I reference F-R-I-E-N-D-S

There’s a story behind this photo.

A long time ago, well, during Covid, I was working as an architectural assistant. Prior to getting an architect's license, it pretty much means you are at the bottom of the food chain if you work in a large office. But I was fresh out of Uni and it was my first real corporate experience and I wanted to make the world know my worth.

Our team was working on a commercial project, and very soon, me, my colleague (let’s call her Phoebe) and my senior (let’s call him Chandler - and yes I’m naming them after FRIENDS) (I love this TV show and watch it whenever I'm stressed)

soon found ourselves working on 11 precincts with just the three of us.The stage of the project was schematic design and we were getting really overworked by the endless number of CAD files (eleven precincts and none of them modular so there are plan ele sections details RCPs on top of those, renderings, each). I remember sitting there, thinking to myself, first of all why are we the only ones working until 3AM for a deadline for a client which we have never even met on camera, and then also for a salary that is less than most junior insurance brokers and working on designs which we don’t have much opinion on? We were told we were the juniors and we should work hard, we should learn. But I realised soon that something is really wrong. Now looking back I know it’s management. But also, the methods used were like, trying to race F1 on horseback. And the three of us were the horse. 

At 3am before the deadline of the drawing submission, I sat in front of my screen to show Phoebe what we should do next for the next few hours before Pacific coffee opens at 8am, and Chandler stood up to stretch his legs, took his film camera that he loves and walked over to the other side of the office, and took this photo. 

I had no recollection of this photo taken until last month when I went to Chandler’s wedding, and he slipped this in an envelope to me. I didn’t expect to be this emotional looking at it, but it’s telling me something. 6 years later, Phoebe now works at the government with a high paying job that she likes, Chandler is - getting married and started his own interior design firm, and I remembered that frustration and that confusion, and perhaps it all started from there when I thought, f*ck this it ain’t right, it’s not a reality that I can accept and it’s not anyone in this industry should say ‘it’s the way it is’ and go on with it, there’s got to be a different future - and thus started our dear AI Architecture consultancy , AAL, not immediately but after trying a few things that proved my point to myself. 

This photo means a lot to me because I remember that fire that I had; ‘I’m not going to let this get to me, I’m not going to surrender, I’m going to do this job well.’ And I felt so empathetic to that old me. I was putting all of my energy, youth into ‘architecture’, when it didn’t deserve my energy. Now I know, innovation deserves my energy. I will put my energy into shifting the way people work, into changing our minds - especially young minds - on how to leverage a race car instead of killing our selves on a horse - or worse, die running as a horse trying to finish an F1 race. And voila, enters AI.

Fast foward to now, I found what I enjoy the post. Image below: Me today at my HKCEC talk on AI in Architectural Design as invited speaker, and I LOVE it.

Guys I post one AI tip everyday to our community group chat, here if it's your thing to be in a community:

And speaking of community we are going to interview an Urban Planner from Kenya doing his PhD at HKU who is savvy in AI and has his own startup, won't mention it too much here but this is the link: HERE

Love,

Adeline