “Intersect Your Lines at the Corners”

This is pure style and allows the inexact nature of a sketch to come across as what it is – a delineated representation of a thought or concept.The inexact nature of the sketch – when attempted to be exact – looks sloppy and, well … inexact. By allowing your lines to cross at the corners, you can still convey the thought (or shape) you are going after, without having to focus on making the shape perfect. There is a “in-the-moment” that sketches imply and if you look at the two rectangles illustrated above, I think the one on the left looks far better despite the fact that it is far less precise or exact than the rectangle on the right.

TIP #05: “Trace Paper isn’t Precious … Draw in Layers” 

Design is an additive process so why shouldn’t your sketch be as well? Since most of my sketches happen on trace paper and not in a sketch book, I am able to lay sketch upon sketch on top of one another to build up and refine my sketches. I may start with a clean piece of trace paper for every sketch, but it’s only that first sketch that doesn’t have the benefit of something prior to work from.

That's it. Here are the 5 ways or techniques (sounds better), that should make your sketches look better and you will put more discipline in your sketches.

I recommend you to read the full post if you want to be inspired! 

How to think like an Architect?

All the time I set the problem to myself, which is - I can not really think like an architect. This is because when I look at the pictures of architectural sketches, I can't 'read' them. I am trying to look at shapes, details and landscapes and the things like that. But I recently discovered a person in YouTube, who is explaining how to think like an architect! Actually he answered in all my questions after I watched those videos.

Picture from Barry Berkus videos compilation  - How To Think Like An Architect.

So let's start from - Architectural Drawing. What should you pay attention at 'reading' sketches.

• Architectural drawings are used for a number of purposes: to develop a design idea into coherent proposal, to communicate ideas and concepts, to enable a building contractor - construct it and to make a record of a building that already exist.
• Linking to sketches and diagrams. Sketch is a freehand drawing, a quick way to record and develop an ideas and one of the most important thing about sketch is that - it's not intended as a finished work. A diagram may be drawn freehand but deals with symbols, to develop a logic of a design. Both may be worked up in more presentable form and used to communicate the principles of a design.

So I found out what do you have to think about when you 'reading' the architectural sketches. First I think, is find out more about that sketch. If it's your friends sketch, then as them what did they think about when they drew that sketch, where did they get an idea, what inspired them and the things like that. Then use your imagination to create how that architectural sketch would look like in real world. Think about shapes and details.

Come back to architect - Barry Berkus. His videos on Youtube are very informative and it has good examples. Also before you watching those videos try to ask some questions yourself about thinking like an Architect. I hope he will answer to your questions! 

Link to the videos:

http://m.youtube.com/user/BarryBerkus