This may have done the rounds already, having originally been published in 2006, but here it is again for those of you who, like me, may have missed it:
If you haven’t seen it, check it out for laugh (click on the image above). Annie Choi gets sick of hanging out with her architecture pals, and vents in an open letter to Pidgin Magazine (a publication from graduate students at the Princeton University School of Architecture).
Do not get me wrong, architects. I like you as a person. I think you are nice, smell good most of the time. and I like your glasses. You have crazy hair, and If you are lucky, most of it is on your head. But I do not care about architecture. It is true… I believe that architecture falls somewhere between toenail fungus and invasive colonoscopy in the list of things that Interest me.
Her blog is one of those sites-where-young-people-dump-their-thoughts-for-all-and-sundry type blogs, kind of like facebook, but with more words and less ‘likes’. For example in a separate post:
This afternoon my co-worker and I were walking across the street to get lunch. On most days, I’d say eating is a real pain in the ass. Sometimes I wish I had just eaten so I could stop thinking about eating and move on with my goddamn life. You realize we have to eat EVERY DAY, like every four hours? That’s insane. It’s really taxing. You know, I’m kind of busy and I occasionally have shit to do, so eating gets in the way of me sometimes doing things. I realize there are people who don’t get to eat every day, so I should feel grateful, but you know what? I’m an asshole. Eating takes up time and energy and especially in New York, it takes up money. Dude, not even kidding you, I just spent $11 on a sandwich and a salad and no, I did not get a mouth boner from it.
The whole “Dear Architects” thing kind of blew up unexpectedly in poor Annie’s face, she received considerable ‘feedback’ after the piece was published, some quite enterprising – including the Italian hatemail (after the piece was republished in Arbitare), which apologised for being in Italian, and the proposal and a plan from Jason, for her:
…very own one-bedroom apartment, complete with coffee bar, burrito-making station, and hedgehog habitat. (Hedgehog not included.)
She has a few less than gracious things to say about Santiago Calatrava (that won’t impress RW!), and REM Koolhaas – so it would appear that her friends do seem to have managed to infiltrate her consciousness somewhat – in that she even knows who these architects are. And not only did her fierce missive backfire in terms of generating a bit more attention than she anticipated – it also failed in its ultimate goal:
Just so you know, the letter has not stopped any of my architect friends from talking about architecture. Plus, the three non-architects I know are now talking about architecture, so it appears that my plan has backfired. Damn you, architects! Damn you! You’ve won this time, but I’m watching you…
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