ARC 592 Professional Practice I - Faux Firm Project

By Russell Baker

For ARC 592, the first of two Professional Practice courses offered at SIU for architecture and interior design students, we were required to create and present a faux (false, imitated, or simulated) firm in the fall 2010 semester. This project has been used by SIU for many years to successfully achieve the objectives of the course. The faux firm was a fun project that allowed students as teams, or individually, to research one of four types of architectural firms including: sole proprietorships, partnerships, professional corporations, and general corporations. The course consisted of both architecture majors and interior design majors, as well as graduate and undergraduate students, so the teams consisted of a diversity of knowledge and skill levels just as they would in a real firm. Individual and team research corresponded with course readings and lectures presented by Professor Swenson, who also met with us biweekly to address any questions or concerns regarding the project.


For the project we were instructed to create four 20"x20" presentation panels along with a visual digital presentation to market our firm and demonstrate the capabilities, functions, of our firm during and up to the end of the first year of 'faux' business.
Each group was to select four projects relative in scale and cost to the capabilities of the firm size selected, and then use these projects as marketing samples. The presentations also displayed things like: location, project types and sizes, firm specializations, project schedules, brochures, business cards, firm stationary, yellow page advertisements, posters, banners, organizational affiliations, business expense schedules and projections, employee salaries, contracts, fees, etc., etc. Also shown and described were firm layouts, floor plans, and spatial considerations, right down to furniture selection. Understandably in today's technological world, many of us chose to market our firm via a website on the internet (see attached picture). Each firm's goal was to try and "sell" their firm's services to the audience as if they were potential clients. As an audience member, it was each student's job to ask pertinent questions critique the firms and decided whether or not they would hire that firm after seeing it's marketing presentation.


Creating a pretend firm exposed many of us, myself included, to a lot of "other" things that firms do, for instance the business documentation and the financial and legal aspects of the job. Watching the other individual and group presentations at the end of the semester was an enjoyable and educational experience. As Professor Swenson said, this project also afforded us the opportunity to hone our acting and theatrical skills, which is one thing that distinguishes this project from other design presentations in college. One of the lessons I have learned from this project perhaps, is that every presentation should be approached and treated as if a real project was on the table instead of just a faux educational mock-up.