A story of every design jury ever.
This writing is dedicated to all those factors that aggregate in making a presentation satisfactory. It is all about the pressure and scenario around the D-day, where the jury maybe 30-45 minute’s presentation but countless factors act upon making it easy-going, confident, and full of contentment or NOT. There were 1080 tabs open in my mind the whole time and 5 tabs on the computer system. I was more choosy about the line weights, grades, and thicknesses than for anyone or anything I know. The day before the jury was a nice sunny day to stay inside waiting for renderings to finish. Nothing makes us more productive than the day before the jury.
After working on models for the whole night, the D-day arrived. I picked my least glue-y, scribbly pair of t-shirt and jeans obviously black as I’m still waiting for something darker to wear. I was carrying a sheet holder like an AK-47, balancing models like juggling balls and t-scale parallels like a farmer’s plough. Process models were hanging to the vehicle’s back seat like baubles rattling in the wind. The print shop was crowded with print sheets larger than my blanket. I was searching for the “new final final jury print .dwg” file to command for print. The waiting period for the computer system to unfreeze was longer than the actual working time. Furthermore, my sleep deprivation led to losing the pen drive at the shop.
I arrived at the school late for the jury. A faculty member was shouting because someone’s print was always on the way the whole time of critics. Colleagues presenting to the jury had nothing to do with the brief but had an infinite number of meaningless sheets, so they loved it. Colleagues done with the critics were complaining about the jury being strict and that they expected detailed drawings. Hence as a reaction, I started making detailed drawings and my friends adding details to my models was constant.
The jury always felt like a team of experts shelling rounds of cartridges, where we were defending more than explaining. The jury interchanged the batch after the break and all my preoccupied ideas went null. I smelled of freshly laser cut wood boards on like a perfume. With wound scars on the palm, high on caffeine it seemed difficult to keep up with the mood of every panelist. The jury panel consisted a know all silent one, a busy in the phone, a loud and overexcited, a hate everything, a format & text style type obsessive, and a reminisce- ‘We used to draw everything in my college days’, a theorist who talked about experiences but made full sense, and a subject base faculty who enjoys the roast.
The jury passed with the struggle of choosing appropriate words to describe the design and best express the concept. Very fond of design with a strong context like riverside, I was very excited to know the critics about design. Apparently, the concept had the built form intertwined and merging to the water with a form enfolding an experience of inside out character. Everybody appreciated the design but, in the end, a juror asked about the situation about the crocodiles crawling up from the water body, and entering the premise, rendering me speechless. As soon as the jury ended, colleagues gathered around me like paparazzi around a celebrity, asking how it went. Finally, it felt like someone took a brick off my head and the mere idea of sleeping with peace was tempting.
At some point, we all have experienced these days. Nevertheless, it does not only teach the principles of designing, architectural conceptualizing, and detailing but it also helps grow confidence and empowers one to work in any situation in a professional career or life. We often remember these as dark days but the satisfaction of work exceeds the despair.
