#a19 #aiacon19 AIA Conference 2019: "day three: Interview with Mandy Freeland"

DREAM, THINK, CREATE,
SOLVE, DESIGN, CHANGE
#whatanarchitectdoes
w/ Clair Marie Wholean and I

It's Day Three but we are going to review parts of Day One, Day Two in this post, because it's the women-centric post..

On Day One, I went to the session that was a continuation of the AIA's commitment to research-based practice led

by these great women. I went to the session last year and though it is baby steps with all of the other things that I am

trying to do in my business and personal life, it takes a little longer than you think it is going to take. BUT,

the session was great with Billie Faircloth of Kieran Timberlake, Melissa Farling of Gould Evans, Upall Nanda of HKS, and Jerl Brittin of HDR. This year there wasn't anyone from a smaller practice, which I missed (being of a small practice) and being that the majority of architecture firms are small practices and do not have the budgets of a larger firm to take on research, I appreciated thebroader range of last year's session and it was through the question and answer period that I noticed that the subject of one of my interviewees was in the room: Clair Marie Wholean, AIA and I was able to connect with her afterwards at this great photo op that was set up outside the room and here we are above:

Two people who I was sitting close to
and I will interview later as far as their
entrance into the research forum

Sharon Fellowship Recipient
and Friend since College
to our instagrapher below 

The other Friends since College who took our photos!

Here we are!!!

Obligatory Bathroom Selfie at Brooklyn Bowl
Is this not the most simple but
definitely designed women's room, ???

When a person asks if you can take their pic and you say, "
"don't I follow you on Instagram?"
Danei Cesario and I

There are a few Facebook Groups that I am part of and one is EntreArchitect which I recommend to everyone who wants non-stop advice from other architects for any (and I mean any situation, work and work/life balance).  And then I am part of a group that I am not necessarily in that part of my life now, though I am still a MOM!!! but I am more of a person who has gone through a lot of the issues presented, so I can act as a "I've been there, it was difficult, but you can do it!!!" and that is the Mothers in Architecture, Design and Construction which had several opportunities for Meetups at the Conference.  There is also a Facebook group that is Women Architects Collaborative and they had a few meetups at the functions below. I was only at the EntreArchitect party but I look forward to meeting everyone at the Los Angeles Conference 2020, we are looking for a group that will be interested in some type of Child Care for the AIA Conference Los Angeles and more Women's Meetups.  

The "Women In Architecture Brunch"

Mandy Freeland and
Michael Riscica

A group of new friends from
the Facebook Group
“Women Architects Collective”
 shared a car to the
Women in Architecture Lunch. 

Mandy Freeland, Elizabeth Hernandez,
and Jeannie Bertolaccini at Brooklyn Bowl "The Party"

So, all of these above photos are of Mandy Freeland and friends which brings us to our next "I've never met a woman architect before..." interview with, who else, but Mandy Freeland!

Mandy Freeland is the founder of one of the first woman-owned firms in Kern County, California, focusing on commercial, public education, hospitality, multifamily, and industrial projects.  She is a wife and mother of two teens, an avid sports fan, and outdoor enthusiast.  She has been serving in volunteer leadership roles in the local, state, and national levels since 2016, focusing on creating a better profession for emerging professionals.  She is always happy to share her experiences as a woman and mother in this profession. 

Interview with Mandy Freeland, AIA, click here


Mandy's Classic Buildings (Or Classic Movements and Technology):

Hearst Castle by Julia Morgan 

photo credit: Wickipedia

The Reliance Building by Burnham and Root
Photo Credit: Wickipedia

The Rookery by Burnham and Root
Photo credit: Wickipedia

The Rookery (Detail) by Burnham and Root
Photo Credit: Wickipedia

We were invited to the Sherwin Williams "Color Mixology" Party at the Waldorf Astoria Skybar and the view was spectacular and the Color Mixology was pretty cool... Here's a basic demonstration of how it works, and I have to say that I do not have the fastest hands picking the colors that I wanted but these are close to the colors that I wanted, it was a little more purple and a little more blue than I ended up with....John Dumesnil, the Sherwin Williams Regional Sales Rep said that his was basically

Gray

Which is on trend but he said "Just not very exciting if you are talking about your personality"

This was my color,
I keep trying to get out of picking dark colors
but you have to really move fast with this
and i wanted a lighter purple but alas...
blueprint purple...

We had a good time, but we were hungry and it was on to the next venue...

And then we got in the Lyft to the address of the EntreArchitect & Charette Ventures Group Party which was at the El Dorado Cantina and the driver pulled up to the Sapphire Night Club, and I said, "Uhhh, is this the right address???" and he said, "Yes, and pointed to teh door which said, "El Dorado Cantina" and we got out and for anyone who knows anything about anything about Vegas and the Sapphire, it is one of the biggest strip clubs in town and as several people have said, "that means that it is one of the biggest strip clubs in the world...." and the interesting thing about this is that the food was good and I was fine with my kids being there and nobody tried to pull my boys into the club as had been warned by several other people who said that they wouldn't take their kids to Vegas.  We had a good time with the EntreArchitect group and Charette Ventures Group who announced the winner of the "business plan" there.  (I missed it but the firm was EVIA Studio and  Hinge Collective as the Honorable Mention.

Charette Venture Group CVG's Business Plan Competition

and here's the photos of the event courtesy of William J. Martin. (obviously he is in some of the pics so I am not sure who took those, probably his wife who is from Pittsburgh, it;s always Pittsburgh, as my husband say.

Mike Riscica, William J. Martin, Mandy Freeland

William, Gloria Kloter, AIA & Brian Penschow, AIA

Dawn Zuber, William, Mark LePage

Dawn, William and I

William, Me and Courtney Rombaugh

William and Meghana Joshi
Interview with Meghana
coming up in the next blog

So there were many people after last year's conference in New York that were saying that they weren;t sure if they were going to go to the AIA Conference in Vegas, because it was in Vegas...

And to tell you the truth I was one of those people because I don't really like Vegas

AND

I had just done a last minute venture to the KBIS and IBS show to meet an archifriend who works for Kohler and in February when it snowed and they started cancelling flights and I was glad to end my 24 hour trip by flying out of Vegas after they deiced the wings....

So this time I drove...

But the reason I don't like going to Vegas is that i don't do the typical things that people like to do in Vegas which is 

1) Gamble

2) Drink

3) More Gambling or see a show for a gazillion dollars of a performer who is 50 years older than me but through the miracle of plastics looks 25 years younger...

So I went and I had a good time.  

But there were still people who were telling me that they don't like Vegas because of the atmosphere, and when I asked them "what do you mean?"

They said, "Well, where else can you go where there are billboards on truckbeds of naked women on the streets?  And I said, "well, there are a lot of areas in the world where you can see photos of naked women on the streets, I can think of several, on is Los Angeles and Copenhagen, and there were people who had told me that I shouldn't bring my kids, who are all 18 an dover because they said that they would start gambling and become addicted (again with casinos on native lands, that is not just specific to Vegas anymore) we have plenty of casinos in San Diego. And that they would be pulled into strip clubs or lured by prostitutes (again not something that is just a thing in Vegas, we live in a Navy town and it is apparent for anyone who goes near one of the bases, what is being advertised readily.

And there were women who told me that they just didn't feel safe there with that going on.

So, we went to the El Dorado Cantina and it is next door to the Sapphire Strip Club and several of us talked to the manager of the restaurant about the venue next door and the manager, who is from Germany originally said, in her typical Germanic way ( I was raised in a Germanic family) Well, we take food over to the girls, and we see them unmadeup and under bright lights and it they are less than perfect because I had joked that I wouldn't want my boys to see them because it would give them unrealistic expectations.  And she said, "Well, you know that a lot of the girls are just college students who fly in from San Diego to make money on the weekends to fund .their education.

Makes you think, huh?

I mean this is not news, most women that I have spoken to, have had a friend who was approached, or had a friend who was doing a job like this to make money.  And people say, "Well, why don't they get a regular job?" The thing is that it is a lot more money "per hour, with tips" than a typical burger joint, and what is the difference between going to Hooters where you are making min. wage with tight, short clothes and you have to listen to men make comments to you about your body and what they would like to do to you for minimum wage than to take your clothes off and dance and have nobody be able to touch you for a lot more plus tips?  Or what is the difference from having a minimum wage job or even a professional job where you aren't even taking your clothes off but you have a boss who talks about your body, makes inappropriate comments about things and you have to keep the job because you need the money.

There have been more than one woman I know who have said that it was hard to turn down a job like that but you do because you don't want to start down that road of making money off of your body or spending money to enhance your body because the the tips you make are going to be based on the size of your body parts.  

So, I am definitely not saying that I am an advocate of any job that objectifies a woman and I am defintiely not saying that I was ever approached to do any kind of the above activities, 

1) I have never even had a job in any part of the food service industry and 

2) in spite of what one of my archifriends said about me being able to be a stripper 

But what I am saying is that if you have a problem with women doing a job like this, make sure that you put your money where your mouth is.  The world's oldest profession was not brought about by women doing something that was easy or that they liked, it was because it is a male dominated world and women weren't allowed to partake in fields that were considered to be jobs that were done by men and once the man was taken out of the equation, they had no other options but to work the only way they were allowed to, off of the only thing that they had that was deemed to be of any value, their bodies.

ARCHITECTS, CLIENTS, THE WORLD:

HIRE A WOMAN (ARCHITECT) . 

PROMOTE A WOMAN (ARCHITECT)

REFER A WOMAN (ARCHITECT)

#WEAREHERE
Evelyn Lee, Mandy Freeland, Elizabeth Hernandez,
Lora Teagarden, Meghana Joshi, Me and Clair Marie Wholean

ARCHICAD
www.graphisoft.com
press@graphisoft.com
http://twitter.com/ARCHICAD

Thanks to Duncan Gilchrist, for the great demo (and for attending and being a sponsor of the AIA California Housing Forum this past March) and to the rest of the team at the booth Marianne Sims, Sarah Parillo, Julianna Gulden, and Mary Moscarello

Meet ARCHICAD 23 at A’19, AIA National Conference

Visit GRAPHISOFT at Booth 8530 for a live demo on the new capabilities of our BIM software and to see the latest developments in Virtual Reality and real-time rendering solutions for architecture.

BOSTON, June 3, 2019 – GRAPHISOFT®, the global leader in Building Information Modeling (BIM) solutions for architects, will demonstrate ARCHICAD 23 live at the 2019 Conference on Architecture scheduled for June 6-7 at the Las Vegas Convention Center, Las Vegas, NV.

ARCHICAD 23 reinforces its existing position as best in class Open BIM solutions with dramatic performance and user experience enhancements together with newly fortified ecosystem workflow connections (dRofus, Twinmotion, Unreal Engine and Solibri). The upcoming version of ARCHICAD helps architects work faster and more collaboratively on both Windows and Macintosh computers. GRAPHISOFT BIMx helps involve clients, owners and other stakeholders on the extended project team with unrivaled mobile BIM capabilities on iOS and Android devices.

“ARCHICAD continues to lead the industry in providing capabilities for architecture teams and services as a result of close collaboration with our customers,” explains Tracey Gatland, General Manager for GRAPHISOFT North America. “ARCHICAD 23 provides the most responsive software UI, as well as intelligent workflows for architects and engineers to coordinate building structures and building systems for clash avoidance.”

ARCHICAD 23 highlights include:

Accelerated Performance and User Experience - Raw performance optimization, streamlined workflows and reduced file sizes result in faster response times and no interruptions.

Grasshopper/Rhino bi-directional live connection - Extract ARCHICAD element surface data as a design reference; changes to the core design automatically updates all design details in Grasshopper.

Enhanced Solibri integration - The updated add-on automatically detects and sends the elements that are changed in the ARCHICAD model, for faster round-trip collaboration.

Re-engineered Columns and Beams - The brand-new Opening, Column and Beam tools increase speed, modeling accuracy and interoperability with engineering disciplines.

New mechanical void management - The new Opening Tool models and coordinates project design voids, recesses and niches as openings for easy scheduling, documentation and sharing.

ARCHICAD 23 puts the architect back in the driver’s seat, with the software responding to the way architects think and work.

Show Floor Presentation on the Benefits of Using Virtual Reality in Design

Architects who inspire us are building virtually with a single tool – one that allows them to express their creativity freely. GRAPHISOFT is proud to announce that Ken Adler, AIA, principal of Aspen, Colorado-based KA Designworks, and featured architect in By Design: Virtual Realities (Season 2, Episode 1), will present The Benefits of Using Virtual Reality in Design on Friday, June 7, from 2:00-3:00 PM (CE Theater Booth EX307).  Adler has creatively applied VR at his firm, helping them to thrive in a competitive market. His presentation explores advancements in VR that can benefit architects while they work and give clients a compelling immersive experience that helps share a complete understanding of the design. VR technology and ARCHICAD enable KA Designworks to explore many aspects in the design process, such as space, movement, materials, daylight management, interior layouts and finishes, and much more.

Join GRAPHISOFT at booth 8530 to learn more.  Visit bydesign.graphisoftus.com to learn how AEC professionals are pushing the boundaries of creativity, collaboration and productivity.

About GRAPHISOFT

GRAPHISOFT® ignited the BIM revolution in 1984 with ARCHICAD®, the industry-first BIM software for architecture.  GRAPHISOFT continues to lead the industry with innovative solutions such as its revolutionary BIMcloud®, the world’s first real-time BIM collaboration environment; and BIMx®, the world’s leading mobile app for lightweight access to BIM for non-professionals.  GRAPHISOFT is part of the Nemetschek Group. www.graphisoft.com