Recently I was an invited critic at an architectural school. I remember crit days vividly from my own education – the fear of pinning up work on the wall and presenting ideas you were emotionally invested in to peers and critics.

My hands would often shake slightly with nervousness as I pinned up, my heart beating so loudly that I was certain everyone could hear it. And I never quite managed to fully articulate all of my ideas – even when I was referring to notes.

It is one of those rites of passage all architects will bemoan – but be secretly glad we ‘survived’. However, my recent visit was to a school that sought to be constructive rather than destructive and the experience was useful, and never quite as bad as I feared it was going to be.

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