Talk Architecture

Send us Fan Mail Part 1 - Continuing the conversation on manual sketching in practice. Whatever you do in architecture school, you are preparing for a fast-paced industry where deadlines serve financial goals — and where sketching has quietly become an undervalued skill. What gets lost with it is the architect: the intuition, the authorship, the sense of a building made by someone rather than gene...

Send us Fan Mail Principals aren't encouraging young architects to sketch any more. What firms hire for is Revit proficiency; sketching has been demoted to a personal plus, useful to the graduate but not asked for by the organisation. So I put the question to a former student of mine, Aminuddin Zakaria — a design architect and BIM lead working on civic and institutional projects at Arkiskape...

Send us Fan Mail Remember the second-year student whose lecturers kept saying "I don't like your plan, change it"? They said: in second year we studied the masters, understood the philosophy of their buildings, and applied it to our projects — borrowing viewpoints. But we can't always borrow other people's viewpoints. Copy and paste design. So how do we build a strong foun...

Send us Fan Mail In this episode, host Naziaty addresses a second-year student’s setback after receiving harsh, unguided feedback—“I don’t like your plan. Please change”—that left him doubting the entire design process. The advice is clear: don’t take it personally, and instead turn the moment into dialogue by calmly asking the critic exactly what needs changing (circulation, entrance, overall sch...

Send us Fan Mail I used to think designing in school and designing in practice were two different worlds. In this episode I argue the opposite: schools of architecture need to teach the same design process students will use when things actually get built. The test case? The dreaded overnight scheme — your boss tells you at 5pm that a design goes to the client tomorrow morning. No time for preceden...

Send us Fan Mail The Design Process is Crucial to understand by tutors and students. Continuing the Q&A sparked by a listener's comments on my YouTube series, this episode tackles a question every student of architecture wrestles with: how much precedent analysis is enough before you start designing? My answer — designing is not a linear process. Analysis doesn't end when the scheme...

Send us Fan Mail Scrolling Threads, I came across a post by Mior Aizuddin Fahmi of Bunga Design Atelier, setting out a pyramid he'd been given by Kevin Mark Low: the project at the top, then subcontractor, main contractor, community, requirements and brief, consultants, architect — and the client at the very bottom. Put the client on top, and the whole thing collapses. Commenters pushed back...

Send us Fan Mail Malaysia is debating the repeal of the Universities and University Colleges Act 1971, and I want to go further: abolish AUKU, and abolish the MQA with it. Speaking as a former academic who felt the injustice of that Act first-hand, I don't see the equity in a law with the power to suspend students and force out staff — or the need for a qualifications agency layered on top of...

Send us Fan Mail Most buildings and workplaces are built around one narrow prototype of how a person should communicate, learn and behave — and that choice stops looking like a choice once it becomes the standard. Drawing on Eva Redford's research-based essay How Society Excludes Autistic People by Design , this episode traces how institutions turn neurological difference into disadvantage wi...

Send us Fan Mail In this episode, Naziaty shares deep concerns about the future of architecture education, drawing from the Substack article and recent discussions on AI literacy. They critique the International Union of Architects’ vision, which shifts schools away from foundational manual drafting, observation, and problem-finding toward AI prompt crafting, systems logic, and positioning student...

Send us Fan Mail In this episode, Naziaty unpacks the triangle that drives her accessibility startup: business, governance, and grassroots working together to fix what Malaysia's legislation still won't. We trace the gap at the heart of the problem — a toothless Persons with Disabilities Act 2008, a CRPD ratification that was never harmonized into domestic law, and a UBBL 34A that only g...

Send us Fan Mail A follow up from an earlier podcast but the real title is based on a blog post - "Designing for Every Citizen: What a Wheelchair, a Bus Ramp, and a Fence Taught Me About Malaysia’s Streets". It also explains that UBBL34A under the Streets, Drainage and Building Act with the MS1184:2014 is not enough to solve problems with the Built Environment.  In this episode, Naziaty...

Send us Fan Mail In this reflective “filler” episode of Talk Architecture, host Naziaty opens up about a personal contradiction: as a teenager scared of maths, yet fell in love with architecture — the technical details, the design work, the very things built on mathematics. Also the fascination with Christopher Alexander's concepts and theory. That tension becomes the starting point for a war...

Send us Fan Mail Host Naziaty, a disability activist from 1998 to 2024, opens this first episode by tracing the deep, two-way relationship between disability and architecture in the Malaysian context — a story that likely mirrors struggles in your own country. From streets unusable by wheelchair users to bus stop ramps that dangerously spill into traffic, shows how access is too often treated as a...

Send us Fan Mail In Part 3 and final episode of the Stop Spoon-Feeding Architecture Students series on the Talk Architecture Podcast, host Naziaty explores why many students and graduates remain trapped in their self-imposed comfort zones. Drawing from insights on unprocessed emotions and fear of failure or judgment, this episode examines how reluctance to make decisions leads tutors to default to...

Send us Fan Mail Are we creating architecture graduates who can’t think for themselves?  In this episode of Talk Architecture, host Naziaty explores the dangers of spoon-feeding in design studios — from ready-made notes and tutor suggestions to declining curiosity and weakened problem-solving skills. Drawing from Dr. Abijit Shatterji’s insights, we examine how convenience is quietly undermining th...

Send us Fan Mail In this episode of the Talk Architecture Podcast, we dive deep into a heartfelt reply to a 2nd-year architecture student asking what needs to change in architecture education. The core issue? Too many graduates lack confidence when entering the profession — a direct result of being spoon-fed throughout their studies. Instead of nurturing independent decision-making through studio...

Send us Fan Mail Host Naziaty Mohd Yaacob explores the growing overlap between traditional architectural practice and entrepreneurship in the current digital era. Solo practitioners now commonly deliver both typical architectural services and signature products—custom-built spaces with a distinct personal style. Stressing the value of deliberate constraints (financial, technical, and temporal) to...

Send us Fan Mail Continuing the exploration of Vitruvius's Venustas, Firmitas, Utilitas , host Naziaty turns to Utilitas — usually translated as function or commodity — and asks what it really means in the 21st century. Drawing on a RIBA article, Accessible Architecture: How Today's Inclusive Spaces Can Help Solve 200 Years of Accessible Design Challenges , we trace the long, uneven hist...

Send us Fan Mail In this follow-up to the introduction on How Architecture Students Study Business in School , host Naziaty digs into the three skills the original Threads question raised: running a firm, pricing a project, and negotiating a contract, where each one can be quietly built into the five years of architecture school — leadership and team dynamics through first-year group furniture bui...

Send us Fan Mail In this episode of Talk Architecture , host Naziaty tackles a question that's been making the rounds on Threads: should architecture schools teach business and financial literacy? After six years of study, many graduates step out into practice with no real sense of how to run a firm, price a project, or negotiate a contract — and the conversation online has struck a nerve. Na...

Send us Fan Mail The Timeless Principles of "Venustas, Firmitas, and Utilitas" (Vitruvius, 1st century BC) is one way to analyse any product, may it be craft or architecture, in terms of the quality and how good that design is. In the history of architectural theory, few ideas have proven as enduring as the Roman principles articulated by Vitruvius: Venustas (beauty or delight), Firmitas...

Send us Fan Mail Welcome back to the Talk Architecture Podcast . I’m your host, Naziaty. After a difficult hiatus since our last episode on March 28—marked by a bout of illness and the heartbreaking loss of my mother last month—I’m slowly returning to the mic with renewed purpose. Though my voice may sound a little rough today, I’m excited to share that the show is very much alive and moving forwa...

Send us Fan Mail Naziaty will discuss on the need to address the intersecting sections of the sets of "architecture practice", "architecture education" and "disability". This is an introduction to the gaps that needs to be addressed.  © 2026 Talk Architecture, Author: Naziaty Mohd Yaacob.  Support the show Do subscribe for premium content and special features which wi...

Send us Fan Mail Kevin Mark Low and Naziaty Mohd Yaacob both sees Malaysian architecture education as deeply flawed, producing graduates who are technically competent but philosophically and ethically underprepared. Discussion on these sub-topics / key points are found in this episode: 1. Systemic failures and "dumbing down" 2. Critique on formalism and form-first approaches 3. Need for...