The GSD was very good to me, although it didn’t feel that way at the beginning…
Welcome to FlashBack Friday, the monthly series of the path of an architect.
It’s 1986 and I’m graduating from Harvard University’s Graduate School of Design. After 8.5 years of Architecture school, 2 degrees and one minor, I finally have my professional education under my belt. The GSD was very good to me, although it didn’t feel that way at the beginning. Our first Architectural History class Professor Edward Sekler says to us students, “if you’re undergraduate taking this class the grade scale is A through E. If you’re a graduate student, A is pass, and B is fail.” There was an audible moan from the audience, mostly undergraduate students. This set the tone, I was off and running… and running with some very intelligent and gifted classmates.
Above, graduation in Harvard Yard. Every year they plant new grass in the spring and put up fences to no one walks on it. Really looks beautiful when it grows in, then there’s graduation and the whole place turns to mud, until next spring when they repeat the process.
All around great guy J. Barnes (in center) who, moving from Columbus, Ohio like me to Boston offered to help carry my stuff in a truck he rented, for a small fee to help cover costs, and did so delivering my stuff to my new apartment without complaint. Thanks JB who now has a very successful firm in Columbus (names abbreviated to avoid unwanted google tracks).
Good friend and classmate on the right, M. Davis, who help guide me to a nice neighborhood in Brooklyn. Owner of a very cool firm in NYC and also has an antique shop.
And finally me with my parents who drove up from Ohio for the big day. It was great to see some family after the long haul, but I made it with a whopping $5 in my pocket, no kidding. Here a smaller ceremony at the GSD (Graduate School of Design) behind Gund Hall.
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