Just a few sketches of the tools I use:

Maruman SS2 sketch book. I have used this sketchbook for over 10 years. I love the creamy paper. Use it not only for sketches but as a scrapbook as well. 

For most of my sketches I start with the Staedler pencil, and retrace with an ink pen. The drawings here were made with a 03 UNI Pen which has water proof and fade proof pigment ink. It’s maybe a bit thin, but is pretty good for hatching as well. I like to keep my text in red using the same UNI 03 pen but then in red. The key to pens is how they feel on the paper.

Shadowing is done with a Warm Grey 2 Copic marker. I use Tombow highlight markers in blue, green and yellow for any colouring. Sporadicly I use other Copic marker colours for some additional colouring.

Other tools are post-it notes (generic ones, not 3M) a scale ruler (150mm, not 1500 as I wrote in the drawing), Tombow glue stick and a Staedler 502 pen sharpener.

Any creative person at the end of a project who looks at the result and tells us he/she is 100% satisfied with the result is a liar. No matter what, I believe that a creative project can never be finished, there is always something that could be changed, something that could be added, removed, painted, erased, enlarged, reduced… I’ve made a small book about this particular point in a project, called “moment of truth” (send me an email if you want to order a copy: sos [at] vanderarchitects [dot] com).

Even though I don’t think I’m a very particular person, I’m not that much detailed orientated, I even quite like it when things go slightly off. Andy Warhol has mentioned this kind of misunderstanding where someone by slightly misunderstanding his intentions creates a completely new direction. This happens often during construction meetings when the contractor misunderstands the intention of a drawings, detail of idea and thus creates this additional design layer in the process. That I like. No, it is not that I’m a person who is never satisfied, far from it.

In architecture the end result is obviously fixed, Wittgenstein might have moved the ceiling of his house 2 cm lower, but for most of us this is a luxury few can afford. I’ve never asked, but probably a writer has the same feeling after a book is printed. S/He might fret over and over on the main character’s opening sentence, but when holding the book in your hands it might be the cover or the font that conveys this feeling of loss. It is not the feeling of satisfaction one might expect after working hard to finish a project. No the feeling is a kind of anti-climax, a feeling of deep emptiness…

For me it sometimes is a chair that a client insist on putting in the space, or a painting, a doorknob, an umbrella stand, a plant. But I gave in, as after all it is not my space anymore. But it was mine for the last 6 or 8 months, this space, it floated in my mind, slowly forming to what it is now. Is that maybe the point? The moment of truth is a moment of loss. And the pain is pain of letting go?

Some thoughts on the process of architecture and being an architect:

On talent: not to be confused with success,
On professionalism: not a means to an end,
On motivation: self motivation, what else?
On the size of the company (I get asked this one a lot): size matters only when making love but size will not guarantee an orgasm,
On the choice of a democratic or autocratic process: there is no middle way,
On money: the ultimate art,
On competition: always deadly, whether too much or too little,
On the use of a concept: practice safe design, always use a concept,
On analogy as a source for inspiration: can be as deadly as sleeping with a rattle snake,
On beauty: architecture’s most worn-out crutch,
On integrity: do we need to choose between being a high class prostitute or a crack whore?
On effort: it always takes more,
On good or bad design: the thought itself will lead to the ugly.