We then started discussing why we doodle when we take notes, and that for some reason we remember more than when we don’t. I’ve always believed that it’s because the piece of information retained is tied to a physical act. Part of your brain is focused on the circles, the other part has no choice but to focus on the information being presented. It might be keeping our mind from wandering.

The idea of keeping the body occupied with repetitive, remedial tasks to improve memory, and even inspiration, happens to everybody. I think that some of our best ideas and solutions have come while taking a shower. We are participating in a fairly automated task, there isn’t a lot of external stimuli to distract, and our conscious mind is not occupied. Edward de Bono calls situations like this (showers, a walk in the park, exercise, doodling) a “creative pause”. We have created an environment where our mind is prepared.

I’ve always found the same effect happen to me when I’m cleaning my desk or studio space. I go through the same motions each week, and each time a bit of inspiration hits me for the problem at hand. Not to draw correlation between my level of creativity and that of Brian Eno, but I had to smile when I read / watched this interview of his:

Inspiration doesn’t just happen. You have to start doing something: you have to build a trap to catch it.

I like to do that by starting the very mundane process of tidying my studio. It may seem like it has nothing to do with the job at hand but I think tidying up is a form of day dreaming, and what your really doing is tidying up your mind. It’s a kind of mental preparation. It’s a way of getting your mind in a place to notice something.

And that’s what being creative is really: it’s noticing when something interesting is starting to happen and then building on it and asking yourself, “Where can I go with this?”

It’s like Louis Pasteur said, “Chance favors the prepared mind.” My version of that is ‘Luck is being ready’, because luck is about noticing changes and acting on them.

Lebbeus Woods passed away on October 30th of 2012. I wouldn’t be presumptuous enough to say that I ‘knew’ Lebbeus, but I did have the honor of taking a special seminar he taught at the University of Oklahoma, I acted as his guide and guy Friday the week he was there, and benefitted from the time and advice that he graciously gave to me when I moved to New York City.

During one of my visits, he described his experiences of working on the Ford Foundation. This was his “PhD. in architecture”. The advice he gave to me was to work in a design firm that actually built something. Through drawing, coordination with engineers and being in the field, you begin to fully understand the problems and conditions that need to be addressed and resolved to create something of beauty and craft.

I’ve always appreciated this advice, and loved that is has remained consistent throughout his body of work. I’ve kept this section of writing pasted to the inside of one of my sketch books (Lebbeus actually has more to say here). Before anything gets built, it begins with an analytical act of crafting a solution:

Once upon a time, before computers came to be the pre-eminent architectural design tool, architects made drawings by hand. Instead of leaving it up to the computer’s software to make and assemble the lines defining contours and edges of forms, architects would draw line by line, gradually building up the drawing. Somewhere in the backs of their minds, perhaps, the Italian term disegno, which means both ‘drawing’ and ‘design,’ worked to convince them that the two concepts were synonymous: to draw was to design, and to design was to draw. In the same way, the ideas of ‘analysis’ and ‘synthesis’ came together in the act, and the artifact, of drawing. To build up a drawing line by line is an analytical act – one chooses exactly where to place the line, based on an understanding of the problem or conditions to be addressed, and, at the same time, of the need for the sum of lines to create a greater whole, a coherent, cohering and integrated form…

A great piece of advice from Seth Godin:

…choices lead to habits. Habits become talents. Talents are labeled gifts. You’re not born this way, you get this way.

It has a bit of similarity to some unexpected wisdom from Will Smith talking with Charlie Rose on approaching tasks:

You don’t set out to build a wall. You don’t say I’m going to build the biggest, baddest, greatest wall that’s every been built. You don’t start there. You say I’m going to lay this brick as perfectly as a brick can be laid. …. You do that every single day, and soon you have a wall. (~23:00)

And I like Jeff Veen’s approach of starting from the bottom up in the The Art & Science of Web Design (and I’m paraphrasing liberally):

Start with the doorknob. Once you become a doorknob expert, you can move on to becoming a room expert, a door expert, a window expert. Make connections, and you can become an expert on how public spaces can foster community interaction, or how city design can alleviate congestion.

We were lucky and blessed enough to be able to travel a bit this year: a long drive from Kansas City to Houston, a trip out to Scottsdale and Sedona, and back ‘home’ to Dallas and Malakoff. This year the lady and I also celebrated five years together by returning to Paris and visiting Copenhagen for the first time. Highlights of that trip were a private tour of Maison de Verre, croissants, croissants, croissants, and given my Danish heritage, Channing felt like she was a bystander at my family reunion.

A lot of trips involved visiting family, but we also were able to see more of our friends…mainly they were coming in from Atlanta, Baltimore, or Norman to visit us. These are friends we’ve known for the better part of our lives, and despite the distance and time that has separated our drinks and dinners, the bonds are still as strong as that first all-nighter in studio.

It was a big year professionally for the both of us. Channing started a new job and it is amazing seeing her be challenged, grow and thrive in her new role. For me, I finished my last few ARE exams and gained my architecture license. It was also my first full year operating in a new capacity/position at work. The role has been challenging and it has helped me grow out of the comfortable shell I was forming – for that reason alone it has benefitted me and I hope benefitting others. This year also marked the completion of 130 West 12th, and the completion and awards for One Dekalb. The license and the two projects where big ToDo items for ’12, so now I need to fill in a few lines for the ’13 list.

This year also marked a full year in our new apartment . We’ve lived in two places as a married couple. The first place was a blessing for us, but this is the first apartment that has felt like ‘home’. At least our first adult home. Of course, the main contributing factor is our small bit of potted dirt and sky that we have out back, but it has also grown to become a combination of our neighbors in the building, the immediate surrounding blocks, and the overall apartment itself. It’s amazing what a few well placed skylights can do.

Of course there is a long list of ‘resolutions’ and ToDo’s I had for ’12. Last year, I looked towards C.S. Lewis for inspiration and divided a few items into ought to’s, got to’s, and like to’s. I spent most of the year focused on the ought to’s, and I have to say that the overall approach worked – Channing and I are in a better place than we were a year ago. So, again, I’m sticking with what works - if it doesn’t easily fall into one of those categories, I shouldn’t be wasting my time on it.

It’s amazing what a simple change in the question has done.

After a little lesson from Paul Ford, my wife and I now start our evenings conversation with: “What did you learn today?”

This has taken us, or more specifically me, out of the “rote and ritual” and encourages us reflect on what we accomplished with our day. As Ford wrote, “the question assumes that this was a day unlike the one before…a day of signal.”

It remains a predictable prompt during our evening, but we now we feel a bit more like kids in school. (I happened to like school.) Actions and events are new, and even simple recaps of the day’s headlines become cause for more interesting discussion. The problems of the day have become less of stumbling blocks to our routine, and more about challenges to solve and how we grew from our new knowledge.

- Benjamin Franklin

We’ve been in the new apartment for a year now and I’ve developed a weekend ritual in my new neighborhood. I enjoy my early mornings and they normally start the same way: a run heading north along Riverside Drive until I feel like I won’t be able to make it back. I push half a mile further and then make my way down to the river and turn south. After I’m home and cleaned up, the serious part of the routine starts – the walk.

The first stop is Starbuck to grab my wife her necessary hot green tea. It must be from Starbucks because of the exact amount of addictive narcotics that they obviously put into their beverages. I then head over to the bakery on 72nd and Broadway for a croissant and a latte for myself. Right outside is a newstand. I quickly skim through the papers and the magazine covers,  the hierarchy of information is easy to grasp: real news is smudge-able black print on off white paper, everything else, inessential, is in bold yellow type. I grab a paper and head to Verdi Square to finish my breakfast and then it’s a short walk north to Fairway or Citarella.

There is no rhyme or reason for which one I choose, it just depends upon my mood and what the display might look like that morning. My intentions are always to get something small for breakfast and a light lunch, but I alway end up buying too much. First its the cheese, then the bread, then the meat. Oh the meat. I probably stand at the butcher’s display for a good 15 minutes dreaming about what’s going to be on the grill that afternoon. I finally just ask the butcher what they recommend for the day. They’ve always been really nice and have yet to give anything but great advice. With arms loaded, I make my way home feeling that I’ve accomplished something with my morning. The rest of the afternoon most likely won’t be so productive.

By the time I make it home, its later than I imagine. Time seems to pass more slowly. With the day’s provisions on the kitchen counter and Chet Baker on the radio,  I’m taking inventory of what I brought home and I try to remember what it was I thought I was going to be making. I have no desire to impress anyone, I’m just happy to be cooking for my wife. Grilled meat, fresh tomato and mozzarella salad, watermelon with mint. The best part of the day, and of this ritual, is the actual act of cooking. There is no real thinking, just a feeling of escape as the week past and the week ahead dissolve into a series of motions as we both busy ourselves with cooking the meal. Nothing but the present, colorful life.

We always intend to eat at a normal lunch time, but 1:00 quickly fades to 2:00 when the food finally makes its way out to the table. The rest of the day is filled with a short walk by the river, gelato for the return trip home, and most likely a TV show or a magazine in late afternoon. If this all happened on Saturday, we smile, thinking we get to do this again tomorrow. If it is Sunday, the week ahead is already trying to pry the remaining evening hours away from us and we are hurried into Monday.

Open, screenless windows

Late night terrace chats

The coldness of the Hudson

Fireflies

Dogs at the park

The last fresh blueberries and strawberries

Fresh tomatoes

Fresh honey

Morning shadows through the curtain

Reading in the sun

Sweat in my hair from a bike ride

The smell of grilling all afternoon

Dining on the terrace