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Architecture is a pretty hard thing to explain, but in a nutshell, it's the creative process that makes a functional building or space that is pleasing to the owner and the people who are going to use it; cost effective; safe; and sustainable [environmentally friendly]. Much of what we do involves creating documents-drawings, renderings [unofficial pictures of what a building could look like as it is being designed], specifications, or models (on the computer of physical models). After that, the architect’s job is to make sure the building gets built the way (s)he designed it.

Anyone can construct a building. A building is just four walls and a roof. Architecture is really more than that. It's about the art and science of it. It's about creating a space that's more than just a building. Architects want to create spaces that impact people and make them feel excited, or ensure that they enjoy being in the space. That's the heart of it—there is an art to it.

Drafting, whether it's by hand or on the computer, is a big part of my responsibilities. I could be working with a client, answering phone calls, sending emails, or visiting a job site. An architect will visit a job site two to five times a week and (s)he will also have about the same number of meetings a week as well—it varies depending on the project. We also manage our projects—we work directly with the people who build the buildings. We're like the quarterback in football—we have to understand the roles of all the players, and we try to lead as much as possible.

Architects encounter different problems every day. The problem could be learning that a building material is misplaced. Or, it could be a problem with the actual building process, such as a set of windows being installed incorrectly. There could be several of these types of problems. It's important not take those kinds of situations personally. You may need to consult with the design team to determine the appropriate solution. You have to solve the problem, the fix has got to happen quickly, and it can't cost the owner money.

But when these things do happen, you have to tell the owner/client that something went wrong—you can't pretend it didn't happen. If you make a mistake, you have to admit it and move on. Offer a solution or some way to correct it, and don't be afraid to admit when you're wrong, because there's so much that goes into constructing a building and so many things to think about that it's not really possible to get it 100% correct.

A project that I spent a majority of my time working on is Plaza Towers. It was a two-year design process and more than a two year construction process. I worked with the lead design architect, and I assisted in making the construction drawings. During the construction, the architect represents the owne,r and we're the liaison between the building owner and the contractors [people who do the physical construction]. That means going to the job site to review the progress and solving problems that come up as the project progresses.

This project was very difficult, but also very rewarding. It was a very complex project because it brought a lot of different spaces together—it's what we'd call a mixed-use building. This building houses many spaces including apartments, a hotel and restaurant, a fitness center and office spaces. It's a very diverse building, so that makes for a fun design process. It's challenging, but it's also really pushes you to create interesting architecture.

I have an undergraduate degree in Community Planning from Iowa State University. I started out in graphic design, but then switched to community planning. I also seriously thought about architecture, but that wasn't until I had already completed two years of school and needed a major I could finish more quickly. Most architecture programs are on a five or more year plan, rather than four. Usually, however, someone who wants to be an architect will earn a bachelor's degree in architecture in a five-year program.

I got the opportunity to take a lot of different classes before I got into architecture. Later, as a teacher's assistant, I came to appreciate my more "roundabout" educational path. I'm glad that I got to try a lot of things, because architecture is a very focused field. If you're coming right out of high school and going right into architecture, chances are you're going to be taking a set of very defined classes. I tend to encourage people to try out some different classes. I appreciate having a broad background. I wanted to know a little about a lot of the different disciplines I now work with every day.

After college, I moved to Florida and then Tennessee, and worked for several years doing urban planning. After three years, I decided it was time to go back for a degree in architecture. I always thought I would go back, and I earned a masters degree in architecture at the University of Tennessee I got the same education as someone earning a bachelor's in architecture, but I did it in a three year program rather than in five years. After I got my master's degree, I got a job with my current architecture firm.

Once you become an intern, there is a pretty organized process to become a registered architect. Once you get an internship, you enroll in an IDP [Intern Development Program] and this ensures that you gain all the working experience and other knowledge by working with a registered architect. That way you can take all the exams and get registered.

While you're in this program, you have a supervisor and a mentor. Your supervisor is someone you work with on a daily basis who knows what you're doing and they sign off on your time sheets. They keep track of how many hours of work experience an intern has logged—it's pretty rigorously documented. There are 15 areas in the IDP in which you have to gain experience, such as site planning and programming (meeting with clients), and project management. That typically takes about three years. Once you've completed the IDP, you can start taking the exams, which usually takes six months to a year. That will eventually lead to becoming registered.

After I get registered, most of the changes for me will be in title and salary. I'll be a registered architect, but most of the work I do here won't change because my firm is really good about giving interns real experience. In addition, after I get registered, I will receive my own stamp that I can put on documents. It's a way to show responsibility for a document so that people know it's been verified. As my career progresses, I could work through various levels of being a registered architect up to principles and firm owners. The principle of a firm is someone who leads a firm, gives it vision, and guides others in the office. Personally, I would like to become a project manager and a lead designer in the future. I could also see myself one day getting into education—teaching and working with students.

Almost every day, I'm doing some drafting on the computer, creating drawings or something similar. I do a lot of sketching or drawing—for me that's a quick way to solve problems. I also talk on the phone, respond to emails, visit job sites, and attend meetings. Managing a building project often involves filling out a lot of paperwork. I also spend some of my day talking with other architects and collaborating with them. That's one of the fun things we get to do—work together to solve problems. Other tasks during the day might include working in a data spreadsheet, working with numbers, creating a document, typing something, or giving a presentation (sometimes explaining a project to a city council or students). Throughout the entire day, architects are always solving problems.

Everything really depends on the type of project you're working on. So, if it's a smaller project, everything happens on a shorter time frame and the opposite is true as well. Every month, we meet as an office so that everyone knows what's going on with the entire office. In addition, the office is divided into teams with four to six people on each team. Each team also has a project leader, who is one of our principle architects, and we meet at least once a week as a team. Team members may also discuss challenges as needed throughout the day. In addition, each year, each architect does a self-review of his/her work, and we're also reviewed by our principle architects.

There's a tremendous variety in my job—there are so many things I could do on a day-to-day basis. I have a daily task list that I use to get started during the morning, but the day can widely vary. The type of work never seems to be exactly the same. That's one part of my job I really enjoy—I'm the type of person that really needs variety and different challenges.

The variety in your job also depends on the size of your firm and the projects you do. My firm is medium sized (with around 35 people, 12 of which are registered architects), but if you get into a big firm, sometimes you can get stuck doing the same types of projects over and over again. Or, if you're a small firm, you can end up doing the same type of work.

The very first building I worked on was a pavilion for the city of Coralville, Iowa, which is located next to the interstate. It was unusual because it has a garden roof—it has a curving roof and we put soil and plants on it. I had to learn a lot about what you do and do not want to put on your roof, so that was interesting. This was five or six years ag,o before it was at all common and we had to learn as we were going along. They've been doing that in Europe for hundreds of years, but it's still pretty new for Iowa.

I interact with the people in my office team the most. Our offices are designed to encourage collaboration, interaction, and teamwork. The principles will have more contact with clients, but as you gain more experience, you also interact directly with the client more often. However, when you're working on a project, you really have to have that direct contact with a client so that you can work through issues together and make any necessary changes.

It's a busy profession, and sometimes we have night meetings. You have to keep track of your time and stay focused. Architecture involves some traveling, and that takes time away from your family. We have to continue to learn so much all the time and you have to go to conferences. I guess that's how it affects your personal life—it takes time to do all these things and really do your job well. You just have to manage your time. Some firms have people working a lot of hours, but my firm is really family-friendly and I've had a good experience here.

I would say traveling is pretty minimal, but it really depends on the projects you work on. We have a lot of work in Eastern Iowa, not too far from our office, and in Iowa. Our firm is lucky to be in a University [University of Iowa] town where there are always a lot of things going on and work to be done I don't think that, personally, I've had a job outside of Iowa City or Coralville (an adjacent town). Travel is moderate for most architects. You will have some projects out of town or out of state, but most construction jobs don't require meeting once or twice a week. Taking three or four trips a week is not uncommon, but it will be cyclical depending upon the stage of your projects. We tend to have quite a few people come to us, so that's kind of nice.

I would say our career field is stable. We're always building things—schools, hospitals, courthouses and homes. There are always things that need to be built, so there will always need to be people to design them. I think it becomes unstable in larger cities and larger firms. There, you tend to be focused on a specific type of work. For example, the housing market is slow right now, and if you focus on designing houses, that work is going to be much slower. That's where it becomes unstable, when your work is too focused on one specific type of building. My firm is fairly diverse in our projects so that we can ensure business regardless of specific economic markets like housing.

Starting interns earn approximately $30,000 and registered architects earn just under $100,000. That can certainly go much higher if you own your own firm or if you're a principle in a firm. It's going to tend to be higher in cities with higher living expenses, like New York City. Principles or people who own firms earn probably from $100,000 to $500,000 a year. The sky's the limit if you own your own firm. It depends on your work ethic, your abilities, and your clients.

I still think of myself as fairly young, so I don't really have a time-table, but I think I'll be able to retire around 65 or 70. A lot of architects work a little longer, though. I don't really see myself being retired because I don't really know what I would do with myself. One of our firm owners is 72 and he still comes to work every day.

My firm has a very attractive retirement plan that not a lot of firms offer. It's an IRA [Individual Retirement Account], and they put a certain percentage of your yearly salary into it automatically. You get paid your salary, and then in addition to that, they put more into your IRA. It's a very good benefit that not many architecture firms offer. It's a lot of security, especially with having a family

"Going green" refers to using methods that are environmentally friendly, and "green" building practices are the corresponding way of implementing those environment-protecting, or "green", methods. Another word for "going green" is "sustainability" and it's not just the future; it's the present and it's here to stay. We've got a responsibility to protect the environment. Buildings consume about 70% of the electricity used in our country, and this country uses the highest amount of energy in the world. The numbers are staggering. So, when you think about it, that puts a lot of weight on our shoulders, as a profession. We've got a responsibility to design buildings that are sustainable, use less energy, don't pollute, and are healthy for the people that use them.

As a firm, we made the decision a few years ago to focus on sustainability. Pretty much everyone in our firm is LEED [Leadership in Energy Efficient Design] certified, which is unusual. We've designed the first school in the state which is LEED certified. We implement natural day lighting, which means constructing the building in a manner that minimizes the amount of electrically generated light and emphasizes using natural light. We also use healthy products like carpets with better fibers and/or renewable products like cork or bamboo. We use geothermal heating and cooling, which takes advantage of the Earth's natural temperature to heat and cool a building by running pipes underground. Sustainability also accounts for a waste management plan during construction, like recycling waste products. It doesn't have to cost more, that's a big misconception.

The variety and the challenge appeal to me. I really enjoy being out on a job site and talking to people and working through problems. I love seeing something I created in my mind become a reality—that's an exciting process. It's pretty cool when it looks like what you thought it would. It's really important to me to have good relationships with the people I work with, so when we get divided over something, that bothers me. Things come up that force you to take a stand, and when someone you work with is on the opposite side, it causes a split. I like harmony, but I work in a career where I know I'll encounter conflicts. That's one part of my job I don't enjoy as much.

The easiest part of my job is taking on responsibilities. I like to have a lot of different things going on at the same time, so I'll accept a lot of different work. The hardest part is saying no and knowing your limits. It's hard to turn down opportunities. It's easy for me to come to work the majority of the time—I'm doing what I like to do.

The shift from hand drafting to computer drafting is a tremendous shift in the way we produce documents. There's also the shift from paper to electronic files that has affected our profession. Now, we can send an electronic copy of a drawing to people, saving a lot of paper.

BIM [Building Information Modeling] will be a big thing in the future. It's similar to CAD, but it allows you to add more details to the model. These details all have qualitative data attached to it, so you can account for pricing and more specifics. Also, BIM allows you to send information to contractors and manufacturers who can fabricate items directly from an electronic file without ever needing a paper copy.

The advice I would give is to know what you're getting into. Visit a firm and talk to someone who has experience in architecture. Don't go into architectural school without knowing what you're getting into. They tend to be quite competitive and just because it's rigorous. You'll do yourself a favor if you investigate further and make sure it's what you really want to do. You'll save yourself time and money.

When I was younger, I took advantage of the career services at Iowa State University. I was living in Tennessee, and I knew I wanted to move back to Iowa. I was a graduate of Iowa State and I had worked with the career advisor there. I called her up and told her what I wanted to do, and she helped me find interviews. Use those types of resources to help you find a job.

Architects tend to be creative people. They enjoy challenges and solving problems and they are skilled at conceiving of many optional solutions for a problem. Architects are very also very logical and analytical people. Communication skills are very important because our field is very interconnected—we do work with a lot of different people, and we need to be able to communicate with many different types of people. We work with clients/owners, contractors, consultants, and many different types of engineers—structural, electrical, and mechanical—so it's important to be able to converse with all of these people in an effective manner. We have to be outgoing because we meet and talk to so many people. People need to be willing to learn, because architects continue to learn for the rest of their career. They should also be open-minded.

If you're in high school, there are always opportunities to intern at an architectural firm. The experience of being in the office is helpful, even if you're just helping with filing or something like that. Any kind of experience you can see what it's about and to get your feet wet is good. Most firms will have opportunities like that. In Iowa, we tend to build a lot of things in the summer and it slows down in the winter, so firms are almost always hiring for the summer. These jobs are usually paid.

It comes down to the ability to creatively solve problems. Being a people person really helps, too. Being able to synthesize a lot of information and make it into an appealing design is key to being a successful architect. Being open to challenges is important. Because you will be challenged and if you can meet that in a creative manner, you will advance.