The workshop on elevations demanded a very particular spatial arrangement for the teaching. Desks in a row, tutor on high, talk of proportions – just as it used to be in the good old days.

For Tuesday 6th May

LOOK AT THE ORDER THAT YOU DO THINGS

For Monday 5th May

USE SOMETHING NEARBY AS A MODEL

(could not have made it up better myself)

For Sunday 4th May

IS THE STYLE RIGHT?

(a question of pressing concern for budding architects)

for 3rd May

OPENLY RESIST CHANGE

(so that is a day off then)

Drawing elevations is a much neglected virtue; as the computer allows the idea of frontality and composition to be dissolved in a parametric blur, the visual contribution of the building as elevation is decreased. But there are still some very old fashioned things to be learnt from elevations; they do act as an signal of what someone might perceive, not in terms of formal composition and geometrical rules, but as the basis of a view that might just be glimpsed in passing. To this end we will have a workshop on elevations, starting at 12.00 on Wednesday 7 May in the studio. Bring paper, pencils, rulers and straight edges. This is so damn normative that it is quite cool. Mostly for sixth years, but fifth years welcome if they might find it useful.

Oblique strategies is the game/instruction pack that was evolved by the musician Brian Eno and the artist Peter Schmidt. Originally it came as a deck of cards, from which one would select at random. The resulting instruction was intended as a prompt in the creative process, and could be applied across many disciplines. The Oblique Strategies have assumed cult status, with the inevitable website devoted to them. They are now available as a widget for the Mac desktop, and it is this version that we will be using.

Every day for the next five days, I will press the widget button and come up with a random instruction. I will not cheat! I will post this on this site, and you should take this as a prompt for action for the next day. The instructions sometimes feel restrictive, but are actually liberating in this. They will not radically alter your direction, but may allow you to see the project in a new light. It may result in a tiny adjustment, or may just gently push you in a more productive manner. Try to work with the instruction for at least an hour, just to see what comes out of it. Keep going if it is productive. The idea, of course, is to provide an alternative to the linear method of most projects.

And so, here is the first Oblique Strategy for Friday 2nd May

MAGNIFY THE MOST DIFFICULT DETAILS

(isn’t that just great!)

Jeremy presented the ‘proposal’ to the management team of the London Architecture Festival. Thinking that it was an informal chat, it turned out to be a crit with around 50 people in the room.

Because there was nothing to show, the response was as expected in a bad crit. Lots of questions, all good ones, which I could not answer. Brought back memories of my first year crit when I was convinced the world could be saved through hexagons. Excrutiating. Luckily, the team from the AA came on next and saved the day with exquisite form. And it was ECO too…

So these were the questions:

How will you engage with the public, as is asked for in the brief? They are browsing and moving through quickly, and will not be able to spend time?

Your language is quite abstract, how are you going to make it more accessible?

What are the visuals of this? The Festival brief set out for striking landmarks; are you going to subvert this or go along with this?

What actually are you going to sell? Are you going to play up to the idea of consumption and actually sell stuff, or are you going to give things away?

If you are selling values, what exactly are they and how are you going to get them across quickly?

Studio 8 is honoured to have been selected to represent the University of Sheffield at the National Architecture Student Festival, which is part of the London Architecture Festival 2008 (or rather they were pushed into it by the boss with no consultation). They have come up with the punchy idea of ‘Architects for Sale’, and an equally punchy image.

No-one quite knows what this might mean but we think it will be in Borough Market for a few days. Not an installation (too 1990s) but a happening (very 1960s). Here is the proposed text for publicity, any comments please by 5pm Friday 4th April (which is the press deadline.)

ARCHITECTS FOR SALE

Architecture is usually considered as a noun, but what if it has been a verb all along? Our love for architectural objects has allowed us to be distracted from questioning what ‘to architecture’ might mean. Why shouldn’t we cross some of the hard, boring lines that define how architects think, what architects design, how, why and for whom? What is architecture worth?

The project takes a site that is about selling, value and (particularly in the case of Borough market) values. By exposing architecture to the environment of value-trading, we will be looking for its social value, and scratching away at the question of redesigning design itself. If Architects are For Sale, what is it actually that they might have to offer (beyond bright oranges and bendy bananas)?

Architects for Sale will take place over two market days in Borough Market