You are here: Home / Architects / Architectural Sketches – Keep or Throw Away

Architectural Sketches – Keep or Throw Away

by 69 Comments

I typically don’t give it a lot of thought – as soon as my architectural sketches have served their purpose, they get thrown away. I don’t consider them valuable or even worthwhile to keep. Am I crazy? (with specific regards to this particular item)

architectural sketches in a flat file

Unlike a lot of firms, we do have several stacks of flat files in our office and starting about a 3 months ago, I decided that my sketches might live on in these archives.

Why? I’m not really sure if I’m being honest.  Keeping my sketches seems a little odd to me and I am trying to make a slight mental shift in my thinking, so that my sketches go from temporary thoughts destined for the waste bin, to archived treasures worth hanging on to forever.

So, keep my sketches or throw them away … I am struggling with that idea.

Bob Borson Residence - schematic design sketches

I know when the shift in thinking happened – on September 29th, 2014, I wrote a post titled “Architectural Sketchbooks” and in that article I featured the sketches of my business partner Michael Malone. He’s been sketching for decades and while most of his drawings are archived within sketchbooks, he has a number of them stashed away within the flat files of our office as well. As I was searching through his sketches for possible images to use for that article, I was very nostalgic for all the sketches I have thrown away over my professional career.

While a vast majority of the sketches I create aren’t worth hanging on to for any sort of extended period of time, it would be nice to be able to look back at them after a chunk of time has passed. Besides, it would make things so much easier for the people who will want to archive my life for the Museum of Bob Borson (affectionately known as MOBB).

All of this is fine and well for crazy architects like me, but am I alone in thinking that these sketches are worth keeping? It’s not like they are art, they are created as part of a problem solving process. I will concede (to those architects out there that think everything they touch is art) that they are artistic – but that’s about as far as I can go.

Bob Borson schematic design sketch 01

Is this floor plan sketch art? Hardly, I think it’s a stretch to even say it’s artistic.

Lantern House size parameters

This is a sketch I did when working on my “Lantern Playhouse” … is it worth keeping? I do like it despite the fact that I didn’t create it to live beyond the weekend when I drew it.

Or does it?

It exists digitally on this website. Is that any different from existing in a flat file? I can still go back and look at it as often as I want … assuming that I can find it. As I sit here and write that last sentence, I am looking across the room at an old computer of mine that hasn’t been turned on in several years. My wife wants me to recycle it but since I haven’t gone on there and cleaned off the hard drive, I am a little hesitant to get rid of it. What treasures exist on that computer that I’m getting rid of? Pictures, old resumes, project files, scans of sketches – you name it. I am really good about creating digital copies of stuff but finding it later – or even remembering that it exists – is a different matter. My memory probably isn’t going to be getting better in the future, I’m kind of counting on it getting worse.

My wife Michelle: (walking into kitchen) What are you doing?

Me: (standing over the kitchen sink eating ice cream directly out of the tub) Huh? What’s that?

Michelle: You are eating ice cream at 9am. I told you to stop doing that.

Me: Sorry, I didn’t remember that. (taking another bite)

Michelle: You just took another bite! Quit it!

Me: Quit what?

I can promise you that I WILL have that exact conversation with my wife at some point in my future.

Villa Capri - sketch by Michael Malone

This is really the sketch that started it all – Michael sketched this over 33 years ago and this digital image was made from the original. Pretty cool in my opinion.

architectural sketches in a flat file

This is MY flat file, I have claimed it … for now. I am going to give this little experiment of keeping my sketches for posterity a chance, even though I don’t know what I will do with a massive pile of trace paper drawings. I have thought that it would be nice to frame one or two of the important ones from a project and give them to the homeowners as a move-in present – although that seems a bit presumptuous. Based on the size of this flat file and the speed at which I create these sorts of drawings, I figure I have about two years before I’ll run out of space.

I curious – what do you think of keeping sketches? Do you keep yours – or if you are not an architect – do you think you would want to keep them if you had any sketches to keep?

Cheers,

Bob-AIA scale figure

even better stuff from Life of an Architect

  • Michele Grace Hottel

    I am really not good at throwing sketches or “art” away from my kids or I and I consider that a problem because we have limited space (until we open the GQO Museum for my youngest who has basically been saying the same thing as you said for several years now) but I have seen that the kids are much better at editing their own stuff than me trying to do theirs. I was pretty good in school at getting rid of a lot of trace and that is too bad because hey were probably much more interesting. For my work project sketches, I usually save them til the end of the project and then go through and only save several. For my own house projects I save them all because it’s ongoing and for my playhouse competition design I’m saving it til next year when I have more time to get it together to submit it!!! if you have the room, keep them.

  • Jennifer

    I’m a junior in architecture school, I tend to keep only some trace paper sketches. My favorite sketches to keep are those “aha” moments that gave me that extra push I needed for the project. I also keep most of my sketchbooks because they have created a sense of comfort that I can go back to when I am stuck in a project.

  • Roger

    We tend to keep the initial sketches, a few overall sketches, and major direction changes; usually in the job folder. While I appreciate the artistic aspect of the sketch, they are used as part of the design process in our firm, so no framed sketches (not me that is sketching, I’m the drafter).

    On the digital archive side, especially regarding sketches and notes, I like Evernote. It is multi-platform, Mac, PC, and mobile, I can create “notebooks” of scanned items, and some text is searchable.

  • Hoda Jaber

    I’m an architect university student in my first year. In my opion, I would not throw away my sketches because I could bring forth new ideas for a project I could be working on. New innovative ideas could come from unsuccessful sketches that I could further improve and upgrade it. Plus, the amount of work that architects put on sketching and gathering ideas are irreplaceable.

  • Tim Barber

    I think we architects like to keep the things we work on. I don’t keep sketches, but I have kept my construction documents, way to long. I really don’t want to give them up, but I really think I need to toss them. My solution is to scan them and save them in a digital format. I have seen some real “Blue Prints” that I would love to frame and hang in my office. I do consider them lost works of art and I can see how one might feel the same about a sketch.

  • manuel moreno

    Hello Bob ! i have been following you right before i choose to study architecture, you have been really helpful with your posts. I’m from mexico currently studying a bachelor in architecture, from this side is a must that you have to keep them even though any mathematical operation no matter how big or small you did at the time of the sketch why ? because if anything goes wrong you can prove, what have you done when and why on court,otherwise the government will start an investigation and if you did´t keep those files oh boy you are going to be in big troubles.

    cheers ! Interesting post as always.

  • Jess Hopkin

    I was keeping sketches all the time from uni and i just have that much already it’s ridiculous. So my parents got me an equil smartpen and now I have a digital sketchbook and can throw out all of my paper stuff I don’t need. I find them good to look back on to see the development in both my thinking and my sketching skills

  • Aaron

    I tend to be a pack rat and keep every scrap, but I reach a point where I have generated so many options or variations that I have to purge just to be able to think straight. So I file what I want to keep (usually just the starting idea and the finished drawing,) and put everything I think I don’t need anymore in a ‘pre-trash’ pile. If after 6ish months I haven’t rummaged through that pile to rescue anything, I figure its safe to recycle it.

  • dave

    i have a folder with my favourite sketches.. there’s maybe 20-30 total. i go through it every now and then and generally end up adding one or two sketches, or throwing one or two out that i no longer think are very good.

  • Kurt Flechtner

    I tend to keep sketches until completion of the project. Then, with the perspective of history, it’s easier to sort out the throw-aways from the more significant ones. I have also found it a nice gesture to have an attractive sketch framed for presentation to the customer as a “housewarming” gift upon completion of their project.

  • I am a Landscape Architect and also a bit of a hoarder so I tend to keep everything (both digitally and physical). Do you keep physical files for each project or just digital records? We have a bookshelf of folders for each project and all relevant sketches, letters, etc go in there. It would be nice to be more paperless, however I can’t seem get myself to totally rely on digital copies of things. (What if the system goes down, etc?!)

    But then again, the more digital rubbish you keep, the more storage space you require…… hmmmmm. I need to start deleting stuff….

    Keep up the great work Bob! Your posts are always enlightening and entertaining!

  • As long as you have the space, why not?
    For sure, I’d keep digital copies.

    After a certain amount of time, you’ll know when they’re ready to go.

    While cleaning my apartment, I found a bunch of old sketchbooks with blog ideas. I realized that I’d written them all years ago.

    Until that moment, I felt the need to keep the thought process alive. Then I knew it was okay to let them go in the bin.

    [Cues “Taps, bows head, takes a moment of silence.]

    Another great post, Bob.

  • David Conley

    I’ve only made one hand sketch of a project I designed four years ago and I still have it. Since I started my quest in becoming an architect at this junction in my life, I have taken to putting down my ideas directly into the computer. When I do graduate from college and start working with the big boys, I’m sure hand sketching will come into play. My final project from last semester in my design class had our instructor insist on a hand sketch for his approval prior to implementing our ideas into the computer.

    Quick question for you, Bob:

    Pros and cons of either working for yourself or working for someone else? Would you consider owning your own firm as opposed to working in an established firm? Thanks!

    • Gene

      David,
      About working pros and cons. I’ve done both. Depends on whether you like knowing you will have income on a regular basis, size of projects, taking direction or giving direction, etc. You will have to find out what floats your boat.
      About sketching. I find if you go to the computer too soon you spend lots of time making a precise drawing instead of having the freedom to think with your mind and “hand”. There is a direct feedback from the motion and “effort” to actually draw a line vs making a colored line on the right layer with a cursor. I like what you can do with a computer once you know where you are going. I became an architect because I like to draw and still do. However, I get little please making colored lines on a screen.

      • David Conley

        Yes, I weighed the pros and cons, at least when it comes to either receiving a guaranteed pay or pulling the BTO – love to work for nothing all day. It seems it would be wiser to work for an established firm at first. You will then learn all of the nuances related to operating a firm on you own. But, I would like to eventually try to establish my own company. There are, obviously, the good and bad in both scenarios.

        Since I had taken to designing using a computer, and being self taught, I can understand needing the ability to sketch, especially when out in the field. But I can usually design an entire house via the computer in a matter of hours, usually around 8, if I had an idea from the beginning. If I only had a partial idea, it usually takes me longer. But the whole design will include, materials, fixtures, furniture layout and a few renderings to help capture the image in mind.

        • Gene

          Like Goldilocks the trick is to find the one that is just right, and that is different for everyone. You obviously have computer skills. The problem is that probably everyone else coming into the field along with you does also. What will make you an asset beyond that? The ability to communicate your ideas to a client, associate, boss, engineer without your trusty computer. A drawing, by hand or computer, shows what you know; a sketch shows what you are thinking. There is a very big difference.
          With the computer it is quite easy to flip a plan, look at from below or the top or whatever. The trouble is you are primarily “looking” at it rather than “thinking” about it. The computer is good at manipulating all the physical parts of a build;ing walls, floors, roofs, materials, furniture as you noted. However, it can not do the most important thing which is to define all the things which are not built. All the pieces surround what you want “the space” which is easier to find in your head rather than in the computer.
          It’s a great profession when you get to make something out of nothing and the nothingness of what you make is the best part. If you can think and draw you will find the right place. With that ability you can move forward whereas if you only have computer skills and the power goes down you are as useful as the chair you are sitting on.

          • Thank you Gene for great insight. After 38 years in the business, I still start a project with the trace and pencil. The computer is a wonder once you know where you are going. I always hated to erase with pen on velum.

          • Gene

            As fellow dinosaur. Do you remember when the latest and greatest technology was Letraset press on letters?

          • I know there are still some in a bottom drawer, gave me a good chuckle.

          • Gene

            I also still have some in a “bottom” drawer., and Bob is trying to decide to keep or toss sketches. Still good for a sheet number now and then otherwise easier to print on clear stickleback sheets.

          • architectrunnerguy

            “A drawing, by hand or computer, shows what you know; a sketch shows what you are thinking.”
            Now THAT’S well said!!

  • Alex

    scan and toss. If it’s not in my sketchbook, it’s scanned and tossed.

    • rktkr

      same here.
      my cheap 3-in-1 copier works great for that.

  • Amir

    On the flip-side however…

    As an observer, I always wanted to get a look at well-known/established architects’ crap-sketches, and working sketches.
    I want to see the ones they don’t keep, cause they weren’t very good, or were stream-of-thought sketches and aren’t very clear without deep inquiry.

    Scarpa-like sketches where half the time you don’t even know what you’re looking at… I love those, and most Architects don’t share those at all.

  • Amir

    My thoughts on this are, you keep what’s important to you. Things that you feel especially good about, or proud of.
    My guess is, as people get better and better, and sketch more and more, the really good ones that stand out in our minds become less frequent, but those are the one’s I’d keep.

    All through school, I kept every sketch I made on trace or in a sketch-book, even 3-4 years after the project was finished… A month after graduation, all but a few were in the trash because I’d realized a few things…
    First, I’d become much better with my sketching, and some of the older ones had served their purpose.
    Second, Only the best of them needed to be kept, and the rest which were merely OK – good, were at least scanned and filed away, so I didn’t need the originals cluttering up everything.

  • kbrsnow

    I think you need to scan in your sketches and put more of them on your blog, with your viewers voting to keep or not keep.
    Otherwise I would maintain them for future use when you have that book deal in place and you can determine which ones are needed or not.

  • Kyu Kim

    Beyond sketches, I am having a hard time deciding what to keep and what to throw out in the office overall. I ended up having to recycle (but basically get rid of) a drafting table and slide rule after years of sitting idle, only to have someone that could have really used it show up a few months later. I think we as architects are pack rats by nature but I need to get rid of some clutter as well…

  • Kevin Keller

    A lot of my sketches are in sketchbooks, but those that are done on trace (if I feel they are any kind of good) get kept. It gets to be a bit of a pain to find storage for them all, but I feel it’s worth it.

  • James B Pettit Jr

    I’ve kept and I’ve thrown away. No system really but I’m glad that I have kept a number of my sketches from years past. I left full time practice a couple of years ago and I am now teaching high school boys architectural drawing. Those sketches that I held on to have become very valuable in the teaching process, especially those that start as a partial detail and go on to plan and isometric. I also have multiple elevation studies of some projects. Within those sketches the boys can see the evolution of an idea and the ways it can change as it matures. They’re young and they often think that their first idea is their best idea and sometimes it is. But usually their best idea is going to come from sketching over and over until the glitches are worked out or until they have tested several ideas and arrived at a clear winner. They are seeing that in my sketches and are starting to understand the value of mastering simple drawing techniques. Some of the boys are also starting to experience the real joy of seeing an idea come to life through sketches that keep getting better. And that is when I realize that throwing away ALL your sketches is really a rotten idea! Some day you may wish you still had some of them.

  • Randy Deutsch

    “Architect and Blogger Bob Borson’s Complete Sketch Archive Acquired by The University of Texas” does have a nice ring to it. Hold on to ’em until 2025.

  • Nathan Woods

    I know what you mean about the nostalgia factor. I often have to root through old projects for one reason or another, and when reviewing RFI’s in particular, I am often fascinated by my old sketched responses to various issues that occur in the field. These days, most of my sketches are scanned and attached to some other document, so they are usually preserved one way or another. Fun to revisit years later.

    • Do you keep all the original sketches in a single place? I don’t think my objectives would be fulfilled if I had to go back and sort through all the different projects and documents to find my sketches.

      • Nathan Woods

        Each of my projects has a digital Sketches folder (subfolder?), where the original scan (or the occasional SketchUp or Bluebeam sketch) resides, from there it’s usually attached to an RFI, ASI, or whatever…but the Sketches folder is quite useful. It’s like an evolving stream of consciousness. Each sketch is filed by date and then a memnomic name, like today’s “2015-01-12_KAV_Entry-Vestibule-Study.pdf”

  • David P

    Bob,
    I’d keep them, all of them. I regret that I didn’t keep many of
    mine and even today I can kick myself for not keeping some of the ones I made
    while on various trips abroad and home and of some of the major projects I was
    on or participated in; Some were “suitable for framing”……Worse case scenario make “pdf’s” of them and categorize them on the computer. I would keep all of them that are complete enough to do so (a subjective comment I know; what’s “Complete mean?), the good the bad and the ugly. After all those that weren’t so good or were those that might not work in the end, or considered “File 13” material, were the precursors to the ones that did work or were continuum’s of those that needed go no further…I just think sketching by hand has become so minimized today with our technology that if you can sketch to begin with it should be left to future architects and maybe too for your own benefit of reminiscing or research that a record of what has been done and can be done, should be. We should not devalue sketching any more than we have to. And if there isn’t a record of what we’ve done then I think we’ve simply lessened our value and to a degree our talents. I hope that makes some sense in your decision process.
    David

  • I trash sketch overlays used to “figure something out” but if I do a full/finished/presentation sketch I at least scan it to keep in the job’s computer archive. A lot of the time I have to scan it anyway to e-mail to the clients or to put it on title block, or to clean up the occasional mistake. I prefer layering sketches in Photoshop to show multiple options rather than redrawing non-changing stuff.

    Having at least a computer record of the sketch can come in handy for future marketing purposes, competition entries, or even for just illustrating the design process for new or potential clients who haven’t worked with an architect before. Bits are cheap, and you don’t have to clog up your flat files then.

  • William

    Sketch, scan and file………..repeat.

    While I no longer work in an architectural firm I still
    generate a significant number of sketches to clarify for my superintendents the
    construction methods needed to accomplish the architect’s intent. These
    sketches are not as nice as they once were, when the hand had daily practice,
    nor are they as nice as yours but they are still critical communications in the
    continuing design process called construction……and the architects still
    compliment the graphic quality which helps my ego.

    I still use a sketch book for most of my sketching/detailing
    with the results scanned and filed digitally. To my wife’s chagrin there are
    boxes of sketchbooks in the attic……….saved for posterity, reminiscence, and the
    joy of turning the pages….esoteric yes, but oddly relaxing to wander the pages.

    The point here is to say “save your sketches”. They remind
    us who we are, how we have matured, and, on occasion, can used to revisit
    issues post occupancy and defend our decision making process……but mostly
    reminiscence.

    Thanks for a great blog.

  • Erik

    Always love seeing your hand-work and sketches Bob. They have a signature about them that is detailed and refreshing. I hope your flat files stay filled with many good ideas.

    • Thanks Erik – I wonder if (over time) the sorts of sketches I create will change as a result of changing my mindset from trashing them, to keeping them. Maybe instead of just details and plans, I’ll start sketching proper building perspectives … who knows

  • Gene

    Sketches tend be fall into two categories; idea generation or exploration and working something out. The latter is usually project specific and has little value to you or anyone else. Idea sketches I keep. Many times there are many ideas generated for a project, and not all get used. If you toss a perfectly good idea you may not think of it again unless looking back through sketches rekindles it. A professor once told me that you have 5 or 6 breeder ideas in your lifetime; keep your sketches and go back to them “often” as some of your best ideas may have happened several years ago. Roebling once said that a man with a pencil, piece of paper and an idea can keep thousands of people busy for years. If the paper is tossed; maybe the idea is also tossed and lost forever.
    Some times you get well into CD’s and what you have is not what you wanted. With sketches you can go back and find where you went left and should have gone right. More often then not reality waters down ideas; so if you have the sketch maybe the next time there is less water involved because of your experience.
    Often an idea can only be explored and used when technology catches up; i.e. Gehry thinking his crumbled up sketches could make some interesting spaces.
    You said you have two years of drawer space. Use the time to review and decide whether they are ideas or working out sketches. After that have the rule like people who live on boats “If something new comes on board something old goes off”.

    • pretty sound argument for a process of evaluating worth and the record keeping process. There are a ton of process sketches that I know I won’t keep – how to get from point E to point F – it’s the more complete sketches that I think I am planning on keeping for now. For me, complete means that someone else can look at it and understand the message without further explanation – no more, no less.

      Thanks Gene

      • Gene

        I would always go for sort and keep. How many good ideas can be found in a ¼” thick stack of trace vs a ¼” of old Architectural Records. I’d rather use the room to keep my ideas instead of someone else’s. It’s important to tell the story as you note without talking. When you look back, if there is something to look back to, you may see something different. Like when you have looked at a plan or section forever, and then you look at it upside down and getting an Aha or I’m so stupid insight. Give your sketches time to ferment; you can always toss them later.
        Also, at some point you spent 10-15 minute on the sketch which you thought was good enough to charge your client 15 minutes x$/hr. If it was worth that much to them it should be worth that to you.
        Last summer I was at MOMA for an exhibit or Corbu original drawings which I had seen dozens of times in books and only then realized how delicate they are. No one can draw lines that thin without screwing up. There is never anything equal to the real thing.
        To see and feel the effort of someone’s hand and mind is special, and photos, scans, PDF’s can not convey that feeling. If your drawing are an extension of you they should be kept; if they aren’t toss them because they shouldn’t have been drawn in the first place.

  • I try my best to keep some of the better sketches and drawings and save them in a flat file. I find that it is helpful to refer back to these when I am teaching students about drawing and sketching, and using the examples to show different techniques and means of design expression.

  • aMa Architecture Inc

    I keep sketches in the project file folder, but then again, I do not have the volume of sketches you do.

  • AlmostJane

    As a future homeowner, I love Steve’s idea [below] of framing sketches for the client. What a terrific memento to be able to hang in one’s home!

    • didn’t I write that idea in my post? Don’t give Steve a big head for his idea

      • Steve

        Yep. Kudos to you, Bob. I re-read your post a little more in depth and you did, indeed, have the same idea.
        I guess that old adage is correct: Great minds think alike…or is it Monkey-see, Monkey-do?
        I have gotten a very positive response from clients when I do this. I’ve seen them hung in the Den of Office of a residential client and in the Conference Rooms of commercial clients. The biggest challenge is narrowing the whole project down to 3 or 4 sketches that really represent the development of the idea. It is a fun way to celebrate the completion of a project.
        Great post – keep up the good work.

        • Anne

          Just keep the ones you are proud of and the pretty ones!

  • AlmostJane

    I only keep paper records if there’s a chance I might need them in the future. You know, for something catastrophic. Like an IRA audit. Otherwise it gets filed away digitally. If not possible to do that, it’s recycled after being “scrubbed” of name, address, account number etc. However I used to keep everything. Then in my early 20s I came to the realization that I never went back to look at or use any of the stuff I’d been saving. None of it even had any particular sentimental value. So it was all chucked and I gained a nice amount of closet space. For a while.

    • yes, for a while! I am not particularly nostalgic so holding on to things is not normally an issue for me. These sketches are something different, at least I’m starting to think that they should be.

  • Tony Perrone

    Sketches show the thinking process. I find looking at someone’s sketches vastly more interesting than the final “all worked out” final hard line drawings/renderings. As time goes by we ususally start to forget how we arrived at the final design but by reviewing the process sketches the thinking history is preserved which may help one for other future projects.

    • Gene

      I agree. Too often the ideas are better than the buildings. Most buildings look better partially built, and more exciting because there is still potential there. Sometimes I see some of my construction photos and say to myself”Why didn’t I stop there?” A pile of 2×10’s or bricks stirs feeling when later they don’t. A pile of potential.

  • Paul Scharnett

    Or, the Borson Museum (BM). Just sayin’. 🙂

    • Yes, BM … very nice.

      • Paul Scharnett

        I couldn’t help it, Bob. A BM visit would be a great way to spend some time reviewing your sketches, I’m sure.

        I have the same conundrum regarding sketches; I oft find myself holding onto petty scraps for far too long and the important sketches for less time than I ought. I did recently watch a TED Talk with Bjarke Ingels and they suggested that the sketches, models, etc. should be used as a type of archive of ideas. I find that to be somewhat true–but it is always difficult to know whether the idea you had 5 years ago is as good as it is going to get until it is proven. All things in cycles, I suppose.

  • Kerry Hogue

    Bob, NEVER throw away your sketches! They should never be put in the trash. They, along with all discarded paper, should be recycled.

    • I don’t make the distinction between trash and recycling, everything get recycled.

      You know, in some offices, the sketches get recycled in to different projects

      • Kerry Hogue

        how true. any architect that says that is not a fact is not being truthful.

  • uh…yeah…keep them for the Borson Oeuvre Complete someday and keep the ice cream at work…geeez

    • ice cream at work wouldn’t work, there are 8 other ice cream eaters up here who wouldn’t think twice about eating mine.

      the problems I have – sheesh!

  • Steve

    For every project I keep the very first bubble sketch and add them to a few other sketches that show the evolution of the design/idea. I have them framed and present them to the client when they move in. The homeowners love it.

    • that’s what I was thinking … although in a moment of selfishness, I think I might actually want to keep them for myself.

    • James B Pettit Jr

      In my former office we always held on to development sketches until we were certain that we would need them no longer. Even then I liked to hold on to some of them as a record of design evolution. Others we held on to for more practical reasons: client sign-off on a plan, elevation, detail, etc. We have kept drawings that started as Scheme A and have progressed to Scheme M or more, frequently to remind the client that his changes have cost us time and him money. There are good reasons to hang on to some drawings beyond nostalgia or the temptation to frame them but, as some have noted, a lot of them would definitely be worth framing given the state of freehand sketching in the profession today.

  • Dawn

    on looking back and being That Cleaning Intern: sometimes I have looked back with wonder, as in what is it all about Alfie? Some rare time’s I’m like wow, that really did include some good ideas, I’m glad it got lost in here and not thrown out after all. The cleaning/moving offices project for architects is somewhere between OK where’s this box go now? and OMG! this is almost as bad as cleaning out my grandparent’s house of 50+ years together. I’m not sure there’s a rule to be made for general trace ideas, though I understand the light awe of a sexy illustrated sketchbook. Is it partly the collection process that comes along with being included in a book: it’s Bookness? or the fact that the Illustrated Idea rated inclusion that captures your attention? Either way, happy saving!

    • who says you can’t bind these sketches into a book? Certainly every sketch isn’t worth keeping but I currently throw them ALL away so there is certainly some sort of happy medium

  • Doug Kuchta

    As an office, we keep the important ones to reference back to the original thought, intention or concept. It also becomes a great learning tool. I personally tend to trash all of mine because they become a cluttered mess, though i wish i spent the 30 seconds to file it or keep a book.

    • I think I fall into this camp currently – the ones that are of value seem to make their way into a project drawer but eventually they disappear into some storage locker, and after 10+ years, they are supposed to get destroyed. I am thinking about the need of some sort of archival system that allows me to hold on to them (other than sketch books)

  • Some architects keep sketches (and models) as a way to preserve an idea. Where you may have sketched a detail for a project but didn’t end up using it, instead of throwing it out you hold on to it and then you may find yourself referring back to it for another project which could use that detail.

    However I don’t think it’s worth keep every piece of trace your sharpie graced, probably just major important ones?

    • James B Pettit Jr

      Some ideas are worth keeping even if there is no application for them at the time they are drawn. I tell my students that they should not be afraid to “throw away” a good idea if it just doesn’t work for their current project. Instead, stash it somewhere and maybe, at a later date, they will find a use for it. This allows them to move on and not put all their “great ideas” into one project. They will have plenty of time to stretch out and use their ideas appropriately if they realize that good design doesn’t come from a conglomeration of cool stuff but from appropriate responses to a program.

  • Kamau Munderu

    You can re-generate CAD drawings. With hand-made sketches, you can’t. So I keep mine.

My “Serious” Disclaimer

The complimentary advice provided on ‘Life of an Architect’ is based on an abbreviated examination of the minimal facts given, not the typical extensive (and sometimes exhaustive) analysis I conduct when working with my clients. Therefore, anything you read on this site is not a substitute for actually working with me. Following my casual advice is at your own peril … if you want my undivided attention, I would recommend hiring me. Cheers.

Pages

Archives of Awesomeness