DESIGN & ME:

Design is a process of research, skill development, and collaboration.  Each action bears equally on the successful result.

Research requires listening, as I learned in high school while documenting local Spanish dialectics in the Dominican Republic.  The lesson came home to me again in Barcelona during college, as I struggled to decipher linguistic and design nuances while interning for a local architectural firm. In my work as a composer and music producer, I spend hours rearranging digital sequences and searching through old album tracks for just the right sample. And as a designer, so much depends on understanding the parameters of the project, from the means to the end, and all steps in between.  Listening is learning.  It’s the first step in engaging the world.  Aristotle first learned Plato’s philosophy before developing his own.

Skill development requires immersion and practice. In fifth grade I taught myself the guitar; now I play lead for a successful local band. In middle school, I immersed myself in Spanish in the DR for two months and became fluent.  My job as an audio engineer for the Smithsonian Folklife Festival followed several summers learning the rope as an intern in a recording studio.  In college, I worked with different software  — AutoCAD,  MicroStation, Rhinoceros, SketchUp,  Adobe Creative Suite, and Grasshopper – and learned these through practice, because formal instruction was not offered in the UVA School of Architecture.  Though my rendering skills will always be developing as new software becomes available, I have a solid foundation now on which to build with confidence.  I’m not afraid of work; it has taught me everything I know.  I’ve interned at a green-build consulting firm, at several small architectural firms both here and abroad, and for the City of Hyattsville, MD.

Collaboration involves passionate detachment; the ability to serve something greater than your own ideas. Through four years of teamwork at UVA, I learned that the best solutions arise from groups. Since college, opportunities to teach have provided further practice.  My experience as a UVA Teaching Assistant last year led to instructing the design component of a 12^th grade high school architecture class this year. Three years ago I began leading summer mural design workshops, a job that continues to teach me as much as I teach the local youth who attend.  The act of teaching has forced me to take ownership of my material, to turn it inside out and manipulate it so others can understand it.  Teaching has made me a better communicator, a better organizer, and a better project leader.

I am committed to bring an open mind, a desire to learn, a solid technical skill-set, and a strong work ethic to every challenge; the path to a well-designed life.