Outside Influence: Has the Architectural Pilgrimage Changed?

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What happens when architecture becomes more accessible through images than through physical experience? This question forms the backbone of our conversation with Nina Boyd, a New Zealand architect currently working in Paris.

The traditional architectural pilgrimage—traveling to see important buildings firsthand—has fundamentally changed. Where Alvar Aalto's visit to Italy completely transformed his design approach, today's architects arrive at celebrated buildings having already seen countless images online. This digital pre-exposure creates a curious paradox: greater accessibility to architectural imagery but potentially diminished impact when finally experiencing spaces in person.

Nina shares insights from her recent Scandinavian travels, exploring how Finnish towns balance high density living with beautiful public spaces. The conversation takes a candid turn when discussing famous buildings that disappointed in person—Frank Gehry's Guggenheim Bilbao described as "facadeism" and certain parametric designs criticized for poor finishes despite conceptual brilliance. These confessions reveal the gap between architectural celebrity and genuine spatial quality.

Working internationally exposes architects to different budget realities, material access, and planning approaches. While New Zealand struggles with limited resources for bespoke elements, the team explores how collaborating with local craftspeople could produce distinctive architectural moments without breaking budgets. This "small batch" approach to custom design might actually represent the future—creating architecture with a genuine human touch that resists both global homogenization and AI-driven processes.

Perhaps the most compelling insight emerges near the end: the architectural breakthrough might not require overseas travel at all. Looking inward to local craft traditions and small-scale collaborations could yield more authentic design expressions than chasing international trends. After all, architecture's most powerful aspects—temperature, texture, acoustic qualities, social interactions—resist digital flattening and demand physical presence.

Ready to rethink your architectural inspirations? Listen now, and join the conversation about where true design epiphanies come from in our digital age.

Chapters:

0:00 - Introduction with Nina Boyd

6:04 - Traveling Through Scandinavia

15:50 - Architectural Exposure and Inspiration

26:48 - Working in International Architecture Firms

35:36 - Famous Buildings That Disappoint

49:36 - Bespoke Design and Human Touch

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
This week's episode is brought to you by the brand
new Hot Off the Press Raptor APA.
The Raptor family includes asurprisingly diverse collection
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Pale Ale can feel like asimilarly broad category, but
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(00:20):
with piercing piney bitternessand citrus hot flavours.
It's a throwback to therelatively recent past.
Rip Falcon, hello Raptor.
Nice Stoked to have Nina Boyd,architect, traveller
extraordinaire and DPP superfan,on the pod this week to discuss
the international scene, how tocome by your architectural

(00:41):
epiphany Buildings that give youthe ick and, of all things,
finnish sausages.
This convo flows like beer in abeer garden, so let's dive in.

Speaker 2 (01:14):
I guess we'll just crack on.
So welcome to the podcast, Nina.

Speaker 1 (01:17):
Whoop, whoop hey.

Speaker 3 (01:18):
Super fan.

Speaker 1 (01:20):
There's two people on your side of the world rocking
DPP t-shirts, because Cal's gotone in Amsterdam as well.
Nice.

Speaker 3 (01:28):
We should have a meet-up, just the two of us.

Speaker 1 (01:32):
Super fans.

Speaker 3 (01:33):
I actually, yeah, brought this all the way with me
, but I almost forgot and I waslike Ben, we've got to be
matching wearing our uniforms,okay, well, I want to know what
you guys are up to, but if wemust, what do you guys want to
know what you guys are up to?
But if we must, what do youguys want to talk about?

Speaker 1 (01:48):
I want to.
I want to cover your guys trip.
Well, firstly, I want to you totell us what the new job's like
, and then I want to hear aboutall the cool shit you guys have
recently gone and seen a holiday.
I want to know.
Doesn't it sound terrible tojust brag about holiday?
I want to know how you've been.
I want to know how you've beeninspired.
Don't peg it that way, becausethen you'll make me feel real

(02:09):
sad yeah.

Speaker 3 (02:13):
I'm sure Ben will have lots to say about it.

Speaker 1 (02:17):
I just really enjoyed your little.
I can't even remember itanymore, it's already blocked
out.
I just enjoyed your tidbit onAlvar Aalto's studio, Ben I just
want to hear more about theinternational scene.
What are we missing out on allthe way over here in little old
nz?

Speaker 2 (02:32):
everything yeah, true , literally everything.
As I was saying before, likeit's pretty dire over here at
what feels a bit dire at themoment the plane was empty
coming back into the country, sothere's never a good sign, I
feel like things are maybeslightly on the up but it goes
to show how bad it is, that'spositive.
It goes to show how bad it is.

Speaker 5 (02:52):
It is.

Speaker 2 (02:53):
Yeah, today I guess have a discussion about
international architecture orjust travel in general and see
how it goes.

Speaker 3 (03:02):
Thanks for inviting me, guys Nice, to be here from
the other side of the world.
A beautiful cloudy morning andit's like 10 am for me.

Speaker 1 (03:12):
So are you in Paris, Nina.

Speaker 3 (03:14):
I'm in Paris right now, nice, in a gorgeous little
apartment subletting off somegirl, so the room I'm staying is
full of her things.
I'll be subletting my way allaround paris for the foreseeable
future, so you know, I've juststarted work, and I've just
started my new job here a coupleweeks in, which is very nice,
but today is actually a publicholiday where are you working?

(03:36):
public holiday in my second weekof work nice, go to french yeah
, I know, I think the frenchmaybe have the most public
holidays in europe, followedclosely by italy smart yeah so
I've chosen a good month tostart work and just at a, at a
pretty small studio that does alot of uh, international work on
I don't know fit outs and somekind of architecture and some

(04:01):
stuff across europe, and i'm'mworking on a project in Prague
at the moment.
I've never been to Prague, soit's all pretty new and exciting
.
Is travel all part of the gig?
I imagine for the directors it'sa huge part of it, but for the
rest of us I don't know ifthat's the case, but we'll see

(04:23):
what I can get out of it.
You know, Trip to Praguewouldn't be too bad is it a
French firm you're working for?
it's like an international, yeah, but it's super international,
like my team is like, from allover.
There's um people from Spain,poland, croatia, peru.
The common denominator is thatmost of them speak French, and

(04:45):
of course I don't, but luckily,like all our clients are
communicating in English, soit's been a relatively easy
transition, I would say, but I'monly a couple weeks in, so you
know.

Speaker 1 (04:55):
Are you taking French to kind of like, get up to
speed?
I've always thought that likeis a terrifying barrier for us
from New Zealand workinginternationally is that we have
zero language skills.
Wow, yeah.

Speaker 2 (05:06):
Yeah, you can learn right.

Speaker 3 (05:08):
I mean, I did like French when I was at high school
and there are little aspects ofit that kind of are coming back
to me, but very slowly yeah.

Speaker 4 (05:17):
I would like to do some night classes, my pal
Exactly.

Speaker 5 (05:21):
That's the extent of my high school.

Speaker 3 (05:25):
Exactly, exactly so, no, I, my pal, exactly.
That's the extent of my uh.
Yeah, exactly, exactly so, no,I mean, I barely got a handle on
italian at the end of last yearand I feel like if I start now
learning french, I'll forget thetiny amount of italian that I
now know.

Speaker 2 (05:36):
I know I struggle with french so much more than I
did with italian.
Italian, you know, there's abit of a rhyme to it.
You can kind of just be likeda-da, da-da, da-da, da-da.
And so we did some travelingprior as well, didn't we?
Before we got to Paris.

Speaker 3 (05:54):
We did some traveling .
When you came over to look atarchitecture, we went from.

Speaker 2 (05:58):
Germany.
To where did we?
I can't remember now.
Germany, copenhagen, which isawesome, such a cool city, super
vibrant, and we were I was, Iwas there for six weeks and it
was just sunny every single day,didn't see any rain for six
weeks was pretty awesome.
I think it was like kind ofcrazy for places like cobenhagen

(06:22):
to, you know, have that muchsun at that time of year.
Everyone was just out reallyenjoying it, which was so cool.
And then where did we go?
We went to Stockholm and toSweden and then over to Finland
and saw all the amazing AlvaAalto buildings and studio and
whatnot, and then back to Berlinand back to Paris.

(06:45):
So nice little loop.

Speaker 3 (06:47):
Nice little loop and places were so much further away
than we realized and weliterally thought that we could
take a train from Sweden toFinland.
And then we realized, like twoweeks before, that we had to fly
because it was like an 18-hourtrain ride.

Speaker 2 (07:06):
Definitely.
Yeah, I'd say definitely.
As I think I mentioned in thelast part, the highlight for me
architecturally was likevisiting Alva Alto's studio.
I just think that was, yeah,really cool.
And I guess what prompted thisepisode was just the discussion
around.
You know how Alva Alto kind ofwent and visited to leave for

(07:29):
his honeymoon and was so takenby the, I guess, the organic
nature of the italianarchitecture, and so when he
came back to finland he hadcompletely changed his, his, his
frame in terms of, I guess,things like light or texture or
rhythm and scale, and shiftedfrom a real kind of methodical

(07:54):
architecture to a much more kindof organic architecture.
So you know, visiting hisstudio, you can really see a lot
of the Italian style comingthrough and things like, you
know, the amphitheater and thatsort of thing in his backyard,
in his courtyard.

Speaker 3 (08:13):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (08:16):
Yeah, just other things like that so.
I think, that was my highlight,for sure.

Speaker 1 (08:20):
Yeah, sure yeah, pretty cool, how and like.
This is a classic thing,classic new zealand um issue.
I guess, or like trope is thatyou know these guys and you guys
as well.
You can do that in a weekendlike you.
In a weekend you can go veryeasily somewhere else, be
totally inspired, completelychange your outlook on life,

(08:43):
come back and crack in, whereasfor us to do that from here it's
like such a big like deal, it'snot like we can take a trip to
europe for a weekend because ittakes your way to travel
literally the other side of theworld.

Speaker 2 (08:55):
It's a big, it's such a mission to get over there and
there's nothing worse than notthan like sitting down although
I guess, like architects, do itall the time but there's nothing
worse than like sitting downalthough I guess, like
architects, do it all the timebut there's nothing worse than
like sitting down for like threedays straight like you said,
ben, you've kind of forgottenall the highlights because
you've taken three days totravel home it was a whirlwind
like

Speaker 1 (09:14):
reduced all of the yeah glamour.

Speaker 3 (09:16):
But wouldn't you also say that that like also it's a
little bit diluted these daysbecause, you see, you get it all
on your, you get it all on yourphone and like your pinterest
board and your newsletters fromdivasade or whatever so
different than seeing it sodifferent.
I would say not at all, noteven remotely I agree, but

(09:37):
imagine being like alvar alto inthe 1930s or whatever 1940s
yeah, whatever, I haven'tstudied him he like has maybe
read some books and then he'slike going there and he's not
going, there was like all thesetourists.
He's like in the mix, you know,with all these italians, piazza,
life and and being like whoa,like this is like mind-blowing,
like I feel like I'm on anotherplanet, whereas we're kind of

(09:58):
like yeah, like go in and likeI've already seen all the
reference images, and thenyou're like wow, the, the, the
details of real life.
You know they're amazing.
But you, you already have thisframe of reference and also you
already know, particularly withAlva Aalto, why we had wanted to
go see it originally anyway isthat we had this beautiful book
of like what is it like?

(10:19):
Christchurch modernism, likeall these Miles Warren houses
and how he was like specificallyinfluenced by finnish
architecture.
I think what we realized when wespent like a week in helsinki,
what most of his influenceperhaps came from like two
buildings and that thearchitecture in general there is
like very cool, but the aspectsof it that were like oh yeah,
you can see how this has been.

(10:39):
You know, brought back to newzealand was from truly just two
projects and we're like it hadeverything that you come to
expect now with like a miles,warren house.
So we were like, oh yeah, that'ssuper cool.
So back then, to just be like Ijust want to take this, you
know, you could imagine himgoing through taking all these
photos I mean like I'm justgoing to adapt this exactly.
But because it's already beenso, like filtered through or

(11:01):
something I don't know, it's alittle bit diluted somehow like
and that's not to say.
So yeah, yeah, like definitelyblown away, but also, just like
it's just, I guess it's like,I'm almost like oh, we've missed
out on that, on that ability tolike, change our whole
perception of something you'vewatched a half hour movie
trailer before watching themovie yeah, exactly okay, okay,

(11:25):
but I think there's a little bitmore than that you know like
miles were, like he actuallyworked in finland right for a
period of time I don't know, tonew zealand, I don't know I'm
pretty uh.

Speaker 2 (11:37):
Well, yeah, don't quote me on that, I'm pretty
sure he did fact check that, butanyway so and I guess like the
same with like ian ethfieldobviously was hugely influenced
by, I guess like themediterranean vibe.

Speaker 3 (11:50):
That's really true.

Speaker 2 (11:52):
So like, at the very least, what I'm getting at is at
the very least, you know, maybeit's not just experiencing for
us anymore, but like having likework experience abroad.
Like how useful do you thinkthat's going to be in terms of
improving your design process oryour um architecture in general

(12:14):
?

Speaker 3 (12:14):
I don't know.
Obviously I'm not a good personto ask, because I've only been
working overseas for less than amonth, but I do feel like
already the budgets are sodifferent that we're specifying
perforated mesh everywhere.
You know what I mean.

Speaker 1 (12:29):
Is it that the budget's super different or that
the accessibility and materialsare so much easier that you can
kind of take your pick of stuffa bit simpler?
We're so limited here that youkind of like to do anything
weird or bespoke, or to targetback to the last episode, crafty
, yeah, it requires quite a lotof effort, whereas there it's
like where's your oyster,because everything's super

(12:51):
accessible.

Speaker 3 (12:52):
I think I think it's a combination of all those
things absolutely.
I think, also people trying tobuild new things, perhaps just
because, I mean, I imagine in acity like prague there's know
there's areas of new developmenthappening and then there's
other areas that are they'respending a lot of money to
maintain.
You have to probably like Ican't imagine the process for

(13:12):
designing like I think what I'mworking on sort of like an
apartment.
You have to jump through a lotof hoops to make like for the
city to like be okay with youbuilding something.
They're just not not gonna letyou build any old crap.
So I think I think there's likea combination of a lot of
things and also like it'sworking with these developers
specifically in my job who, Iguess, yeah, from it you know as

(13:35):
developers.
They're like we are gonna likemake this amazing, this is our
brand and they have like abeautiful websites that go along
with it and spend like like Idon't know thousands and
thousands, maybe hundreds ofthousands of dollars, probably
not, but like a lot of money onrenders and like all the stuff.

Speaker 1 (13:48):
It's like just in a different league, I suppose yeah
, that focus on plannings,particularly internationally, I
think in comparison to newzealand's really interesting.
Talking to you know a lot ofpeers that have worked in in
particular in london.
You know like it's planningfirst and building sort of just
like an afterthought, whereashere but in terms of consenting
and stuff like that yeah, yeah,building first and planning sort

(14:09):
of like oh, maybe try, and, youknow, ignore that as much as
possible, but it's not like theprimary thing yeah whereas I
find overseas it's far moreconsidered.
You know, they're reallyconscious about how well our
cityscapes and theirenvironments and what they want
them to look like we're here.
That's just not really the case.

Speaker 2 (14:26):
Yeah, but do you think that the reason for that
is because we're such a new kindof country and buildings, like
owning buildings, is still kindof like a big thing here.
But as buildings kind of getmore expensive like building,
like home ownership, for example, example in europe is very

(14:47):
expensive then you know, likethe governments might, or people
might kind of push thegovernments to shift from like
having incentivizing propertywhatever to more like lifestyle,
because it'll become more aboutlike you know the landlord or
the tenants and more like aboutlike the planning of you know

(15:07):
how people are living inbuildings, like it has been over
there for many years you knowwhat I mean.

Speaker 1 (15:13):
So she's saying that we shift away from the like
independent home ownership thingyeah, I think inevitably is.

Speaker 2 (15:20):
We're going to right.
So there's going to be a pointin time where housing ownership
in new zealand is going to right.
So there's going to be a pointin time where housing ownership
in New Zealand is going to betoo expensive, probably similar
to like Europe.

Speaker 1 (15:28):
But it's not just housing, it's commercial as well
.

Speaker 2 (15:32):
Yeah, but then people will just start wanting
different stuff from thegovernments, right, and that is
like when the planning stuffcomes in a little bit more.

Speaker 3 (15:40):
I don't think our population will ever allow for
that yeah.

Speaker 5 (15:44):
I think there's a big shift there, like from, I mean,
less and less people owningmore and more, perhaps, then, to
the government owning all thehouses.

Speaker 2 (15:57):
Like that's a very, very large.
I'm not saying the government,I'm saying people still own it.
I'm just saying it's less of a.

Speaker 5 (16:03):
It becomes less about home ownership in general and
more about a lifestyle, living,renting, wanting um different
things from a home well, I don'tknow, perhaps like the more
stringent planning rules andstuff, is maybe just a as a

(16:24):
result of just being an oldercity yeah, there's more care a
very young country?

Speaker 3 (16:30):
I don't.

Speaker 5 (16:30):
Yeah, I don't know if who owns houses or something
will drastically change ourplans massively, but maybe age
and then feeling like you havesomething to protect we don't
have a huge amount to protect oranything.

Speaker 1 (16:45):
But it's not even necessarily protection, like
obviously, like the heritageconsideration is really high.

Speaker 5 (16:50):
but they still do.
I have no idea what theplanning requirements are.

Speaker 1 (16:55):
Yeah, but they do like amazingly contemporary
stuff within that, like you know, that old or that heritage
framework you know, and that'sevidenced everywhere.
I'm sure you would have seensome pretty excellent examples
of that recently yeah yeah, it'sjust in general, everything is
so dense, just yeah.

Speaker 2 (17:13):
Yeah it's pretty cool , but I've already it's hard.
The cities are just so welldeveloped already.
It's so hard to compare because, uh, here it's like we've got
these big sections that we'dlike starting to chop up a
little bit more, but therethere's just no sections.
It's like the in-between spaceswhich are like so well utilized

(17:33):
.

Speaker 1 (17:36):
On your guys' travels .
I mean, you've talked to thecity thing a little bit.
The densification in the lastepisode as well, ben, were you
guys out in like the ruralenvironments or anything as well
was the architecture?
Was there like goodarchitecture evidenced out in
those places outside?

Speaker 3 (17:50):
we drove from like.
So we was, we visited helsinki,and then we spent a few days
staying in this town calledtempe, like north of helsinki,
um in finland.
So it was super cool and reallysmall.
Like what do we think?
Like Like the population ofWellington pretty much.
Yeah, yeah, it was very it wassuper interesting vibe Like not
what we expected at all, andthen we drove slightly further

(18:13):
north.

Speaker 2 (18:16):
It's got the most sauna to population ratio in the
world?

Speaker 3 (18:20):
Yeah, actually it does.
It had so many saunas, eventhough we just went to the same
one.

Speaker 2 (18:24):
They're so good.
No, no, we went multiple timesbecause it was so epic between
these.

Speaker 3 (18:30):
It was kind of crazy.
Between these towns that wevisited it was like all fun land
.
There was absolutely nothingthen it was just like big box
retail and like these hugehighways.
It was kind of like I don'tknow.
That's kind of what I haven't.
I mean, I've never been toRussia, but there are like
aspects of it where I'm likethis is kind of maybe what I
would feel like.
It was like like little, youknow, like tower blocks and like

(18:50):
20 huge shopping malls Soviet.

Speaker 2 (18:55):
But the architecture is like big buildings and like
big blocks of land.

Speaker 3 (19:01):
So it's like it was weird, it was like driving.

Speaker 2 (19:05):
It's kind of like a walmart with a big car park, you
know, but the car park is justlike bare land.

Speaker 3 (19:10):
It was buildings in the middle man, it was a weird
vibe, but then like you, whenyou got to the towns, there were
like all these little beautifulprojects that you could see
where they're obviously likeinvested a lot of money back in,
like I don't know between the40s and the 60s, like getting
these beautiful buildingsdesigned by alvar alto for, like
the library and these littlevillages and stuff or townships,
it's like a town and then it'ssurrounded by these big shopping

(19:32):
malls, it's still very there'sstill not a huge amount of
standalone building, though it'sfar less common, unless it's a
farmhouse.

Speaker 2 (19:42):
You know, yeah, interesting people, just don't
want to look like everything isstill is far less common, unless
it's a farmhouse, you know?

Speaker 3 (19:45):
yeah, see, that's interesting.
People just don't want to livelike that, so everything is
still high density, like what wewould call.

Speaker 2 (19:50):
high density is like their kind of medium to low
density.
You know, yeah, and that's justeverywhere.

Speaker 1 (19:57):
So you've got like townships.
I don't know a township, atowel pile or something, but
it's super high, dense, and thenjust all the amenities
surrounding the outside of it,and then it's just open farmland
again yeah, actually you.

Speaker 3 (20:09):
You say that it's funny, like I thought it did
kind of feel like taupo a littlebit.
It was very like you know, theylike had its and it's like
breakers like it was that kindof vibe.

Speaker 1 (20:19):
What's finished like?
Tell me more.
I love covenco.

Speaker 3 (20:24):
That's nostalgic as fuck me too.
We didn't go there.
We didn't go.
Yeah, we got it.
We had a sausage on the streetthey do.
They're really into giving outsausages, like sausage sizzle
vibes, but they don't give youbread, so you just get a sausage
and a piece of paper and itgoes and the sauce goes
everywhere they'll eat sausagesin the sauna.

Speaker 1 (20:47):
I should have introduced them to a piece of
bread and been like whateveryour equivalent of Bunnings is
get this outside, and you,honestly, I know, but I don't.
One lady was like nothing else.

Speaker 2 (20:57):
Literally One lady was telling us that they usually
hang up their sausages over thesauna.
So it's like cooking thesausages while they're in the
sauna and pour a bit of beer inthere to get it nice and
seasoned, and they'll just hangaround the sauna and then eat
their sausages in between.

(21:17):
So funny.

Speaker 3 (21:20):
Sounds like a good country.
Maybe that was the triphighlight.
Yeah, that was good.

Speaker 2 (21:23):
That was right up there.
Favorite building, the sauna, Imean sounds like a good country
the trip highlight.
Yeah, that was good, that wasright up there.
Favorite building the sauna.
I mean, oh yeah, we had, we didsome.

Speaker 3 (21:29):
We saw some good sauna architecture though slight
, slight segue there was areally nice one in helsinki that
I think it was like either acollaboration or just designed
by like this japanese architectwho was like taking the like
idea of the onsen and kind ofcombining it with the sauna, and
that was beautiful.
It was like all like beautifultimber and like that obviously

(21:51):
specified like a like the kindof timber that smells amazing
when it like warms up in thespaces, so it was just like cozy
and it was called turi sauna.
I don't know.

Speaker 1 (22:04):
That was super nice it does sound like a little it
had like a little courtyard Ijust found out.
I'm gonna, uh, I'm gonna it's anudist sauna in this show notes
it's not a nudist, share it up

Speaker 3 (22:22):
that's just the normal one yeah, exactly one of
us was naked but I don't know,yeah, like so awkward I guess
like, obviously, it's such ait's such a huge privilege to be
able to go and like travel andgo see all this other
architecture around the world,and it is like all so stunning
and overwhelming.
And then I think like,ultimately, though, you're like

(22:45):
so lucky to have seen all thisstuff, but my take is that it
doesn't necessarily change yourwhole perception around what
you're like.
I don't think that my likearchitectural style if I ever
had one is like radicallydifferent.
I think you probably just havea bit more of a thing of like oh
, why can't you do that?
Or like, for me personally, I'mlike super all about living in

(23:06):
a way smaller space than anyflat or like home I've ever
grown up in.
I'm just like yeah like I canlive in a in a small apartment
like no problem.
That's probably like thebiggest takeaway from like
traveling.

Speaker 2 (23:20):
I don't know, and without cars as well, is pretty
good just being able to likewalk everywhere.
I think is pretty key.

Speaker 3 (23:28):
Oh yeah, walkable city.
I mean, that's the only thing Iwant in life is a walkable city
, or bikes.

Speaker 2 (23:33):
All of those Scandinavian countries I would
include, you know, and you knowalso France and Germany and that
sort of thing.
They just obviously likethey're flat, unlike Wellington.
It's a bit harder there and Iknow Wellington's really trying,
but yeah, just like bikeseverywhere, most people just
bike and it's just superconvenient.

Speaker 1 (23:54):
It's so much faster, it's interesting that you kind
of say, nina, that even seeingall this stuff and being in
Europe for the last two yearsreally like it hasn't like
profoundly changed your designapproach, more kind of like
influenced it, like with like,maybe like the minutiae.
I wonder if it's that's becauseof that exposure, like you

(24:15):
spoke to at the start of the pod, like that exposure that we've
had for a long time throughmedia, of all forms of this
stuff, and so when you see ityou're like, oh, that's cool, I
really like it, but I've seen itbefore, so it's already had
that kind of influence.

Speaker 5 (24:29):
Yeah that rationale does?
It does like explain whyarchitects back in the day would
have such drastic sort ofdesign direction changes after
like a big travel or somethingyeah but if you're seeing it
every day, where are?

Speaker 2 (24:46):
the epiphanies I just I I'm going the opposite
direction in this.
I I generally feel like you'rehaving epiphanies.
After seeing and experiencingthose spaces, I know a lot more
clearer what I like interesting.
So like a lot more clearer,with a lot more clarity should

(25:11):
this podcast just become englishwith ben?

Speaker 1 (25:16):
yeah, no, whatever, I'm a designer mate, I'm
dyslexic did you enjoy thedensilation?

Speaker 3 (25:24):
this is what happens this is what happens if you
start getting this is whathappens if you start getting
that stupid gemini thing towrite all your emails for you.

Speaker 2 (25:34):
Yeah, forget how to use english.

Speaker 1 (25:36):
No, nina, I'd forgotten long before that yeah,
you said that you've beenepiphanized, yeah as well do you
reckon that like when?
When do you feel like you'regoing to get the opportunity to
put that into play?

Speaker 2 (25:49):
yeah, so.
So that's kind of where I wasgoing.
I definitely know what I want alot more but it's so hard to
translate it into the type ofarchitecture I'm currently kind
of doing.

Speaker 1 (26:02):
Do you reckon there's even the appetite for it here?

Speaker 2 (26:06):
I mean, it's as simple as like, it could be as
simple as like what kind of formor what kind of proportions,
what kind of rhythm?
You'd like you know Years ago,when we visited Pompeii and
there's, like you know, theruins of, like, the courtyard
houses that are like the centralcourtyard, with the water
feature in the middle to keepthe you know, to keep the air

(26:28):
nice and cool when it hits thewater and kind of bounces out
through the house.
I love that Science of Ben.

Speaker 3 (26:34):
I love that.

Speaker 2 (26:35):
And I'm like shit, yeah, one day I'm going to have
like a sweet courtyard with asweet water feature.
Don't know when I'm going touse it, but you know it's just a
goal, okay.

Speaker 1 (26:46):
So you can have heaps of sandflies at your house.
Is that the plan we can dealwith sandflies.
Every time I think about havinga water feature or looking into
a water feature as a designsolution, I'm like fuck
sandflies.

Speaker 3 (27:02):
That's so true.
It doesn't have to be bigthough.

Speaker 2 (27:05):
Don't listen to them, don't listen to them.

Speaker 1 (27:07):
Nina, I'm being too practical.
What about this?
No sandflies.

Speaker 3 (27:12):
You say I don't know, traveling hasn't really changed
my aesthetic.
And then you design your houseand you have, like your water
feature in the middle, the saunain the corner.

Speaker 1 (27:21):
Your gargoyles, your gargoyles the Parisian terrace.

Speaker 2 (27:28):
Who doesn't want gargoyles?
Literally like your terrace outfront.

Speaker 3 (27:32):
What else could you have?

Speaker 1 (27:33):
It would be like a Frankenhaus of just like all the
international inspiration.

Speaker 2 (27:38):
An obelisk in the middle of your water feature,
with Egyptian writing on it.

Speaker 3 (27:43):
And, just like a tabacadilla, built in so you can
go and grab some drinks.

Speaker 1 (27:49):
Is this not just postmodernism?

Speaker 2 (27:53):
That's the only postmodernism I would subscribe
to yeah, well, that's where newzealand's at right.

Speaker 3 (27:58):
We'll bring it back behind the times because it's
really it's changed me to at mycore.

Speaker 2 (28:03):
That's a good drink is drinking beer.

Speaker 5 (28:05):
Improved your architecture at all you have
like a beer sculpture in yourfountain I tried that in
university.

Speaker 1 (28:13):
I got hammered and then like before starting like a
project, really really late tosee if it would inspire me and
it did not, it did not work didyou have fun, though, did you
have fun I think I had fungetting drunk.
I don't think I had fun gettinga bit that's a, b.
That's pretty good get drunkand pull off a b, then I feel

(28:36):
like you just had to show up toget a b, to be honest.
But is that a low-key?
Brag oh, not at all b for brag.

Speaker 2 (28:44):
So, sam, sam and gerard, have you guys ever, or
even have you ever consideredworking abroad, or either wanted
to or ever?

Speaker 1 (28:53):
going to.
I did a short stint at Hopkinsin Dubai Did you yeah, at the
end of fall, whoa Crazy.
Which was pretty intense.

Speaker 3 (29:06):
Yeah, what's Dubai like?
How long were you there for?

Speaker 1 (29:10):
Not that long.
I can't remember living there.
It was like Dubai itself as aplace to live is pretty horrible
.
You just live in an expatcommunity and basically the
driver would pick me up from thehouse I was staying in, take me
to work and then take me homeor I wouldn't go home.
We're doing like I think we'repulling like 16 hour days most

(29:32):
days, which is real intense butlike, again, super international
.
But with the stuff we wereworking on was massive.
Like I was working on a in acompetition team when working on
the design of like, a new likevillage, basically a new gated
village community, but it wasthe entire thing.
It was nine acres ofdevelopment land or something
was pretty big.
Oh, yeah, it was interesting andthat was crazy international

(29:56):
heaps of brits because hopkinsobviously is a uk-based firm.
The brits love dubai also yeah,heaps of filipinos as well, um,
and quite a few like easterneuropean um peeps, so it's
really fun yeah, totallyabsolutely like soul, crushingly

(30:16):
like intent, just full-on, justlike.
Yeah, it was a lot of hours Ihad to do a um to to get well,
like to like, kind of likeconfirm the internship.
I had to do a cad test on likethe first morning, so they
basically gave me a bunch ofstuff to draft.
Now, like you've got x amountof time to do this and it's

(30:37):
full-on, the principal's behindyou, like watching you cad and
you're like huh, oh god, that'sso stressful nina did a cad test
yeah, it's stressful it'sstressful.

Speaker 3 (30:49):
This is like old school.

Speaker 1 (30:50):
AutoCAD 2D as well.
So you're just like ohscripting, oh it's heinous.

Speaker 3 (30:55):
It's intense.
I had a job interview for anoffice in Milan before I got my
current job and she was like Ineed you to model a pyramid in
Revit and I could not figure outhow to do it.
I don't know, I don't know, Idon't know.
I was like I was like trying tomake a box and then like delete

(31:16):
and then make like, and thenyou know void format and then
void out.
And then I was like can youjust tell me how to do it?
Because I, like my math doesn'treally work like.
I mean, I might be an architect, but the geometry of it, I was
just like I genuinely can'tfigure this out, but I kept
trying.
And then she's like no, no,that's not it you've got to
model all four faces all facesthere you go, there you go.

(31:40):
Yeah, it was actually quite easyyeah, at hindsight crazy I
should have made you guys eachdo that test to see if you could
have figured it out.
It was also in rebuttal.

Speaker 2 (31:50):
I wouldn't have got there until you told me the the
cheat gerard, what about yourinternational?

Speaker 5 (31:56):
just what does the wall tool uh go to a 45 on?

Speaker 3 (32:00):
rebuttal, nah, not wall tool, it's only it's like
make a, you gotta make a it's anice quick way.

Speaker 2 (32:06):
An object, nah, she specifically said it needs to go
to a point as well, right, nina?

Speaker 3 (32:10):
yeah, because I was like modelling a tiny square and
then like a big square, andthen you know.
But nah it has to be to a pointto crawl, to crawl overseas.

Speaker 5 (32:22):
I have not been overseas to work.

Speaker 1 (32:27):
I've only really been to Australia, so I'm not overly
helpful to be influenced, notoverly helpful on this overseas
influence, thing to beinfluenced other than being
influenced by the Aussies yeah,and you don't use Pinterest and
you say that you don't look atstuff on Instagram, so maybe you
are.

Speaker 5 (32:44):
Everything comes from Gerard's own mind his own mind
is enough of an adventure.
We try not to look at too muchyeah, yeah, so you can.

Speaker 3 (32:54):
You're still your mind's still open.
You can just have like somecrazy experience.

Speaker 5 (33:00):
Yeah, I would love to do a little aki tour yeah aki
marathon, one might say weactually got a lot of.

Speaker 3 (33:07):
You know we looked at all the Aki Marathon places
that they visited.
It was helpful.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 2 (33:14):
I was done all the hard work for us.
So, shout out to the AkiMarathon lads.
Thank you very much.

Speaker 5 (33:20):
Dog.
In terms of working though,yeah, two minds, I think one
mind sometimes working foryourself is really stressful and
needing to pay your rent andall that mind.
Sometimes working for yourselfis really stressful and needing
to pay your rent and all that.
So it kind of seems like aluxurious holiday in my mind to
like go work with somebodyoverseas for a year or two not
16 hours a day.

Speaker 1 (33:41):
You're probably doing that for yourself at the moment
yeah, just move to Dubai, moveto France yeah, you want to go.
You want to go move somewherewhere there's siesta yeah, they
have human rights.

Speaker 5 (33:52):
Just to start, this is a starting point, fair point
yeah, I don't know, I think, achance to learn from somebody
who's doing some really coolthings.
What about antarctica?
I feel like that's a place thathas, like a unique, been there
yeah not a lot of architecturalinfluence well, the architecture
.

Speaker 2 (34:09):
Isn't it the architecture that?

Speaker 5 (34:10):
is.
There is a.
Nice is unique enough.

Speaker 1 (34:13):
There's some pretty epic creations out there pretty
interesting.
Well, yes, yeah, I mean likethe actual, like the bases are
interesting in themselves but,to be honest, like the forms of
icebergs floating in the oceanand glaciers and everything is
pretty, it's pretty cool, it'spretty inspiring.

Speaker 3 (34:31):
I knew you were going to say that.

Speaker 1 (34:34):
I've got a hella photo album full of just awesome
formed pieces of ice.
Yeah, I've actually drawn onquite a bit, I think initially
when I set up, I read heaps ofit because I didn't have any
buildings to put on my website,so I just had pictures of the
cool icebergs.

Speaker 3 (34:50):
Amazing.

Speaker 1 (34:53):
Have you made any iceberg buildings?
I done any iceberg buildingsgotta let some of the influence
come through man yeah, I knowget bergy, get bergy with it.
I'm actually kind of doing aniceberg-esque building.
Well, it's more of like a whyget?
Earthquake bigger underneath itkind of could you, could.
You could say it's say it looksa bit like an iceberg in
Queenstown at the moment.

Speaker 3 (35:14):
Cool, is it all white ?

Speaker 1 (35:16):
No, it's not, it's brown.
It looks more like rocks thanicebergs, to be honest.

Speaker 3 (35:24):
It's cool, that's pretty cool.

Speaker 2 (35:27):
You're not wrong, though, gerard.
I might have to put a waterfountain in my next building
yeah, get it done, mate, do it,that's done it's not a water
fountain, though.

Speaker 3 (35:35):
It's got to be like the beautiful, perfectly
symmetrical, like courtyard verytailored exactly.

Speaker 5 (35:42):
Well, I just I'm a big sucker for those those old
school sort of heating coolingtechniques that ultimately
result in like some interestingforms, like the big lake, like
the big pond in front of yourhouse and then like a solar
chimney, so just a large bit ofyour building that opens at the
top.
It definitely is.
Yeah, totally.

(36:02):
We were sitting.

Speaker 2 (36:04):
We were actually just .
We didn't go to the Louvre, butwe went to the park out front
the other day.
Close enough, Good story Same.

Speaker 5 (36:12):
thing.

Speaker 2 (36:13):
But no, so they got us here.
It was a hot day and they'vegot all the ponds and there was
like thousands of people, but,like you, sit around the pond
and it was just so nice and cool, you know.
So just a body of water to coolthe air temperature.

Speaker 3 (36:29):
Yeah, but New Zealand is surrounded by a body of
water.

Speaker 1 (36:32):
Yeah, that's why it's always temperate, generally
temperate.

Speaker 2 (36:36):
Yeah, no, it still gets hot.

Speaker 5 (36:38):
I think that's the temperature notion to
architecture is something thatmaybe doesn't get played with
enough.

Speaker 3 (36:47):
Oh be experiential.

Speaker 5 (36:49):
Yeah, one that we don't play with enough, as with
all of my stories.
I'm gonna have to referenceconor dolman again, because I
don't haven't been overseas andhave to live vicariously through
his your favorite architect,conor dolman yeah your favorite
international architect yeah,he's a big dog.
Recommend now he went tozimthor's the velspar baths.

(37:10):
It's just saying like thetemperature in each of the pools
is different.
So like it adds, like thiswhole another layer to like, the
experience of the space.
So I think that's something youcan't see in the photos or like
, because those spaces are soseparate you can't see them all
together apart from in like afloor plan.

Speaker 1 (37:27):
So the navigation through that space was like,
like, like, very worth the tripto see that yeah, I feel like
that's true, that's the case,this, so maybe the temperature
thing, but I think that's thecase for a lot of these
international buildings, likethere's definitely some like
clunkers.
I've been to some clunkers thatI've like built up in my mind
and then you go there and you'relike, really, is that it?

(37:49):
But then like some of them,some of them, you're like okay,
I did not understand any of thisfrom a photograph or from a
video or anything.
Yeah, yeah, and I think that's.
But that's probably just goodarchitecture in general, right
like it's literally it's notjust a building.
It's, it's emotion, it'sexperience like we've talked
about heaps this season, whichis kind of cool, but I think

(38:11):
that's the that's the key.

Speaker 3 (38:12):
It's something that evokes more emotion than just
visual if you can capture thebest parts of a building in a
photo, then you're definitelydoing something wrong.
Right like architecture isn'tarchitecturing.
I actually had a question thenfor you guys, because I've been
thinking about this for ageswhat is like a building that
either you like was totallyshoved down your throat at

(38:32):
architecture school, or like,since then, that's like you're
meant to love it?
That you either visited andwere like well, this is really
not what I expected, or or thatyou perhaps never liked, but was
like in the zeitgeist is likethis is an amazing building that
you have to love.

Speaker 1 (38:51):
Like I'd be really interested to know.
Ben pre-prepared us with thisquestion.

Speaker 3 (38:55):
I know, but it's such a.

Speaker 1 (38:58):
So I've thought about this one.

Speaker 3 (38:59):
I didn't read the group chat so I am unprepared.

Speaker 1 (39:03):
I, for me, it's the Guggenheim Bilbao, like going to
.
You know, I feel likeparticularly sort of our, our
generation of architecture wasone of the kind of
quintessential buildings.
Yeah, everybody talked about it.

Speaker 3 (39:20):
Yeah, that's Frank Gehry.
Frank Gehry in general, rightyeah.

Speaker 1 (39:25):
But in particular Bill Bauer.
Like I'm not going to understatethe impact, the societal impact
that that building hadbasically completely regenerated
, the city but as a building,it's so disappointing to go
there and you realise that ahuge majority of it is just
facadeism.

(39:45):
It's not even building to it,it's just form on structure that
is zero function.
It's just there for aestheticand I'm kind of like just boxed
out inside.
Yeah, that's just framed.
You can see behind it, you youknow big, cool, sweeping form,
and then you turn around thecorner and it's just like a
lattice like a lattice grid work, framing and you kind of oh god
, it solves your weathertightness issues, when you don't

(40:09):
have to weather tie anything.
I was just super disappointedit's amazing to look upon and
like it's, it's you know such a,you know, you know pretty,
pretty wild form and everythingbut like that was super
disappointing.
But then, in comparison, thedisney play or the disney
concert hall in la those two aresort of like brother sister
buildings.
Sure is a bit more like theentire form is a bit more

(40:33):
inhabited, and so it's way, andI've been to both and that's way
more interesting, I think.

Speaker 3 (40:38):
But yeah, the gilgudan baobab to me was, it
was a clunker yeah, yeah, that'sreally interesting because
you're right, frank gary was ahuge one when we were at
architecture school yeah, that'sdisappointing.

Speaker 5 (40:51):
I found at architecture school you were
taught to despise or hate FrankGehry.
You're like, well, that's notarchitecture, he's just
squishing at people.
But I've always been massivelyimpressed by the guy.
He must be amazing in a clientmeeting God Incredibly
convincing that guy'scommunication skills must be
amazing in a client meeting.

Speaker 1 (41:11):
God, incredibly convincing.

Speaker 5 (41:12):
That guy's communication skills must be
reasonable.
He could talk you into someweird things, I reckon.

Speaker 3 (41:20):
Yeah, I agree, and maybe that's the most amazing
part of it.

Speaker 5 (41:26):
Well, there's clear substance to a lot of his work.
I think some of it's amazing,but it's just.
Yeah, that's a bit of a shamethat that one's let down yeah.

Speaker 1 (41:36):
What about you?
Ben Well man.
Ben doesn't like being negative, can you?

Speaker 2 (41:42):
be honest.

Speaker 1 (41:44):
It's a safe space.
I don't know, give it bothbarrels mate.

Speaker 5 (41:47):
Nobody's going to hear this, I guess like, yeah,
some of zaha stuff don't sayabout zaha don't pick the only
female architect and be like Ivisited the uh, what's it?

Speaker 2 (42:02):
at the fire station at vitra, you know, in the vitra
complex, and it's just so likeit's crazy, because so it's
basically got one focus pointand the whole building is
designed to that one focus point, including, like, the kitchen
and everything which is likepretty cool, but also like the
most ridiculous building I'vealso ever been in and I guess

(42:25):
like maybe I'm a little bit toopractical, yeah I'm not saying
the negative part.

Speaker 5 (42:29):
Yeah, I know, I know it's just it's, it's.

Speaker 2 (42:32):
The whole building would just never be used for
what it's intended to be usedfor, and it just becomes a
sculpture and then I kind ofthink that's a bit of a letdown,
but it's still it was reallyinteresting.

Speaker 3 (42:46):
It's cool that people can make sculptures.

Speaker 5 (42:49):
I'm glad to hear it warps three-dimensionally.

Speaker 3 (42:53):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (42:54):
Yeah, but it's too literal for me.
It's like let's take a buildingand just kind of warp it and
then build the whole thing likethat and it's cool, but it's
also just a little bit too kindof literal, I guess.

Speaker 5 (43:07):
Well, maybe you've had For me.

Speaker 2 (43:08):
For me.

Speaker 5 (43:10):
I suggest maybe you've had an epiphany there.

Speaker 3 (43:13):
Yeah.
I'm only doing super rationalbuilding.

Speaker 5 (43:16):
A very strong conceptual piece of architecture
.
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (43:22):
No, I'm too practical , gerard.
You can't handle whensomething's not fit for purpose.

Speaker 5 (43:28):
I guess.
Well, like that's design.
Sometimes You've got to like,trick yourself into things.
It's like is it Madagascarwhere the penguins look the
other way to walk off the cliff?
Maybe one day you should throwsome rational conceptual
elements into one of yourbuildings and see what happens.

Speaker 1 (43:46):
Yeah, I know, that could be part of your design
development from this journey.

Speaker 5 (43:51):
Yeah, that's good points understanding where the
line is of what's conceptual andwhat's you know, what's not
actually that conceptual I foundwhen I was this doesn't have to
do with going overseas, butearlier when I was starting
working I would try push likecrazy ideas to of what I thought

(44:11):
was crazy to the job I wasworking at the time and everyone
kept saying yes to things.
Yeah, but like with each oneI've been built the first house.
And I was like, oh, I'm going toput a wall on an angle and then
because it's like double story,so half height, half levels, so
I was like oh if I angle thewall then the room below gets

(44:33):
more space, more floor area, andthen the room above gets more
like head area.
I was like oh, oh, this is acrazy idea.
But then when it's built, it'slike it just kind of just works
amazing.

Speaker 3 (44:44):
There you go, and then that then that other one.

Speaker 5 (44:48):
You built the um particle board one yeah yeah,
the boss at the time was likeyou're not going to get that
through and and then they wentrip-roaring ahead with it and
loved it.
Amazing it was like a fullyellow bathroom.
I don't know.

Speaker 3 (45:03):
That's the yellow toilet house.
That's so cool.

Speaker 1 (45:06):
The urine toilet.

Speaker 3 (45:07):
Yeah, that's so cool.
I visited it the other day.

Speaker 5 (45:10):
It's awesome Nice, didn't you?
Yeah, how's it looking?
Yeah, it looks mint.
It looks like the day qualityconstruction, right there,
construction, but I think likesome ideas, a ski field on top
of a power plant.
When it's built, it's no longerlike crazy.
Oh, this is the realm ofreality, but maybe the fire
station makes sense.

Speaker 2 (45:30):
So we went.
We obviously went there,fucking cool building, but at
some point that was like anobscene, crazy idea to somebody
Totally.

Speaker 1 (45:38):
Now it's in the land of the living.

Speaker 3 (45:40):
Yeah, absolutely.

Speaker 2 (45:41):
Fair Still, that is actually like a power plant and
is used as a power plant.

Speaker 5 (45:49):
So it's very, very much fit for purpose.
So does the fire station justnot have people in it?

Speaker 2 (45:54):
I think that lasts of like two seconds as a fire
station.
So what is it now?
That's just a marketing ploy.
It's just literally yeah, it'sjust you visit it, just look at
it, it's an exhibition building.

Speaker 1 (46:05):
Right, I guess it works.
It's just the building on show.

Speaker 2 (46:10):
Yeah, I mean like there's a bunch of interesting
buildings, like there's a TadeoAndo building, my favorite
building, which my favoritebuilding, which is one of the
Herzog buildings, part of like acomplex or something.
Yeah, like Vitra.
So you know the Vitra Museum,which is like the furniture and
that sort of thing, it's like inthat complex.
So it's just used as like for atourist attraction now.

(46:30):
And it is, I mean, like thatwhole place is so worth going to
.
I think like highly recommendvisiting there.

Speaker 5 (46:40):
One stop shop of inspiration so did so did.
Did it start off as a firestation or was it always like a
conceptual fire station for thevitro?

Speaker 2 (46:48):
my understanding is that it was a fire station, but
now thinking about it, maybe italways just was a conceptual
fire station.
He's having his epiphany butyeah, I, I can't answer that,
I'm not sure.
Sorry, yeah, and what about you?

Speaker 1 (47:02):
what any buildings that you sort of had shoved down
your throat that were lessinspiring?

Speaker 3 (47:08):
kind of a lot, but, being still mine, like I
obviously don't have anythingbad to say about zaha, but like
I visited, you know, a couple ofthose buildings and it's not
even that.
It's like not practical.
I think that's super cool tobuild stuff.
That's not practical.
I think it's more just like thelevel of finish was pretty
average and like this is justbasing off like two or three
buildings one in guangzhou, onein one outside of copenhagen

(47:31):
just really like the finishing'spretty bad.
The bathrooms are ugly.
You know, like when you knowyou're like, oh, the
architecture feels so rightbecause even the bathrooms are
like so beautifully designed andlike, yeah, epic it's kind of
disappointing when such aletdown you're like well
like yeah, like just the promiseof like this architect is not
delivered, but I, I don't know,like I think the whole

(47:52):
parametric architecture thing Ialways was super resistant to,
which made me almost a minorityat architecture school, and now
I feel like we've come so farpast, like it's so weird to
think about that time period now, especially now, like everyone
knows that Patrick Schumacher islike whatever, not a good guy,
and I'm just like feel a littlebit vindicated, and then I'm

(48:13):
also just like, yeah, like Ialways felt like it just didn't
like speak to me and then itjust doesn't speak to me, but
that's like it's different foreveryone, right?
Because some people will belike well, this is like
phenomenal, and I'm sure thereare buildings that are finished
beautifully, but I'm still likeI don't know.

Speaker 1 (48:29):
Yeah, that's not for me era felt like a lot of effort
was put into the front end andnot much yeah, back end.

Speaker 3 (48:35):
Do you think we're done?
In general I know I can'treally comment.
Yeah, do you think we're donewith that?

Speaker 1 (48:42):
I think it's probably been a bit more refined, mainly
probably because the tech'smore refined.
I feel like back in the day thetech was so kind of janky, you
got janky results.
But now it's so polishedEverything's a bit more easy,
probably.
Maybe, so the parametricsolutions are just more I don't
know.
They just seem more curatedwhat are some of the?

Speaker 3 (49:06):
yeah, what are some of the?

Speaker 2 (49:06):
newer parametric offerings well yeah, who was it
telling me?
Someone was telling me.
I'm pretty sure it was today.
I can't remember which firmthey were talking about.
I thought it was like orsomething like that, where they
basically like we're talkingabout models like having a work,
workshop, chat, you know, kindof like trying to manifest it,

(49:27):
but we're talking about, likecreating phone models yeah and
like they were saying like yeah,whatever firm it is, I'll have
to double check.
But like they basically likemake the form out of like these
big phone models and just get ithow they want it and then
basically like just scan it,chuck it in like a ai generator
and that kind of generates thefacade.

(49:47):
I hate that.
Um, please, there's like heapsof people kind of scared I'm
just saying, that's becoming athing.

Speaker 1 (49:58):
oh, it's becoming a thing.
It's kind of using alltechnologies at hand, you're
still model making.
The form has still come from ahuman mind.
You've just used a tool toperfect it.

Speaker 5 (50:12):
You sully it, you take yourself places that maybe
you weren't prepared to go, andthere's no coming back from that
.

Speaker 3 (50:20):
Gerard, if you walked into, if they had two identical
pavilions and one was designedby AI and one was designed by an
architect, do you think youcould go into the pavilion or
look at it and know which onewas designed by a human and
which one wasn't?

Speaker 5 (50:35):
Yeah, I think so Definitely.
If it was like an architectthat liked to design buildings.
You know that liked to designbuildings yeah, like we all did
it yeah, but like somebodythat's not true, somebody who
like follows, follows through onthe details, who you know is
like john wardle, making likeepic little handles everywhere
and like really nice littletouches.

(50:57):
I feel like you could spot ajohn wardle with your eyes shut,
I think.

Speaker 3 (51:01):
Yeah, you could feel it.
I think it's pretty beautiful.

Speaker 5 (51:03):
Yeah, like every time you touched a handle, you're
like this is an extremelycomplex timber profile.
Yeah.
Paul Joyner who made this, butoh my goodness, so nice.

Speaker 1 (51:14):
It's that level, it's the added depth right the.
It's that level, it's the addeddepth right, that added depth
to the building that I thinkcomes through that human, human
touch.

Speaker 5 (51:21):
I think yeah architecture, like all these big
buildings, conceptual buildingsthat fall over at detail level,
like that's the benefit of likebeing in a small practice where
you can yeah be the designer,but then you get to make sure
the design intent comes throughat the detail end, and I feel
like people are so quick to handoff, develop detailed docs to

(51:45):
uh millions or whateverdeveloper contract, that or yeah
even to a whole different firmI know then you like, you lose
the.
You lose the salt and pepper.

Speaker 1 (51:54):
You know, I totally agree I think, being able to
carry that intense through fromwhere to go is so important to
like realizing the truth, thetruth of your building hell yeah
it has no heart, it doesn'tknow what it's trying to do, it
doesn't know what doesn't havehands, has no hands.

Speaker 5 (52:10):
Oh fuck, yet I am a robot.

Speaker 4 (52:17):
Maybe I'm a robot from the future, that is like
that is so true.

Speaker 3 (52:21):
Yeah, I totally agree .
I just think I also wonder if,like, maybe that's the
opportunity that sometimes NewZealand is missing out on.
Is it?
Is it like?
I don't know what it comes downto is like, is it a question of
economics or I don't know?
But I think the thing thattotally sets apart any good
building you've ever been intoversus a normal building, that

(52:42):
you don't even think twice, it'snot amazing.
You is that level of detail andlike, is there a thing of like?
Well, in New Zealand, we'redealing with things on such a
smaller scale that we should betaking on all this extra.
We should be taking on theextra level.
We're like yeah, of course,we're gonna also have like a
whole part of the scope.
That's like designing all thehardware and getting it

(53:03):
fabricated, but then at the sametime in new zealand, like I
don't know, are our services soexpensive that it's like no,
like everything has to be offthe shelf, like I just I really,
I really despise that we alwayshave to get everything
proprietary.
I'd love to know what thosemeetings sound like where the
architects are saying like okay,this is our scope and it's like
this, this, this and this and,of course, like it's every like

(53:24):
we're gonna, we're gonna budgetthis much for like all the, all
the hardware and all the like.
We're gonna make some likebeautiful and we're gonna make
the kitchen sink and we're gonnaget this like this done bespoke
, and like that's just part ofit, like we, how do you have
that conversation with theclient?

Speaker 1 (53:39):
I really like.
I really like what romana saidlast week and he's like, if
you're running a custom batch oflike 20 of something or it then
becomes viable and I'm likeshit totally, I've never really
thought about that, like it'sdefinitely relatively small runs
of things yeah true, I think,just be sensible.
Like don't don't design a custom, something that's like insanely

(54:01):
complex and uses like sixdifferent materials, so you need
six different trades and theyall need to interact or anything
that's not gonna.
That's not gonna like fly, butif you do something that's like
still cool and bespoke butrelatively simplistic, yeah,
it's probably worth it that's sotrue.

Speaker 3 (54:19):
I think it's just something that you don't.
It's not a skill set that lotsof architects have and like
obviously, yeah, the discussionguys that I had last week and
like you, gerard, being in aworkshop all day, but a lot of
architects like myself like wehaven't spent time in workshops
building stuff, so that's kindof like a really foreign concept
you've only been two weeks yournew job.

Speaker 1 (54:38):
Is there any scope for that there?

Speaker 3 (54:41):
A little bit in my office because I think they've
made a bit of a name forthemselves, developing like
super customized joinery andthings for like very like small
living kind of vibes, Like youknow, like they've designed like
a custom, like you know, sinkthat folds down these kinds of
things a folding sink, that'sright and like they're, they're

(55:03):
really into like the beds thatlike lift up beds and things
like that, to like really, likeyou know, make the most of the
space mechanisms yeah, theyrequire, like a little bit of
mechanical engineering and andum.
But what I'm realizing is, likethe reality of of even getting
those over the line, even thoughthat's probably the main
selling point that they're goingto employ this.

(55:23):
You know, office to do do theirarchitectural work is like you
know, specific clients are stilllike, oh, but actually can we
get something off the shelf?
Because that just soundsexpensive and if it breaks, if
something breaks, we can't justgo and replace it easily.
We have to, like, get a wholenew sink specifically fabricated
.
So can we just like, havesomething that's already

(55:43):
available?
So I think it's just a battleeverywhere really.
I mean, what's going to happenwhen, like at alva alto, like
one of his buildings, the handlebreaks and then they can't
replace it?
What are they going to do?

Speaker 1 (55:54):
break.
It's just crafted so well.

Speaker 3 (55:56):
Well, yeah, it is cast from brass.
The building will break.
I don't know what you do inthose scenarios.

Speaker 5 (56:02):
I think having a closer relationship with like
weird boutique makers, likethere's people around who just
turn timber so it's like youcould get a whole bunch of knobs
done by somebody.
Of course there are people.
If you want to make something,I guarantee somewhere there's

(56:23):
some guy who will make a smallbatch of those for a reasonable
price.
I think it's just yeah, we're soused to.
We must wrap all this into apackage and put it through one
main contractor and you couldpull out a whole bunch of those
items and call them quitesupplied and you and the client
go around and find hell yeahfind a little makers yeah you

(56:44):
could do that sort of thing withlike smaller workshops like I
often get people coming in andwanting to like elaborate on
things yeah, I think yeah, well,that's what robots can't do
either, like they can'tcollaborate with other humans
and make friends, and then goand bear with each other.
Yeah.
I feel like in there lies somemore meaning of life.

(57:07):
Maybe this whole story is thatmaybe you don't need to go
overseas to have a breakthrough,but maybe looking inward and
local and smaller God yeah, well, maybe the story is, there's
just inspiration, so the future?

Speaker 3 (57:23):
maybe that our next partners will take it small
scale get it local, local crafteveryone in new zealand between
the ages of, you know, 25 and 31didn't like go overseas.

Speaker 1 (57:40):
Then imagine how like thriving, all those
opportunities would be in newzealand yeah, but she says she
says one of those peopleoverseas yeah, but like
literally I'm like over here butthe problem is there's not the
opportunity.
The opportunities aren't likeyou know.
The market here is not great,so the opportunities aren't like
you know.
The market here is not great,so the opportunities aren't here

(58:01):
, which is a shame.

Speaker 3 (58:02):
But if people were here.

Speaker 5 (58:04):
If you generalize everyone goes overseas.
Well, so many people gooverseas for.
A lot of people Two to threeyears, maybe four, but then they
all come back.
So it's like this they're justepiphanized.

Speaker 1 (58:15):
They just come back.
Epiphanized Everybody comesback.
The call of the motherland isstrong.

Speaker 5 (58:22):
I had a very controversial building as my
option for one that I feel getstalked up very heavily.

Speaker 1 (58:30):
What's that yeah?

Speaker 3 (58:31):
Yeah yeah, yeah, yeah yeah.

Speaker 5 (58:33):
Because I haven't been overseas very much, is it?
To Papa.
I'd say to Papa no, no it mightget me in a lot of trouble no
go, please, please, please orsave it for the patreon if you
don't want to save it for thepatreon yeah, bleep it, bleep it
yeah, now I'm having a mindblank.
What's the um, what's thelittle chapel down in?

(58:57):
Karori um well, it gets talkedup as if it's like.
Sagrada Familia.
There's better John Scott outthere, but like John Scott's,
done some really nice things.
It's a pretty nice buildingthough.
Well, like I also feel like agothic piece of church
architecture is infinitely moreimpressive, but we're not out

(59:19):
here celebrating the ogarchitects of the day.
You know, the very, very earlyweek.
Maybe it's exactly.
Maybe it's a matter of time,like we only celebrate
architects that we can, likerationally think one or two
generations and then I thinkit's five or six generations.
It's like no, you just made itit's a matter of Five or six
generations it's like no, youjust made a.

(59:39):
It's a matter of locationthough.
It's fucking building ever andwe don't care.

Speaker 1 (59:44):
If we're looking at churches, the Gothic cathedrals
in Dunedin are celebrated prettyheavily.
It's because they have them.
There aren't that many inWellington.
The only really kind of Gothicchurch is is um old saint paul's
, which is epic awesome such acool church it's a

Speaker 5 (01:00:03):
really cool building and this yeah, yeah, it's very
like warm huggy space.

Speaker 3 (01:00:11):
All that timber, yeah , that red carpet, yeah like I,
yeah, obviously not denying johnscott's like one of the best
architects that has ever everexisted in new zealand.
Yeah, but yeah, for me as well,maybe fortuna, just the way it
was like just gets about.
So high I was like oh yeah,it's really cool, but like I

(01:00:33):
don't know, yeah, it is cool,but it's maybe not like we.

Speaker 1 (01:00:38):
We won't look to get onto the Fortuna lecture.
Sorry, spell it then.

Speaker 2 (01:00:44):
I think it's cool.

Speaker 1 (01:00:45):
I think it's cool.
I like it.

Speaker 5 (01:00:47):
The Fortuna lecture they need to invest in some
bigger TVs.

Speaker 2 (01:00:51):
No, yeah, they need to invest in some maintenance as
well.

Speaker 5 (01:00:55):
It's a terrible space for a lecture.
It is.

Speaker 1 (01:00:57):
Yeah, yeah, nice toilet, just make sure you
wonder what it was like for asermon, which is like a lecture.

Speaker 3 (01:01:04):
So maybe the planning's not great.
They probably don't needscreens.

Speaker 5 (01:01:08):
There's less pictures if you're just reading from the
book.
They need a paper, though, oran architecture lecture, they'd
upkeep somehow, though.
There's a little.

Speaker 3 (01:01:20):
TV screen.

Speaker 5 (01:01:20):
Yeah, there's so many like epic churches in new
zealand, so I think for it toget singled out it's like well,
maybe just because it getstalked about so much well, yeah,
we should probably wrap it upthere anyway, call it done.

Speaker 1 (01:01:33):
Awesome to have you on nina, and nice to have your
international perspective oh,it's not an international
perspective.

Speaker 3 (01:01:40):
I've just been on holiday for a while more
international than ours.

Speaker 1 (01:01:43):
But um, I hope the new job goes well.
I told her that what?

Speaker 2 (01:01:47):
we're talking about today and she's like oh, has it
influenced your architecture?
But not, I don't think it hasin any way.

Speaker 1 (01:01:54):
I'm like good, there goes that conversation the
answer is the answer is wewhisked over that pretty quick
but I'm glad it's influenced youben that's made me feel better
about my lack of trouble

Speaker 3 (01:02:09):
I just, I just don't want to come on here and be like
, yeah, so I've like been onholiday for a few, for a while.
Um, I totally like I'm the bestarchitect in the world, like I
haven't even, haven't evendesigned it's such a profound
impact on me.
Yeah, literally here I go, likespecifying my tin roof, as per
usual awesome thanks for comingon and it's been great nice to

(01:02:34):
talk to you guys.