Ça plane pour moi...

Last week I had the chance to meet with a very distinguished and formidible teacher at FIDM, Yves Ghiaï. This was a special meeting--and my first with him--because due to scheduling, I never had the chance to take a class with him. My (now former) program director helped arrange a meeting after one of his classes so he could take a look at my work, knowing he'd have a fresh eye and lots of constructive criticism to give. (Knowing how easily swayed I can be by others' opinions, the director also reminded me they were his opinions and that in the end I had to decide what I wanted to incorporate into my portfolio.)

He liked this opening layout for my retail project, a comic book store located in the Gastown district of Vancouver, B.C.:

Monsieur Ghiaï said this one layout had a good flow and hierarchy; I started with an inspirational image ("BOOM!") that set the tone of the project (thanks for the suggestion, Charles de Lisle) and then showed how, from sketches to final floor plan, it all came together.

He looked at my other projects (two residential, one other commercial) and noticed that none of them followed a pattern, and that each one looked a little haphazard because of it. So going with this inspiration-sketches-final product "formula," I took a crack at reorganizing the layout for Boomerang, my hotel project. Here's the "before" opening spread:

And here's the "after" spread, using the idea of chronological flow:

I like it. I admit, it may not work precisely on all of my projects (as is, I had to lose one of my lobby elevations for this hotel project) but I've come to realize this portfolio is an ever-evolving piece.

Sometimes it feels like it'll never be done...sigh.

Thoughts? Comments?