San Diego Civic Theatre, San Diego, California: Conceptual color marker sketch on yellow trace paper shows the exuberance of opening night.
For past decades, I have explored architectural ideas through drawing: from tentative doodles to scratchy sketches, from colored diagrams to illustrative depictions. Though a variety of technological tools are at my fingertips—CAD, 3DS, Photoshop, even AI—I still prefer the simplest of tools at my desk, a pencil and my hand.
Design sketches can be artifacts representing a search for ideas, sometimes an elliptical journey of tests and failures. In other cases, sketches can establish the conceptual narrative and design agenda—a graphic thesis, a 2D picture that launches the creative process. Design sketches can also be gestural capturing gestalt and overall expression, as taught in figure drawing classes. Or perhaps, an illustration can delineate an architectural caricature, not unlike the art within the comic books of my youth.
Here, I have collected 17 various sketches of mine for your perusal—all part of a creative journey, not to be scrutinized as a final product or conclusive solution.
Saffron restaurant, Beverly Hills, California: An intentionally crude collage of marker and craft papers explores broad ideas of patterns, colors and fabrics—ignoring tedious details.Din Tai Fung restaurant, The Americana at Brand, Glendale, California: For this 160-seat, 7,000-square-foot restaurant, thin and thick black ink lines display the patterned wood and glass screens wrapping from walls to ceiling.Pacific Christian High School, Culver City, California: Color pencils over color markers over a photocopy of a pencil drawing—a bird’s eye view show three brick anchor buildings (theater, library and cafeteria) connected by occupiable green roofs.Library at the American University of Cairo, New Cairo, Egypt: Quick five-minute pencil sketch of shade and shadow expresses the Egyptian-influenced modern design and associated stone pattern (while w/ HHPA).Taegu Arena, Taegu, Korea: For a 14,000-seat basketball arena, gestural sketch on yellow trace paper—a few lines represent the curved glass walls and saddleback roof.Start Select esports lounge and bar, Arcadia, California: Heavy shades and tones from markers and color pencils capture the hangout mood of technology and drinks.Buddhist Temple, Natural Bridge, Virginia: A minimal pencil and marker drawing made evocative with a Photoshoped backdrop of the property’s actual trees.Greenman Elementary School, West Aurora, Illinois: A piano work by J.S. Bach inspires the rhythm of windows on the building’s brick surfaces, a school that emphasizes a performing arts curriculum–color pencil and pen.Robbins Elementary School, Trenton, New Jersey: 20-second doodle of pen and color pencils explores how the proposed collision of new glass additions to an existing traditional red brick building.Kenter Residence, Los Angeles, California: A traditional living room captured in mere pencil lines and modest textures.EC Kids fitness and community center, Culver City, California: An aerial view depicts playful forms, recreational areas and youthful spirit, inserted into an existing 10,000-square-foot industrial warehouse, done in color markers.Aztec Student Union, San Diego State University, San Diego, California: For a new 230,000-square-foot university center, a fast and loose five-minute, color pencils sketch exhibits the public space, the heart of the design. (while w/ HHPA).Sushi Noguchi, Yorba Linda, California: Quick repetitive pencil line work captures the many wood slats that provide privacy, filtered sunlight, ceiling interest, and overall interior warmth and character.Herb Alpert Music Center, Los Angeles City College, California: Renovation of an existing stair, color pencil, markers, and paper collage on white trace.
Why do I sketch? Sketching comprises many things: artistic ideas, physically moving one’s body, and communicating an idea to an audience. With drawing, I enjoy the connection between my brain and my hand, between my imagination and a pencil, between an idea and a blank piece of paper. I also find complacency in how graphite moves across the tooth of vellum or how ink slides across smooth trace.
Herb Alpert Music Center, Los Angeles City College, California: Exploratory sketches for a new lobby, pen in sketchbook.
#130: TO DRAW OR NOT TO DRAW—THAT IS THE QUESTION
February 5, 2021
Hand sketch with colored pencils of Villa Sunset, Beverly Hills, California, by Martin / Poon Architects (drawing by Anthony Poon)
To capture the spirit of a proposed architectural design, the human hand once held a pencil. For better or for worse, that same hand uses a computer these days.
Long before the advent of technology, architects drew by hand—ink on paper, for example. Sometimes meticulous and detailed, other times expressive and abstract—handmade presentations communicated the design vision for a client.
Falling Water, by Frank Lloyd Wright (drawing from the Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation Archives, The Museum of Modern Art, Avery Architectural & Fine Arts Library, Columbia University, New York)
Drawing was an intuitive process, where a few loose but curated lines could imply the Big Idea. The illustration was not burdened with capturing every last detail. The act of drawing, where the felt tip of a marker tracked along a softly textured surface of vellum, that in itself was an event of artistry and physicality. Yes, an art form.
Hand sketch with markers and color pencils of Escena Residence I-3, Palm Springs, California, by Poon Design (drawing by Anthony Poon)
Come the 60s and 70s, and IBM Drafting System introduced something that forever changed how architects designed and communicated ideas. The Brave New World was Computer-Aided Design and Drafting. The acronym CADD, or simply CAD in recent years, promised a technological future. These days, CADD or CAD sounds as archaic as labeling something “space age” or “high tech.”
Computer rendering of Kinrgy / Julianne Hough, West Hollywood, California, by Poon Design (rendering by Lukas Ruzbasan)
Nonetheless, it wasn’t long after the design industry embraced digital technology that rendering software would allow architects to represent their two-dimensional drawings as images suggesting the real thing—as if the project was built and someone took a photograph.
Computer rendering of Chengdu Financial Center, Chengdu, China, by 5+ Design (rendering by Mike Amaya)
But the early versions challenged clients (here and here). With the pretense of a presentation image looking sort of like physical reality, the clients stared too closely at the computer-produced rendering. High gloss images were produced to convincingly sell the design idea. Architects expected clients to be thrilled by the fetishized images washed in idealized sun and reflections, over saturated with colors and faux material. Unfortunately, circular conversations went like this.
Architect: “Here is what your building will look like!” A computer rendering is proudly presented.
Client: “Wow, it looks so real already. What kind of stone is that? I don’t like marble with so much veining. How come the joints are so big? What is the finish on that light fixture? Bronze?” The client starts to get confused.
Architect: “Oh, sorry.” Back peddling quickly, “This is just a mere preliminary concept. Umm, we used the computer to apply textures, shadows and materials, but the software is limited. It probably won’t look like this at all. Oh, yeah, so if you are worried, don’t be. This is just a computer drawing.” Sounding weakly apologetic.
Client: “Then why did you show it to me, if it isn’t going to look like this?”
Computer rendering of Linea Residence G, Palm Springs, California, by Andrew Adler and Poon Design (rendering by Lukas Ruzbasan
The next iterative step for computer renderings tripped dangerously into video animations, also known as “fly throughs.” The shortcomings of the early computer renderings were many times worse when trying to provide a short quasi-realistic film for the client—a feeble video tour that was so to present what it might feel like to walk into the proposed new house, viewing room to room. Things did get better though.
Computer rendering (left) and photo of finished project (right), Doheny Plaza, West Hollywood, California, by Poon Design (rendering by Lukas Ruzbasan and photo by Hunter Kerhart)
These days, the technology behind Augmented Reality and Virtual Reality are delivering architect and clients into exciting, but still to-be-tested, waters. Promising yes, but lots of hiccups to come.
Computer rendering of Chaya Downtown, Los Angeles, California, by Poon Design (rendering by Olek Zemplinski)
The challenge is this. When the architect and his software represents the design as a realistic photograph, video, or AR/VR, it will inevitably fall short of reality. The answer, whether drawing by hand or using a computer, is to not just capture a physical reality at a sample point in time, but rather, capture the emotion. Instead of trying to show the exact brick pattern in the picture, embody the atmosphere, character, and personality instead.
Computer rendering of National Palace Museum, Southern Branch, Chiayi County, Taiwan (rendering from predock.com)
