A Farewell to Facebook

In light of recent security issues with Facebook we have decided to discontinue our Facebook pages, business and personal.  While this is not the only reason it’s the one that pushes us to take the action.

While Facebook has been a nice forum to post in-progress things one wouldn’t normally post on a website: live videos, in-progress sketches, and light-hearted outlooks; the results and ROI (return on investment) have not been worth it.  We’ve had this page since 2008 and in that time we’ve received five leads for projects, one that turned into a prospective client meeting but not a project.  Facebook seems to be more suited for B2C (business to consumer) sales than the B2B (Business to Business) leads more typical of an architect’s lead base.

We’ve had the best results from LinkedIn having met a couple of contractors through LinkedIn which HAS materialized into projects.  Google Plus doesn’t seem to have taken off like Facebook but at least they are not making the news for security breaches – yet.

We thank all of you who have followed us on this platform.  We made it up to 487 followers at one time and we hope we have shared with you some insights on architecture you may not have seen from other sources. 

We encourage anyone who would like to connect with me to do so on LinkedIn or Google Plus where we share the same posts. 

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/timothyberneche/

Google Plus: https://plus.google.com/u/0/b/107928473258237916970/107928473258237916970

Best wishes to everyone. 

Tim Berneche

www.Berneche2.com

Celebrating our twelfth anniversary of our business.  

We've come a ways since February 6, 2006!

March 2017 Edition of Outside The Box

January 2017 Edition of Outside The Box

December 2016 Newsletter - Inaugural Edition of Outside The Box

Welcome to the new Berneche2 Monthly Newsletter!

If you would like a copy mailed to you inquire at Berneche2@gmail.com.  

Enjoy!

If you would like one of the above guides click below:

What an Architect Does and How You Benefit

How to Prepare for your Design Project

21st Century Drafting Dots for Trash or Bumwad

This post is for the fellow architects and designers primarily, those of us who still know how to break out a roll of "trash" and sketch up some concepts anyway.

Trash is the term we used at Ball State for tracing paper rolls.  It is a great tool for quickly sketching over a plan or drawing to quickly sketch and develop concepts.  Other common terms are bumwad, and onion skin.  It comes in white and yellow and while the yellow looks really cool I use white as I often scan these into PDFs.

For the schematic design phase of work to existing structures, I will plot a set of the as-built drawings in red (in most cases we have to field measure and create our own) and then trace over them with a black felt tip.  Then when I scan all can see the contrast between new and existing.

To hold the trace/trash in place, traditional methods are to use drafting tape, which is a lighter stick masking tape.  Cellophane tape with the end folder over to create a removable end works okay as well.  A product called Drafting Dots was more popular for holding down drawing sheets in the days of hand drafting, and I had a box of leftover ones I tried for a while to hold down tracings.  The adhesive on them was pretty intense and damaging when removed.

My accountant uses "sign here" Scotch Flags on tax forms.  I started saving them thinking I might reuse them for documents I send to others, but it eventually occurred to me that these would be perfect for holding small drawings down, and particularly the trace that goes them.  It has just enough adhesive on them to keep them in place, yet not too much to tear off any of the paper.  They also sell plain unmarked ones which I typically use.  They are available at most office supply stores.

A Warped Sense of Humor

So we are architect of record for a restaurant project called “Double Gallows” in the Humboldt Park neighborhood of Chicago.  It is a small neighborhood bar type establishment, and we inherited the project from another architect to help the client get a building permit.

The interior will be an exposed structure ceiling common in many restaurants nowadays.  There is a small vestibule at the front entrance and the interior designer wanted the tile to come up to eight feet but was uncertain how to terminate it.  It was discussed to put in a drywall ceiling but we would have to rework a mechanical duct to work with the new ceiling. 

So I thought of the name – Double Gallows.  Just how far might the client want to take this concept?  I decided to find out.  I proposed to the interior designer that we put wood trim at the top of the tile, raise the height enough and have a couple of faux trap doors with hinges on either side of the opening.  Then hang two nooses from the underside of the roof deck.  

Voila…double gallows!   Okay, so they didn’t want to take the theme THAT far.

But the interior designer thought it might be cool to do the trim and drape string ropes across the underside of the roof deck to allude to the ropes.  Showing that being a smart arse can lead to unusual but creative solutions.  It also shows that enjoying The Far Side and Calvin and Hobbes wasn't for naught.