A reflection of an Architect, Urban Designer and a Rookie Blogger
An Architect and an Urban Designer to a Rookie Blogger
As I was already on the bandwagon of the master’s journey, excited, nervous and a bit overwhelmed for a big change taking place. Starting my Urban Design course in one of the reputed universities in the UK is was another feather in the hat for me. Before starting the course, I had already been through the details of all the modules and credits which are the part of the Urban Design course.
The very first day when the course began was the induction day, where we all were briefed about the entire system of teaching and the submissions. Looking at the entire picture made me feel a bit nervous for how I am going to manage everything, as the entire teaching and learning system for me was new. Although, I am absolutely aware about the fact that UK has the best education system. So, I just decided to trust the process and go with the flow. Along the city being welcoming, the people here being friendly, our personal tutor Natalia always makes it very simplified for all of us with respect to everything related to the course, and you can always reach out to her for any issues.
The Principles and Practice of Urban Design module is the one which has all my interest, as it helps to gain awareness of the design issues in the built environment. We always have different lectures based on various Urban Design themes which address a number of issues at the Urban level, which give us the food for thought. Not only does it help us to just address the issues, but also gives us an idea about the various angles at which we as aspiring Urban Designer should look at. Furthermore, study those issues and think critically about them and try to find sustainable solutions with the help of research and case studies. We have by far have had a fair study about the Urban Infrastructure, the socio-economic aspects of urban design, Landscape Urbanism and similar other topics.
That being said, in the second week of the course, we were introduced to the Urban Design blogs. I had already come across the Newcastle University Urban Design blogs and had read the blogs posted by my seniors, but when I got to know that we had to write blogs as a part of our course I got very excited. Being an Architecture student, I always used to be interested in reading various Architecture, Technology and Design related blogs. A few of my favorites are Rethinking the Future, Arch Daily, Architectural Digest, Conde Nast, Dezeen, etc. It always fascinated me the way they write and club it with those magazine style images and frame them perfectly which engages the reader.
The thought of someday having my own blog related to my interest always just used to stay back while reading these blogs. But when this task of writing a blog was put forth in front of us as a part of the course, it gave me a good push to start writing a blog. At first, I was totally clueless on how and what am I going to write about. Dilan, our professor was always there to guide with how to choose your topic of interest, how to begin and put it in a proper format. She also showed us examples of few of her works.
This helped me narrow down the topic of my interests and elaborate my ideas and understanding of the topics discussed during the Urban Design Seminars. I won’t say that I faced any difficulties while writing these blogs because I was already curious about it and I took a keen interest in doing it. My overall experience in writing these blogs was really good and I feel I might continue to do so for my upcoming semesters as well. I can say that being an Architect and an Urban Designer, I am a rookie blogger too 🙂
