Dennis Hollingsworth

Still Sprockets

It has been quite a while since I have been in an architect's office, so it was interesting to see how my fellow design professionals are comporting themselves nowadays, thanks to Gawker:

The Banana Republic ad with the architects?it's everywhere! And it raised some questions for us. So we asked an architect?we'll call him Frankie Lloyd?who works at "a large firm downtown with an eccentric, megalomaniac starchitect at the helm" how the ad stacked up to his reality. The answers may surprise you!
Gawker: So have you seen those Banana Republic ads?
Frankie: No, I haven't.
Gawker: Okay, pick up a copy of any magazine. Well, any medium to highbrow magazine -- the New Yorker or New York mag will work well.
Frankie: Yeah, OK. I saw the one inside the cover of this week's New Yorker.
Wow, the colors of those shirts are very bright!

Gawker: So what is it like being surrounded by nubile 23 year olds in khaki coordinates at all times?

Frankie: I am not really sure, to be honest with you. I think I may be involved
in some different types of architecture than these people.

Gawker: What do you mean, it's not really like that?
Frankie: Well, firstly, these people look really well-rested and almost obscenely casual. If this were a real meeting, the model on the table would have some stray marks on it. More likely, it would be shattered in a million pieces on the floor.

Also, in my experience no architects dress like that - the Liebeskind eyeglasses and black turtleneck/blazer, German expressionist style is still the bottom line at most nyc offices. Most people are executing variations on this basic Sprockets-y theme.

Gawker: Well, you guys do spend a lot of time in the airy conference room overlooking the Hudson, staring at little wooden dollhouses and making flirty-eyes at each other, right?