MY DIGITAL JOURNEY - PART ONE

 

In 1987, I was seconded to the University of Zimbabwe to create a new course in the faculty of education. I devised an intensive one year course to upgrade secondary school building teachers to degree level. I had really been thrown in the deep end, but by staying up late every night, preparing for the next day, I was able to keep my head above water.

 

One thing that really helped was that I had my own computer. My dad had managed to pick up an Amstrad PCW 8512 In UK and bring it back to Zimbabwe. With this I could devise my own handouts at home ready for photocopying the next day.

The method was still basically the same. Devise the page layout on screen and print out the text. Add illustrations, either by drawing directly in the gaps, or by pasting ready-made images by hand.

 

I wasn't yet aware of Desk Top Publishing. At least it wasn't available for the home market. It would take another couple of years before I started to dabble in that world, with my first IBM compatible setup.

Here you see one drawing exercise, linked to a study of architectural styles in Harare centre, and one practical brickwork exercise. Oh for the days when my body had the flexibility and stamina to build something like this.

 

In 1989 I resumed my architecture career some 18 years after "dropping out". It's tricky to be a green "assistant" at the age of 40. People assume you have more experience than you really do. I knew lots about bricklaying and teaching. I had a keen interest in the history of building styles and technologies. But designing buildings, and thinking like an architect? Definite case of impostor syndrome there.

This was a little private job that the office passed on to me because there was no way they could make it pay, or wanted to assume liability. Leaky mess left behind by cowboy builders. I actually knew the client vaguely from my time in curriculum development. I don't know if my proposal was implemented, and I don't know if it worked.

I show it here as an example of my hand-drawing, builder-centric approach to rejoining the profession. I still had a computer at home and I wanted to keep writing building books, but time was limited. I played around with a primitive desk top publishing package. And eventually got my hands on a thing called TurboCad. But all the while, my day job for two years was spent standing at a manual drawing board. Parallel motion, adjustable set-square & Rotring pen on A1 sheets of tracing paper with pre-printed title blocks.

There was a physicality to this work that the digital desktop lacks. We had to scratch mistakes out with a razor blade. How magical the undo button seemed on first encounter. But gradually we were sucked into a virtual world, trapped in side a screen, one hand tethered to a mouse.

 

In 1990 I applied to return to university and complete my training as an architect. I had survived two years working at the drawing board, going to site meetings, writing up minutes. I almost got a scholarship to Australia, but that fell through. Luckily perhaps because Joburg was much closer, a 24 hour coach ride, including the border stop.

It was a non-standard admission. I prepared a portfolio/CV as an A4 booklet. This is quite normal today of course but something of a novelty at the time. The text was all computer generated but the illustrations were pasted in by hand.

 

I enjoyed the process of redrawing a selected group of projects, simplifying and abstracting to better highlight my design ideas. It gave me a chance to reflect on those two years of transition. Working in an architect's office, gradually distancing myself from the worlds of bricklaying and education that had been my rite of passage.

 

How did I imagine my future? It's hard to rewind the brain thirty three years. A young father with three wonderful children but a shaky marriage. Embarking on a new profession in a young African country, full of promise. Trying to fuse blues guitar with African rhythms and themes.

Life is a roller-coaster. Maybe that's the point