A gifted storyteller communicating the role and value of architecture to a new audience, host Bob Borson uses the experiences acquired over a 25-year career to inform his podcast.
A small firm owner, architect, and college design instructor, co-host Andrew Hawkins brings his insight from his 20 years in various roles within the profession.
It responds to the public curiosity and common misunderstanding about what architects do and how it is relevant to people’s lives, engaging a wide demographic of people in a meaningful way without requiring an understanding of the jargon or knowledge of the history of the profession.
With a creative mix of humor and practicality, Borson’s stories are informative, engaging, and approachable, using first-person narratives and anecdotes that have introduced transparency into what it really means to be a practicing architect.
To learn more about Bob, Andrew, and what life is like as an architect, please visit Lifeofanarchitect.com
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A gifted storyteller communicating the role and value of architecture to a new audience, host Bob Borson uses the experiences acquired over a 25-year career to inform his podcast.
A small firm owner, architect, and college design instructor, co-host Andrew Hawkins brings his insight from his 20 years in various roles within the profession.
It responds to the public curiosity and common misunderstanding about what architects do and how it is relevant to people’s lives, engaging a wide demographic of people in a meaningful way without requiring an understanding of the jargon or knowledge of the history of the profession.
With a creative mix of humor and practicality, Borson’s stories are informative, engaging, and approachable, using first-person narratives and anecdotes that have introduced transparency into what it really means to be a practicing architect.
To learn more about Bob, Andrew, and what life is like as an architect, please visit Lifeofanarchitect.com
This is Life of an Architect, a podcast dedicated to all things architecture with a little bit of life thrown in for balance.
We’ve all had days where the drawing set grows by thirty pages and the inbox doubles before noon. A consultant goes silent, a client changes their mind, and just when the printer jams, someone asks if you’ve “had a chance to think big.” The pace is relentless, the roles are blurred, and the weight of expectations never really lets up. Some of it is systemic. Some of it is self-imposed. But all of it demands more from architects than the job description ever promised. Today, Andrew and I are unpacking the stress points, the structural cracks, and the deeply human experience of navigating them. Welcome to Ep 178: Under Pressure
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This was an interesting topic to prepare for - mostly because like all of the posts I write, or topics Andrew and I discuss, we ultimately want them to be of some value. While it might be fun for some people to listen to us come onto the show and complain about things for an hour, I'm not sure my partners would appreciate it. So here we are, trying to discuss a topic titled "Under Pressure" and have it NOT devolve into a therapy session.
Andrew had this topic on his list and as I was working through topic ideas, the title is evocative. Now that my curiosity was piqued, I started going back through old blog posts and podcast episode to see if I could find a handful of items we had previously discussed that would help provide some structure to our conversation today.
1. The Expectation for Instant Results jump to 05:07
7132 Therme & Spa Vals by Peter Zumthor
The pace of architectural production has sped up—clients expect renderings in days, permit sets in weeks. The design process, once iterative and reflective, now must deliver answers at the speed of email.
There are a lot of different kinds of pressure in this profession, and over time, most of us come to know them well. Some are situational—deadlines, clients, budgets. Others are structural—shifting expectations, evolving roles, and an industry that sometimes feels like it’s changing faster than we can keep up. One of the clearest pressures we face today is the expectation for instant results. Clients, consultants, and even team members are conditioned by technology to expect immediate answers. The result is a process that often skips over reflection in favor of speed. The time it takes to think deeply, test ideas, or simply pause and consider—all of that gets compressed. It’s not that we don’t want to be responsive, but the design process was never meant to move at the speed of text messages.
There’s also an emotional cost to this kind of urgency. There’s a quiet anxiety in always feeling behind, like no matter how fast you move, it’s never quite fast enough. It’s especially difficult in architecture, where the best ideas don’t always show up on a schedule. When everything is a rush, the design process starts to lose its richness. There’s less iteration, less time for feedback, and less joy in discovery. I’ve had to learn when to push back—when to explain why that extra day might lead to a better outcome. It’s not always easy, especially when it feels like everyone else is racing ahead. But sometimes, resisting that pressure is part of protecting the integrity of the work.
There is a Peter Zumthor quote I mention at the 12:45 mark that I think is particularly suitable for this bit of our conversation. Points to me for remembering that it exists, points off for me absolutely destroying in my attempts to share it. Read it down below and hopefully they next time someone asks you to work faster, you will be better prepared to articulate why things take time to make properly.
Life of an Architect
A gifted storyteller communicating the role and value of architecture to a new audience, host Bob Borson uses the experiences acquired over a 25-year career to inform his podcast.
A small firm owner, architect, and college design instructor, co-host Andrew Hawkins brings his insight from his 20 years in various roles within the profession.
It responds to the public curiosity and common misunderstanding about what architects do and how it is relevant to people’s lives, engaging a wide demographic of people in a meaningful way without requiring an understanding of the jargon or knowledge of the history of the profession.
With a creative mix of humor and practicality, Borson’s stories are informative, engaging, and approachable, using first-person narratives and anecdotes that have introduced transparency into what it really means to be a practicing architect.
To learn more about Bob, Andrew, and what life is like as an architect, please visit Lifeofanarchitect.com
