#ukcod

Two weeks in LA flew by. This was my fourth time participating in the practice previews program and my first experience working in LA. Griffin Enright Architects is an exceptional office that is currently focused on lots of high end residential housing projects. In the two weeks there it seemed that they had at least 7 projects working through construction and several others along the way. Because of this I was surprised at how small the office was. I arrived my first day expecting somewhere between 10-15 employees, but was warmly greeted by 3 full time employees, 1 part time intern along with Margaret Griffin and John Enright. This small office size made for a really wonderful experience as I was allowed a very personal vantage into the mechanics of the office and day to day activities.  

Because so many of the projects in the office are in the CD/CA phase I spent lots of time redlining drawings in cad. It had been a few years since drafting with xrefs so I spent some time getting re-acquainted with the process. It seems that much of the workflow involves generating ultra clean/controlled models withing Rhino then exporting out for high tolerance drafting into Autocad. There was also some work being done with VR and the Unreal engine in the office which seems to have replaced Maxwell as their primary form of rendering.

I found that the greatest difference between my experiences in New York offices and this one was the amount of trust the principals here place in young designers. All of the full time employees were around my age and had graduated from sciarc within the last few years. Because of this trust in young employees I found the office required individuals to work outside of their comfort zone and engage in tasks that they may have little experience with prior. After a few days working in the office it became apparent that anyone working there would be allowed to engage in a variety of architectural endeavors assisting in projects from their inception through construction. Certainly an exciting place to be for someone hungry for for real world experience. Both John and Margaret leave several afternoons a week to go to sciarc to teach. This appropriately keeps the office rooted within a progressive contemporary conversation while engaging in the politics of building high end residential architecture. The experience was unique, challenging, and refreshing. 

There were several excellent lectures happening while i was there. Tom Wiscombe gave a great lecture titled Objects Containers Worlds that sparked an interesting conversation between himself and Thom Mayne, and sciarc had their Drawings Conclusions Symposium where I was able to see Peter Eisenmann give a keynote. It was a nice departure from watching these people on youtube while working in studio.  Aside from the great office experience I was able to see some wonderful projects, eat some amazing food, and reconnect with old friends doing remarkable things in LA. 

-Thompson Burry

Have had a great first week!! Have been doing a lot of things in Revit and learning a lot!! Been mainly working in two multi-use projects (residential and commercial), Magnolia Hill and Camarillo, both in North Hollywood.