When an architect draws a house, he thinks about ...

When an architect draws a house, he thinks about:

1. How many cars do we want to have in the car porch.
2. Where do we put the bins?
3. Where do we put the postbox?
4. What kind of spaces that is suitable in front of the cars. Living room with windows is certainly not ideal.
5. How do we enter a house? When we open the front door, do we face directly to an open living room or an entrance lobby to address us?
6. Where is the best position to put the powder room (toilet for guests)? It obviously can't be facing the living room. And when we open the door to it, what do we see? Is it a nice basin with a mirror or a toilet bowl? Do we have windows to bring light in so that it won't be dark when we are in the toilet?
7. How do we separate the public living room with the more private spaces like kitchen, dining, maid's room (if we have one), and utilities (laundry)? Is it just walls or a space that blurs the distinction between the two?
8. How to organise the dry kitchen? How many spaces do we need to put the fridge, oven, microwave, pantry, stove, sink, table top, cabinet, etc? Do we have enough space so that at least two people can work together in the kitchen? If so, the minimum width for clear floor spaces should be 1200mm. 
9. How do we enter the wet kitchen from the dry kitchen? 
10. How many people do we want to sit in the dining table? The total width of the table, plus chairs, plus some space to allow people to push out chairs to get up must be at least 3000mm.
11. How is the living room? Where is the TV? Is there any window? If yes, what do we see outside the window?
12. Where is the bedroom and toilets/bath? In Malay culture, we don't orient the toilet bowl towards the qiblat. In Chinese culture, toilets should not be on top of an entrance downstairs. Sometimes culture plays some role in decision making.
13. Stairs, where do we position them? When we go up, how do enter a bedroom? Through a corridor or a space (like another living room for family, or a library, or an AV room? To end up with a corridor will waste our money because it is only used to walk. To end up with a space is worthy because the space can be used for something else besides circulation.
14. Floor, what kind of material do we want. Door, do we want full height? Windows, are they better of full height and opens up towards a balcony.
15. Sofa set, it comes in 1, 2 and 3 units. How do we lay them out in a living room. The distance between the edge of a sofa and the table should at least be 750mm to allow people to walk through. 
16. What is the thickness of a wall? A brick wall is 115 mm. When we draw, we need to also consider the thickness of the plaster covering the brick wall. Overall would be around 150mm. 
17. The bed. King size is 2x1.8m. Queen size is 2x1.5m. The width for a person to walk around the bed is 750mm. TV should not be too far away from the bed because it won't be comfortable for us to lie down and watch tv from a distance too far away. Unless we have a cinema.
18. The door to a bath in a bedroom should be facing the bed. Think about in the middle of the night, mum is just about to sleep, dad goes to toilet and turns on the light, mum will not be comfortable.  

This, plus many other considerations took me LOTS of time. Ended up doing 3 hours of overtime this Saturday morning. Plus lots more hours doing work at home. And presentation is on Monday morning!

If someone thinks that the only job of an architect is just to draw, they are right. We just have to draw. But in the drawing process, there are so many thinks to think about. And these are just the thoughts for one single house.There are still shopping malls, offices, markets, library, schools, commercial complex, stadium, and so much more.

And being someone who is also active in da'wah, the time management becomes super crucial. Because of that, du'as like this becomes a daily recitation:

يا حي يا قيوم برحمتك استغث اصلح لي شأني كله ولا تكلني الى نفسي طرفة عين

(Ya Hayyu Ya Qayyum Birahmatika Astaghith Aslihli Sya’nii Kullahu wa la takkilni ila nafsi tor fataain)

Wahai Yang Maha Hidup, Wahai Yang Maha Berdiri Sendiri
Dengan rahmatMu aku memohon pertolongan
Perbaikilah untukku urusan semuanya
Dan janganlah Engkau serahkan aku kepada diriku sendiri
Walau sekelip mata