As an architectural technician, you’ll have the skills and knowledge to work alongside architectural professionals and plan different residential and commercial designs. Your training will prepare you to use modern technologies like Building Information Modeling (BIM) software and to survey, develop plans, and calculate estimates for projects.
The type of professional you’ll be working alongside as a technician depends on where you’re employed. However, if you end up working at an architectural firm, you may have the opportunity to work alongside progressive and forward-thinking architects. Read on to learn about three highly celebrated architects and their career paths and distinctive styles.
Zaha Hadid, Internationally Renowned Iraqi-American Architect
Zaha Hadid stands out as the first woman awarded the distinguished Pritzker Prize in 2004, and for her works that incorporate glass, plastic, titanium sheets, and steel to convey fluidity and lightness. Born in Baghdad, Iraq, her career began when she moved to Lebanon to study mathematics at the American University in Beirut. In 1972, she moved to London to study and teach alongside the famous architects’ Rem Koolhaas and Elia Zenghelis at the Architectural Association.
Hadid began her own practice in the 1980s, soon gaining international recognition after winning an architecture competition in Hong Kong. Her firm Zaha Hadid Architects (ZHA) has now been active for forty years and completed more than one thousand projects worldwide.
Graduates of technical design programs may have the opportunity to work at a firm like ZHA. Some of Hadid’s most well-known buildings include the Rosenthal Center for Contemporary Art in Cincinnati, the National Museum of 21st Century Arts in Rome, and the Ordrupgaard Museum Extension in Copenhagen.
Every Architectural Technician Should Know Frank Lloyd Wright’s Work
Arguably the most famous architect from the USA, Frank Lloyd Wright’s creations were strongly influenced both by the natural world and by the quaint flatness of the American prairies. Born in Wisconsin in 1867, Wright’s career spanned seven decades until his death in 1959. During this time, he designed over 1,100 buildings of all types, over 500 of which were built.
Wright started working at an early age, initially in Chicago under the prestigious architect Louis Sullivan for six years. He won international recognition while living in Europe in the early 1900s and publishing some of his work before returning to his home country.
Some of his iconic structures, like the Guggenheim Museum in New York and Fallingwater in Pennsylvania, are now designated as historical landmarks and function as tourist attractions. They’ll be instantly recognizable to any student in architecture training.
The Glimmering, Wonderful Buildings of I.M. Pei
I.M. Pei was one of the most prolific architects of the 20th century. Born to a prominent banker in China, he left for the United States in 1935 to study architecture at the Michigan Institute of Technology and Harvard. Incredibly skilled at an early age, he taught and worked for the U.S. government before abandoning his post to work for a developer in New York in 1948. In 1955, he started his own architecture firm.
As a technician, you can work at a firm under intelligent and ingenious architects
His works were frequently composed of stone, steel, and glass, and he had a penchant for incorporating glass pyramids into his projects. Some of his famous creations include the 47-story cruciform-shaped Place Ville Marie in Montreal that he designed with Ray Affleck, the renovation of the Louvre in Paris, and the renovation of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland, Ohio. His appreciation for light and abstract qualities gave his projects a distinctly magnificent flair that any architectural technician can appreciate.
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