Breaking the Cycle: To Make Great Architecture You Have to Suffer

Redlines

In this episode of Redlines, hosts Jake and Erin speak with Cecilia and Elif, two architecture students who took an unpaid summer internship abroad at a famous firm in Spain at the recommendation of their professor.

However, instead of gaining valuable experience in an architecture office, they were treated as expendable labor.

Cecilia and Elif recount the harrowing details of this exploitative internship and the fear they felt in speaking up due to the power dynamics at play with famous architects and professors. They explain why they and other students stayed despite the conditions and discuss how this experience impacted their career paths and beliefs around what is acceptable treatment in the architecture industry.

Ultimately, Cecilia and Elif hope that by speaking openly about these abusive practices, the next generation of architects can help break the perpetuating cycle of poor labor conditions in the name of becoming a “great architect.”

Three major incidents:

1. Cecilia and Elif arrive at the internship and are forced to work manual labor on a construction site instead of in an office, with no safety protections (6:00)

2. Famous architects visit the construction site, gather the students around for a demonstration, and have them running around doing tasks, yelling when they make mistakes (19:00)

3. After Cecilia takes two days off, the architects gather everyone and lecture them that leaving for even one day is unacceptable and detail the punishments (38:00)

Four key takeaways

• Architect students worldwide are often exploited as manual laborers during their internships, working long hours in dangerous working conditions with no safety equipment, training, contracts, or labor protections.
• Speaking up about famous architects and professors was scary due to fear of retaliation and harm to future career prospects.
• Some student interns feel compelled to stay to get required credits or due to visa dependency, despite the conditions.
• Sharing stories openly can help prevent ongoing exploitation so the next generation of architects doesn't have to suffer the same way.

Quotes:

"Rather than framing them (internships) as learning opportunities or rites of passage, we need to start looking at them the way they are. They’re just exploitative."

"My professor told me that good architecture takes three things, time, money, and freedom… but I realized at our internship we had no money, no time and no freedom due to the constant surveillance."

Relevant Links:

• Out of Architecture website: https://www.outofarchitecture.com
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