Architecture

paper

I used to create houses all the time. These neighborhoods were created in middle school, but as far back as I can remember I was building cardboard houses, creating floor plans, and building worlds out of lego. I would assign every “space” a purpose and think about how people go in and out. I am convinced that my love of planning events, designing organizations, architecting software, learning about computer networks, and choreographing dances all stem from this same obsessions over imagining people or things moving around spaces with their own free will and finding joy from it.

legos

I don’t do a lot of lego art, but I spent a weekend in high school building a whole village after learning that the way buildings cast shadows is a big consideration of architects. The shadows a building casts and its interaction with the sun isn’t just about the sun moving from east to west but also about the latitude of the building.

These buildings were pretty basic, but the magic happened when I moved the light source around it. I loved studying how the light can affect our emotions as we see inanimate scenes come to life…

minecraft

Although it was a short-lived hobby, I spent the summer between graduating college and starting my first full-time job immersed in Minecraft. It was partially motivated by my theory that if I could get better at video games (something I was not exposed to as a child), I would get better with computers. Overall I say that experiment was a success, but with Minecraft, I ended up turning off the only feature which made this “game” any bit challenging which was survival mode. I basically used minecraft as a glorified 3D creative space where I flew around and built houses. I turned monsters on to inhabit my homes but they couldn’t attack me or blow up my houses.

I find the idea of block-ifying everything in the natural world a very satisfying concept. I spent a lot of time landscaping the curvy beaches and forests to turn them into beautiful gardens with stone steps.

I also always wanted to be an architect so I tried building different styles of homes inspired by their location and terrain.

I actually did spend a summer in middle school learning architecture at the University of Maryland Eastern Shore. I also spent an entire semester at the University of Maryland during the first of many tech career identity crises taking intro-to-architecture classes.

As I created my Minecraft world, I thought a lot about negative spaces and the views from the windows, and “open” versus “closed” spaces. This modern apartment was built for an exhibitionist that did not mind a very open living room!

One of the funny things that happens to you when you play Minecraft is that you start thinking the real-world looks like Minecraft. As someone with a fairly sheltered childhood, I have this odd sensation every time I travel to a new terrain or see a quiet and beautiful city that “I feel like I’m in Minecraft”. Only those who’ve played Minecraft will understand… 😉