The Interview

It really didn't go as smoothly as I had originally hoped. An open-ended survey to 10 of the prominent architecture + design magazines went unanswered. The survey, and the ultimate methodology underlying it:

10 Questions: Power in Architecture

Please articulate how you, in your capacity as a professional within the 'field', see each concept's relationship to architecture?
1. Progressivism
2. Relevance
3. Irrelevance
4. Radicalism
5. Urbanism
6. Tolerance
7. Eroticism
8. Sterility
9. Equality
10. You

An open-ended survey grants the interviewee (and therefore her audience) the possibility of a confrontation with her own sense of sef; as both lover of architecture and professional operating within its power structure as the discriminator of information. The terms are loaded, often with sexual motifs, or terminology utilized excessively within movements of justice. How does the mind, upon establishing the perspective ("capacity as a professional") analyze these loaded terms? What underlying logic drives the response? Was this done by committee or was this done independent of others within her work culture?

So I transitioned: could I manage to touch bases with a senior partner at a prominent architecture firm? The questions:

1. How does your position within BBB shape your understanding of architecture as an academic or theoretical philosophy?
2. What makes architecture relevant?
3. irrelevant?
4. Which came first, the architect or the academic?
5. Who comes first: the client or the community?
6. Who comes last: Fred the person or Fred the architect?
7. Which is larger...your model shop team or your marketing department?
8. Is there any building, development, community, or law that you would encourage (or have actually lobbied for) the removal of from the physical or political landscape of NYC?
9. What would you replace it with?
10. Define radical architecture.

And I received the interview. But not in time. Important people have things to do. I can't wait until Friday. I show up unannounced. He is on meetings the receptionist tells me. Who am I? I'm the guy holding a bottle of wine looking for this guy to do my goddamn interview. I start to name drop...