Where Do You Start?

A student in a recent course asked a really good question. To
paraphrase, "When you begin a new design, where do you start?"

For me, and I think for many experienced designers, it's not a linear
thing. A lot of ideas, impulses and strategies occur simultaneously.
But what if they don't? Where, then, do you begin? And how do you teach
someone else where he/she should begin?

Next time you hit a dead end, try this. Find all the lines inherent
in the architecture: doors, windows, corners. Extend them with thin
lines into the landscape creating a Mondrianesque grid. Now see if
you can work within that framework. If you have important views from/
through the house, the place for a focal point will be shouting at you.

Any lines you place on the ground plane that relate to the grid will
automatically relate to the architecture. Then work from there.

Okay, it's pretty basic, but it's a start. Compare it to learning to
write. Remember the outline with Roman numeral I at the top? The grid
strategy is taking the design process down to its very basics. It's
not the end though. If you don't develop that outline into a cohesive
piece, with introduction, three examples and a conclusion, you most
certainly won't get that "A."

So, where do I start? It depends on how quickly something comes to
me. However, the end result can be deconstructed to find Roman
numeral I. That is, even if it doesn't start with an outline
or a grid, the end result still contains the structure I would have
had it begun that way. Make sense?

I welcome your comments.