Life of an Architect
Education & Explainer
About
A gifted storyteller communicating the role and value of architecture to a new audience, host Bob Borson uses the experiences acquired over a 25-year career to inform his podcast. A small firm owner, architect, and college design instructor, co-host Andrew Hawkins brings his insight from his 20 years in various roles within the profession. It responds to the public curiosity and common misunderstanding about what architects do and how it is relevant to people’s lives, engaging a wide demographic of people in a meaningful way without requiring an understanding of the jargon or knowledge of the history of the profession. With a creative mix of humor and practicality, Borson’s stories are informative, engaging, and approachable, using first-person narratives and anecdotes that have introduced transparency into what it really means to be a practicing architect. To learn more about Bob, Andrew, and what life is like as an architect, please visit Lifeofanarchitect.com
Episodes
- Ep 201: The Middle of Middle Management
Middle management is not usually the part of a career anyone dreams about, which is probably fair since most dreams do not involve inheriting more responsibility while time and authority stand nearby pretending they were not invited. Still…
- Ep 200: Hate to Love You
Ep 200: Hate to Love You looks back at favorite episodes, hard lessons, great guests, and the conversations that made this podcast worth your time from day one.
- Episode 199: Conflict Resolution
Ep 199: Conflict Resolution explores how architects manage tension, stay useful under pressure, and move hard conversations toward better outcomes.
- Ep 198: The Creative Process
Ep 198: The Creative Process | Why creativity in architecture depends on process, judgment, and knowing which ideas are worth pursuing
- Episode 197: The Knowledge Gap
Ep197: The Knowledge Gap: As veteran architects retire, the profession risks losing hard-won knowledge, mentorship, and judgment no handbook can replace.
- Ep 196: Do Architects Retire
Ep 196: Do Architects Retire explores why architects work longer, what comes next, identity shifts, and how money choices that shape retirement options.
- Ep 195: Designing Your Own House
Designing Your Own House explores why architects hesitate to design their own homes: pressure, endless choices, ego vs livability, money, and what it reveals.
- Ep 194: Being Your Own Boss
Being your own boss isn’t about starting a firm. It’s about control, momentum, money, and owning the tradeoffs shaping your career long before you noticed.
- Ep 193: The Client Experience
Ep 193: The Client Experience, looks at why client relationships feel adversarial and why architects have more control than they think.
- Ep 192: Have a Plan
Have a Plan is a reflective conversation about why pausing to think matters and how intention can help you move off square one this year.
- Ep 191: Ask the Show Fall 2025
Architects ask the questions they actually want answered as Bob and Andrew dig into careers, practice, and the occasional absurdity.
- Ep 190: The Truth about Titles
The Truth about Titles explores why architectural titles matter, why they don’t, and how their meaning shifts over the course of a career.
- Ep 189: Holiday Gift Guide for Architects
Discover the ultimate Holiday Gift Guide for Architects – curated picks, tools, and books that every designer will actually want to unwrap this season.
- Ep 188: Changing Paths
At some point in every career, the path ahead stops looking like the one behind it. The work that once defined you begins to shift, not because it lost value but because you start to see yourself differently within it. For architects, that…
- Ep 187: Objects of Design
Architects explore the stories behind objects of design that remind us why design matters — revealing creativity, purpose, and meaning in everyday things.
- Ep 186: The Rules of Modernism
Every rule was made to be broken, except in architecture, where even the act of breaking rules seems to come with its own set of rules. Modernism promised liberation from the past, but it quickly wrote its own commandments into the story—f…
- Ep 185: Procrastination – Today’s Problem Tomorrow
It’s one thing to be busy and another to be productive – and most of us are far better at the first than the second. The reality is that architects live in a world of deadlines, meetings, and endless to-do lists, but somehow there’s always…
- Ep 184: The Architect as Brand
The Architect as Brand explores how personal reputation and firm identity collide, coexist, and shape modern architectural practice.
- Ep 183: Tips for being an Architect AND a Good Person
Architectural career tips meet life lessons in a conversation about balancing professional success with being a genuinely good person. This is Tips for being an Architect and a Good Person.
- Ep 182: How AI is Changing Architecture
Discover how AI tools are transforming architecture, from design and research to workflow efficiency, and shaping the future of practice.
- Ep 181: Attitude Reflects Leadership
How leadership behavior shapes culture, trust, and growth - why people mirror what leaders model, and how influence is built through everyday actions.
- Ep 180: Size Doesn’t Matter
The phrase “it’s just a small project” has probably caused more confusion, blown more budgets, and strained more relationships than we’d care to admit. It sounds harmless, maybe even charming - the architectural equivalent of a quick favor…
- Ep 179: Is Half the Story Enough?
Architectural influencers on social media can bring real insight to the table while others blur the line between experience and performance, you should evaluate what you’re seeing, questioning why it was shared, and learn how to tell the d…
- Ep 178: Under Pressure
What happens when architects face extreme pressure? Ep. 178 explores how stress reveals character, process, and priorities in practice.
- Ep 177: Hanging Out Your Shingle
There’s a moment in almost every architect’s career where the idea first surfaces—quietly at first, then louder over time: What if I started my own firm? Maybe it’s the itch for creative freedom, maybe it’s frustration with someone else’s…
- Ep 176: Little White Lies
We’ve all stared at the calendar, convinced there’s a hidden twenty-fifth hour—plenty of room to redline that section, nudge the model, and squeeze in just one more detail. “We’ll sort it during bidding,” we promise ourselves, and the opti…
- Ep 175: Stupid Questions
Nobody wants to be the person who asks a question that causes everyone else within ear shot to turn and look at them. We spend the early part of our careers trying to prove we deserve a seat at the table, hoping we sound competent, sharp,…
- EP 174: Dear Future Architects …
There are bits of advice that one collects over a 30 year career and when given the chance, some are worth passing on to those who care to listen. While this could have been a lessons from my father sort of episode, we decided to keep thin…
- Ep 173: Mentorship Matters
Mentorship turns confusion into clarity, builds confidence, and connects you with people who help you grow faster than you ever could alone.
- EP 172: A Week in the Life of an Architect
Most people have no idea what I do for a living, and to be honest, most of how I spend my time doesn’t look like the things I did when I was in college. Have things gone terribly wrong for me? What about Andrew? I’m pretty confident that h…
- Ep 171: The IQ of an Architect
Being an Architect is difficult and there is plenty of evidence that this is not a vocation that is suitable for everyone. The coursework you will take in college is all over the place – from the drawing and design classes to physics and u…
- Ep 170: Architecture School versus the Real World
There is a moment of realization that occurs when you get your first real job in an architectural office that maybe architecture school and what is now going to be expected from you are a little out of phase with one another. Are you prepa…
- Ep 169: Architecture Studio
The act of creating architecture is a fairly unique process and the manner in which you learn how to think both creatively and technically is a skill that requires certain training and nurturing to develop. When young and eager architects…
- Ep 168: Architectural Career – Is It Worth It
Building upon our last episode when we discussed the path we have taken to get where we are, how unpredictable and in some cases, how circuitous that path can take, what we didn’t really talk about was if the journey was what we wanted. It…
- Ep 167: How Did We Get Here?
It is the start of a New Year, everything still smells fresh and most things looking forward are theoretically in place for an amazing year … at least I think so. Since it is first podcast episode of 2025, today’s conversation is more of a…
- Ep 166: 2024 Yearapalooza
December 2024, and Andrew and I find ourselves in front of the microphone for the final time until 2025 – from my perspective a mere 28 days away. It is the annual state of the state address where we look back at all the interesting bits a…
- Ep 165: 10 Myths about Architects
We’re going to explore some of the most common myths about architects and peel back the layers to reveal what this profession is really about.
- Ep 164: Holiday Gift Guide for Architects
It’s almost that gift-giving time of the year and if you have an architect in your life, you know that getting them a gift is possibly among the most agonizing experiences possible – but that’s why we’re here. Now in its 15th consecutive y…
- Ep 163: Architectural Wanderlust
One of the most enjoyable activities is traveling on vacation – at least for most people, but it takes a special sort of individual who actually loves to plan the activities when it comes to traveling. I know I don’t love it, but I am also…
- EP 162: Objects of Design
Some things are cool – even if you don’t know it yet. Andrew and I have prepared some stories today about some things you are probably familiar with but probably don’t actually know the whole story. We have each selected two things and we…
- Ep 161: Wow Moments
It happens on every project – sometimes you know exactly what it is because you had a hand in bring it into existence. Other times, you might be visiting the work of another architect, or really, you could just be going to a nice restauran…
- Ep 160: Determining Value
Ep. 160 explores how architects define, communicate, and prove their value—to clients, collaborators, and themselves.
- Ep 159: Ask the Show Fall 2024
It is time for the second and last installment of the Life of an Architect “Ask the Show” episode for 2024. Once again, as is our practice we solicited questions to be submitted through our Instagram channels and selected as many as we tho…
- Ep 158: Architects and iPads
For architects, todays post is a analysis of why you want to use an iPad and what applications are worth your consideration and money.
- Ep 157: Project Constraints
You sit down at your desk, you turn your computer on, maybe you sharpen your pencils, you lay out your rolls of trace and your sharpie pens – whatever your creative process - and you are about to start work solving the problems at hand … B…
- Ep 156: Build a Better House
We are discussing residential projects that focus on incorporating high value building science techniques with guest Steven Baczek.
- Ep 155: Optimism
The vast majority of practicing architects view the time spent practicing their craft as a calling, but what happens when you don’t want to get out of bed? Today we discuss the role of "optimism" in architecture.
- Ep 154: Networking
Today we are tackling a topic that we have never covered before, not even a little. Imagine walking into a crowded room and not knowing who to talk to or what to say, a situation I have found myself uncomfortably in more times that my ther…
- Ep 153: Inspiration
Inspiration can come from many different sources - but can you actively seek it out when you are feeling like you are in a dry spell?
- Ep 152: Starting a New Job
When you are starting a new job, even you very first job, here are some tips that might make the transition a bit easier and potentially, more fruitful.