Hej, it is Raygo with you here today! It was extra special yesterday as it was Sweden’s National Day and quincentenary (500th anniversary). On this day 500 years ago, the people elected Gustav Vasa as the King of Sweden, who led Sweden to leave the Kalmar Union. Since 1983, Sweden has celebrated its National Day on this date, and it has become a public holiday since 2005. So let’s celebrate with Sweden!
As for today’s post, I want to make a throwback about my final review of this semester. For Architecture students, the final review is our final exam. It is the time for us to present the works we have been designing throughout the semester to a group of juries, usually architects, consultants, professors and other experts in the field. The products we usually show are not limited to drawings, diagrams, models, sculptures, audio, writings, videos or even movies to display our creative thoughts.
At KTH School of Architecture, we can choose from ten studios in our master programme. As for me, I have been working in the Housing Studio throughout this semester. Our studio looks into housing typologies in Sweden. It introduces different strategies to tackle various housing issues, the increasing rental prices and the shortage of affordable housing, to name but a few.
I found it very inspiring as the living conditions in Hong Kong and Stockholm are entirely different. After being here for almost a year, I found that the two cities have various similarities and differences, making it interesting to analyze and develop my proposed design, a timber high-rise in Uppsala, as a high-rise building is a common building typology in Hong Kong. In contrast, timber construction is widely adopted in Nordic countries such as Sweden.
The final review took place in the largest lecture room on the ground floor of the architecture building, and our tutor invited ten guests as our reviewers, who were presented on that day, to give us comments and feedback. The schedule was tight as there were 15 classmates, including me, to show our projects, which made each of us only have around 10 minutes for presentation followed by discussion.
It was a massive relief for me after receiving positive feedback from my reviewers and looking at the outcome after all the hard work I had paid throughout the semester. Marking the end of my first year of master’s study at KTH, this final review is undoubtedly one milestone of my architecture education and journey.
So that’s all for my sharing today! If you want to learn more about my studies during the semester, feel free to check out my previous post about our studio visit to Uppsala. Meanwhile, you may also start planning your day of arrival to KTH if you begin your study here in the coming fall. You may also find more information about that from Lorenzo’s recent post! I wish you all a great day ahead.
//Raygo