ARCHITECTURAL PRACTICE
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ARCHITECTURAL PRACTICE: the NIA point of view.
Being a paper presented at the Colloquium organized by the Architects Registration Council of Nigeria, at the Musa Yar’Adua Centre, Abuja, 1st to 3rd of April, 2008 by Arc. Ibrahim Abdullahi Haruna, FNIA, mni.
PREAMBLES
Architectural practice: the Nigerian Institute of Architects (NIA) point of view as a topic, could mean what NIA considers as an ideal practice in Architecture. It could also mean the type of architectural practices NIA recognizes in its statutes. This paper will attempt to understand it from the two perspectives.
The type of architectural practices NIA categorically recognizes, will include practice as consultants in private firms; as a public servant; as design –and –build and also as an academician. Each of these are made reference of in either the NIA Code of Conduct, or Bye-Laws. There are however other forms of architectural practices that though not categorically mentioned in NIA statutes, but are going on without attracting any suction. These include sales and manufacture of building materials; project management; value engineering; facilities management; technical staff of works department in private companies; journalism; politics and free-lancing. This paper will however concentrate on consultancy, public service and academics.
JURY REPORT
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INTERNATIONAL ARCHITECTURAL COMPETITION FOR THE NEW ABUJA CITY GATE
JURY REPORT
1.0 INTRODUCTION
Sequel to the decision by the Federal Capital Territory Administration to relocate the Abuja City Gate to a new site, an international architectural design competition was organized. Pursuant to this, and in accordance with the rules guiding international design competitions, the Authority selected a Jury of experienced persons through the various professional bodies and international organizations. The Jury was inaugurated by the Executive Secretary, FCDA on 3rd June, 2009.
The jury was given a period of two weeks from 29thJuly, 2009, the date of opening of the bids, to adjudicate and report on the submissions. The jury concluded its assignment on the 12th of August, 2009.
NIA-ABUJA SEMINAR ON SPECS WRITING
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SPECIFICATIONS WRITING.
BEING A PAPER PRESENTED AT
NIGERIA INSTITUTE OF ARCHITECTS – ABUJA CHAPTER
SEMINAR/GENERAL MEETING.
HELD AT CHELSEA HOTEL ABUJA, ON 27TH SEPTEMBER, 2006,
BY: Arc. Ibrahim A. Haruna, FNIA, mni.
- 01.INTRODUCTION.
Communication has been the vital ingredient of interactions, between individuals, and even nations. Good communication bridges gaps, ensures understanding and yields positive results. Bad or lack of communications on the other hand widens gaps, causes misunderstanding, and may end up yielding negative results. Communication is the back bone of every profession, be it journalism (dissipating information as news), accountant (dissipating information in figures), Law, medicine and indeed architecture. One is either communicating news, or financial figures, or rights and privileges, or disease and cure, or how to construct. They are all ‘trading’ in information, ideas and acquired knowledge.
Without good techniques of communication, none of these professionals can achieve the desired results. Therefore, every professional must be able to instruct, inform or direct appropriately, and convey the exact information to the person being addressed in specific terms. This often happens even in ones domestic affairs where one gives un-specific instructions, and end up getting unexpected results.
The fundamental symptom of incomplete specifications is excessive questions from the given to the giver of the specifications. In construction, where the architect receives too many requests for more and more information from a contractor, it means the architects intention is not adequately specified.
MARKETING ARCHITECTURE
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MARKETING ARCHITECTURE: A FUNDAMENTAL TO SUCCESSFUL PRACTICE.
1. ABSTRACT.
Marketing is a relatively new field in architecture because of the restrictions placed on any form of advertisement by most of the earlier code of professional conducts of the regulating bodies virtually all over the globe. Schools of architecture expend all the time teaching on how to do the job with no course on how to get the job. This over reliance on how to do the job has perhaps compounded the problem of how to get the job because architects tend to get too confined to the technical aspect of architecture forgetting that architecture as a profession is also a business. There is therefore the need to focus on this all important aspect of the profession now that how to get the job can even be more tasking than how to do the job. This article aims at raising issues on the marketing of architecture as a catalyst to further contributions.
NOT ARCHITECTS.
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STILL ON ENGR. MAGAJI ABDULLAHI’S STATEMENT ABOUT ARCHITECTS. Published in Daily Trust Newspaper of Friday August 5, 2005.
By Ibrahim A. Haruna.
On the front page of Daily Triumph Newspaper of Friday, 22nd July 2005, His Excellency the Deputy Governor of Kano State was quoted as having said “he expressed dismay on how in many cases an architect plays and performs the role of other professionals such as building consultants, structural engineers, surveyors, quantity surveyors and a town planner in execution of a buildings of any magnitude.” This was at the occasion of the inauguration of the Engineering Regulation Monitoring (ERM) programme in Kano. These I find very difficult to believe could have been his words. I know him as a smooth speaker who does not run out of what to say under any circumstances, and could not have been forced to say that for lack of what to say. I know him as an icon of professionalism too well to believe he could make such a direct wild and unsubstantiated allegation capable of throwing fellow professionals into disrepute. Those who know him as a politician also do assert that he is someone who applies ‘engineering calculations’ to politics so much so that he weighs every word before he mummers it. Perhaps it was the draft of his speech writer which he never found time to edit before the occasion. This prompts my desire to react to that article.
