Will Wong of Spacesmith: Five Things You Need To Create A Highly Successful Career As An Architect

Will Wong of Spacesmith: Five Things You Need To Create A Highly Successful Career As An Architect An Interview With Jason Hartman

Jason Hartman

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Jan 23 · 7 min read

Be open minded. Your architecture degree may lead you to a different career path. I have friends from architecture school that have leveraged their B. Arch into product design, lighting design, teaching careers, client reps, and of course, architectural design. You’re not beholden to the degree itself, it can be a gateway to other careers that are connected to architecture and design.

As

a part of my series about the ‘Five Things You Need To Know To Create A Highly Successful Career As An Architect’, I had the pleasure of interviewing Will Wong.

The architect WILLIAM WONG, AIA, LEED AP, better known as Will, is a principal at New York-based architecture and interior design firm Spacesmith. Will is a life-long New Yorker who is intrigued by the constant evolution of the city’s skyline and infrastructure. Will is a registered architect in the state of New York and enjoys traveling with his wife and son in his spare time. At work, Will is a leader in project management across the firm’s workplace, retail, academic, and nonprofit projects, for clients such as Li & Fung, Columbia University, and Abrams Books. He holds a Bachelor of Architecture from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.

Thank you so much for doing this with us! Can you tell us the “backstory” about what brought you to this particular career path?

m a native New Yorker, and that means I grew up in a city that’s constantly changing —

I’

there’s always something that’s being built or demolished. I wanted a career that was involved in shaping our built environment.

Having grown up surrounded by new construction, I’m very is interested in the

critical and complex process of building in a dense urban environment, and my awareness of designing projects is relatable to the human scale.

Can you share with our readers the most interesting or amusing story that occurred to you in your career so far? Can you share the lesson or take away you took out of that story?

One interesting story happened a few years ago, when I was doing a survey with consultants above a finished ceiling on a project. One consultant steps off the beam and falls through the tiled ceiling, landing onto the table below. Miraculously he only sprained an ankle. The takeaway here is — always be aware of your surroundings when on a job site!

Do you have a favorite “life lesson quote”? Can you share a story or example of how that was relevant to you in your life?

Life lesson — the squeaky wheel gets the grease. If you don’t speak up or speak out, or be your own advocate, nothing will change. If I didn’t ask for more responsibilities, or to join a project team, I would not have advanced at my various firms.

Are you working on any exciting new projects now? How do you think that will help people?

Yes — we are currently working on several projects, with varying degrees of excitement.

One is a new retail store, with an international client and consultant team. It features a very unique staircase, that is post-tensioned, and hopefully can be a project that people reference in the years to come. Our firm has worked with a number of international retail and luxury brands, which is very exciting and requires global coordination with overseas clients and teammates.

What do you think makes your company stand out? Can you share a story?

Spacesmith is a great company, that has a diverse body of work. We have work on projects of all types, all scales and all around the globe. Some days I’ll work on millwork details, and other days it’ll be on a feasibility study for an entire building.

For one client, Columbia University, we used ideas from workplace design and universal design, or accessibility, to address student needs and learning differences. Spacesmith converted a former chemistry library into much-needed classroom space in a historic building, Chandler Hall. The 6,500-square-foot project also included renovating space on the floor below to relocate private and shared offices effected by the renovation. Our team developed a flexible design that speaks to the new demands of the modern-day classroom: proper acoustics for verbal presentations, technical capabilities to support digital presentations and teleconferencing, and spaces that can adapt to every students needs and allows for collaboration.

None of us are able to achieve success without some help along the way. Is there a particular person who you are grateful towards who helped get you to where you are? Can you share a story about that?

Yes, you are so right. I was steered into the architecture profession by an influential drafting teacher in high school. We learned how to draft and draw letters, a skill called lettering, by hand. We also learned how to sharpen our mechanical drafting pencils with a true point sharpener, use a parallel edge, all of which makes us better drafters in CAD today, where everything is done by computer.

You are a successful business leader. Which three character traits do you think were most instrumental to your success? Can you please share a story or example for each?

Asking questions, maintaining your composure, and taking responsibility: Those are the traits that I believe help me (and many others) the most. We interface with a lot of talented coworkers and consultants, each of whom brings a different set of skills and base of knowledge to the project. I always enjoy picking their brains and trying to learn more about their profession because it’ll help me be a better architect. Because I’ve learned from engineers that sprinkler heads need to be a certain distance apart, I can work with the engineer to design and layout the ceiling where lights, and sprinkler heads are aligned and coordinated, instead of haphazardly located.

Ok. Thank you for all that. Let’s now jump to the main core of our interview. Can you share 3 things that most excite you about architecture and the Real Estate industry in general? If you can please share a story or example.

First is the opportunity to get internships while students are still in architecture school.

Second is how architecture degrees can lead young professionals to many different career paths.

Third is the emphasis on mentoring, and the opportunity to be mentored and to become a mentor.

I’ve got examples for these in the question on “five things” you asked below.

Can you share 3 things that most concern you about the industry? If you had the ability to implement 3 ways to reform or improve the industry, what would you suggest? Please share stories or examples if possible.

I am concerned about the need for better education/training. Not every university prepares architectural school graduates for the working world. I’ve interviewed plenty of potential job candidates who have great rendering or Photoshop skills but cannot work well in a team environment.

I’m also concerned about the burnout and wellness of our colleagues. There are firms where the expectation is that we work nights or weekends constantly. (This is not the case at Spacesmith, but at other larger firms.)

I’m concerned that we aren’t doing as much as we can to combat climate change and design sustainably. We are working on new projects that take on great challenges to be more sustainable and reduce embodied carbon and carbon emissions, but these often face challenges from the client groups or the engineers they engage. It’s really a struggle to push to achieve the goals we believe in.

Ok, here is the main question of our interview. Can you please share with our readers the “Five Things You Need To Know To Create A Highly Successful Career As An Architect?” If you can, please give a story or an example for each?

1. Get an internship(s) while you’re in architecture school. This is so the architecture student gets a sense of what it will be like, working in a real-world environment. They can see the constant coordination we do, or how to address concerned clients, or how to follow up and get payment.

2. Develop good habits of logging your intern hours consistently. I found myself losing out on months of intern time because I didn’t report my training hours on time. There is a specific window fo time that you have to report them, after which you have lost the opportunity. By staying current on your intern hours, you avoid having to go ask previous employers to sign off, in the event you had switched firms.

3. Work for a few different sized firms at the beginning of your career. I’ve worked for small 4 person firms, mid sized firms and a large national firm.. Do you have to be involved in everything at a smaller firm? Or do you want to focus on a specific role at a larger firm? By gaining experience at all types/sizes, you will see what you like to do best.

4. Be open minded. Your architecture degree may lead you to a different career path. I have friends from architecture school that have leveraged their B. Arch into product design, lighting design, teaching careers, client reps, and of course, architectural design.

You’re not beholden to the degree itself, it can be a gateway to other careers that are connected to architecture and design.

5. Find a mentor, become a mentor. I’ve been fortunate to have worked with plenty of talented colleagues, who’ve given me great guidance everything — both professionally as well as out of the office. Because of the support and help I’ve received, I always enjoyed helping out the next generation of architects.

Because of your position, you are a person of enormous influence. If you could inspire a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the greatest amount of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can trigger. :-) I would like to encourage more people to understand and design sustainably, to understand how and where our building materials or finish materials come from, so we can still achieve great design while protecting our planet

How can our readers further follow your work online?

Check out Spacesmith.com and our social media for the latest!

(We are also covered in the news a lot. Here is one recent story: https://www.workdesign.com/2021/11/spacesmith-creates-a-new-hq-for-nonprofitlegal-provider-nylag/ ) Thank you for your time, and your excellent insights! We wish you continued success.