Architecture | Peter Maddison's story

Peter Maddison reflects on being an architect and studying a Bachelor of Architectural Design at RMIT.

The dialogue is entirely in voiceover and uplifting music plays throughout.

Duration: 2:07 mins

[Visual] Peter at night, packing a surfboard in his car.

[Screen title] Unconventional

I’ve always been one to say yes to something, not knowing where it will go.

[Screen title] Experimental

There’s something that can be said for finding your own track and putting your own footprints in the sand, and those footprints are yours.

[Screen title] Peter Maddison, Bachelor of Architectural Design

Hi, I’m Peter Maddison of Madison Architects and I’m also known for another thing I do in the media called Grand Designs Australia.

[Screen title] Peter Maddison, Director, Maddison Architects, Host of Grand Designs Australia

[Visual] Peter Maddison looking through his car window, back at his architectural designed house with awe and pride.

To be even mildly successful at architecture, you have to give it everything and go an area that is not predictable.

I think you gotta plot your own course and stick by that course.

There’s going to be twists and turns that you have to adapt to and it’s your ability to take those turns and set your course that will stand by you in the long run.

[Visual] Driving through winding roads of the countryside, Peter stops and chats with a local farmer over the fence.

RMIT particularly has taught me about the value of collaborative learning. I do a lot of projects where I think it’s going to break me. Where I think that either I’ve bitten off too much in terms of the design intent or I’ve got into a technical area I don’t fully understand and I’m relying on other people to pull it together.

[Visual] Peter pulls out his surfboard from the car, puts on his wetsuit and looks out across the beach in front out him. He swims out into the water on the surfboard.

You know, being unconventional is almost the core of being an architect. It’s that trial and tribulation of experimentation which is going to test you as a person but more importantly put something out there physical in the environment that other people can judge.

And it’s that judgement, which as an architect, is the testing component of one’s success and sometimes the buzz that keeps you going.

It can take you to a place you can’t predict and at the end of the day that’s a real journey.

[Visual] Peter standing in front of his architecturally designed house looking unto it with a smile.

[Screen title] Be true to you

[Closing credits]
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