Paradoxically to the external observer, but not really surprisingly, the MArch course is much more demanding than the PhD. As an interesting experiment, our tutors are imposing a design methodology that makes the emotional effect of a building’s interior the most important consideration. For the past month we have been designing a photorealistic image of the interior of a building, even before its site or programme have been decided. The emotional response to a building’s interior has been something that interested me since my first year in university. Bringing that to the foreground fits neatly with Nigel’s recent rant regarding the predominance of abstract theory in architectural education.

To remove arbitrariness, Adam and Peter favoured association with known, traditional types. References to sci-fi films in the work we produced for last month enduced smirks, but I am entirely comfortable with them. Pop culture references tend to be more salient and desirable than references to Adolf Loos.

The two images and short narrative that follow are the work Andy and I presented on Friday’s crit. It’s basically a hotel made of stacked cloisters (a cloistel!).

Dozens of lonely business trips and the accompanying post-meeting ennui make one appreciate Windows Solitaire. The empty evenings have to be spent somehow. So there’s playing games on the standard-issue company laptop or vegetating in front of the TV with second-rate films. The “social” option is to kill time at the bar, with whiskey and inane conversation with other victims of business travelling.

This place, with its secret garden surrounded by concrete megaliths, was not conducive to ennui, or loafing, or nursing the beginnings of alcoholism. When nothing in my room could keep my interest any longer, I was resigned to spending the rest of the evening at the bar. But passing the lift, I kept on walking along the corridor. I was in a sanatorium. Or a monastery. This corridor was a cloister, and I paced it out slowly, looking through the bays to the colonnade gamelan across the atrium. Its contrapuntal rhythm made sense; as if a Cartesian façade would have been far too easy, far too simple, and by extension deceiving. Life is neither simple nor easy, but this was the place and time to examine it and make sense of it.

It was then I first thought about quitting my job.

Lunch on weekends usually involves going out, typically to somewhere like Café Retro with the Moris. By weekend standards (post-crit weekends especially) getting up, going out, buying food, and bringing it back to prepare is simply a logistical nightmare. But this morning Jane made the effort, and managed to put together a fry-up by 16:00. It was a slow morning. Besides, we had a rugby brunch with the Moris yesterday.