Aušra Česnauskytė
Outside of INSIDE - Portraits of alumni
For their self evaluation report in 2021, INSIDE conducted interviews with alumni who, in one way or another, represented the different positions on the bandwidth and generations of alumni. The interviews were conducted by the head of the department who also wrote their reports. These reports were submitted to the interviewees for approval after which they could add comments.
Aušra Česnauskytė grew up in Lithuania where she completed a bachelor of architecture at Vilnius Technical University. She experienced that education as extremely technical and describes it as: "technical-basic-render-presentation-based portfolio".
After graduation, she was able to work at architectural firms but she felt disconnected from the specific interpretation of the architectural profession she met within them. She wanted to find new ways to discover her personal position as a designer in the built environment, she wanted to experiment.
INSIDE was an excellent match for that ambition because of its availability of "digested knowledge of different spatial design approaches." She really appreciated the setup of the first year, with 3 different approaches to spatial design and meeting the professionals behind them. One studio a little more than the other, but nevertheless she still sees the value of confronting the three different design cultures. "If I had to organise all those experiences myself, it would have cost me a lot more time. At INSIDE, I was compactly offered it".
She certainly wouldn't change anything about that format, but she does see room for improvement in the workshops. She looks back with most pleasure on the workshops where practical skills were offered. She also experienced travel as an important program, not only because of the places she visited. But certainly also for traveling together and the positive effect that had on the sense of community between the students. But according to Aušra, it is always good to be open to change, "because the same good things of today might not stay good for a long time."
In 2020, Aušra graduated from INSIDE with a project that she is using to stimulate "The emergence of a new society in reply to overdesigned sterile city landscapes." In this project she initiated a new 'urban tribe' of what she called 'Hello everyone people', for which she designed an organisational structure as well as unique uniforms. One of the ways she presented the project in was a children's book. After her graduation she stayed in The Hague because she saw better possibilities there to survive financially and at the same time to stay in touch with her friends and network. For her income she works in a bakery, which she also sees as a research place. She likes to observe this specific environment and its users.
Despite her positive experiences during her studies, Aušra felt somewhat lost after graduation. She had found a good direction for her work and wanted to continue with her graduation project. She was eager to work with others on "strategy based urban design approaches" but discovered that for the 'real world' challenges she encountered, she lacked the knowledge and skills.
"During my studies, I had written a lot about my position, but those texts were often experimental and modest and, after the study, didn't seem to work for the applications I was doing with them. I felt knowledgeless about how to make those kinds of grant applications and project proposals and gathered people around me who had experience with that and incorporated their experiences into my descriptions." This led to the inevitable disappointment of rejections but Aušra also had success.
She is now working with another Lithuanian alumna of INSIDE on a project in Vilnius and London. "We were asked to write a proposal for the Architecture Fund in Lithuania. We merged some principles from our graduate projects and proposed a 'Future Walk': an urban event to read the future city through speculative scenarios while walking through the current city."
They chose 'neglected neighbourhoods' in Lithuania for these walks in order to make equality and potentialities visible to the participants of the walks. The project was embraced by the organisation and has already led to an online community where thoughts and observations are exchanged. Moreover, the organisation introduced the project at the London Architecture Festival where they will also organise a future walk. Aušra herself is modest about this positive development. She thinks she mainly owes it to the "scale" of Lithuania and the fact that the speculative approach in thinking about the built environment was still unknown there.
Aušra reiterates that she would have liked to have known more about life after the study during the study. She had no knowledge about the "dirty reality of professional life," no knowledge about the necessary time investment and dealing with disappointments. "So I lacked the mental preparation for professional post master life."
She advises INSIDE to get serious about that: "explain how things work by someone who has experience," she recommends, "that doesn't have to be much but make students aware of how you can build your carriers." And then not only the success stories, but especially the basics. During the conversation she names that as workshops in "future practice skills" that are best programmed after the thesis completion in the second half of the graduation year.
Despite this missed mental preparation, she feels that INSIDE has given her a great solid start for her professional life. But that start is still not stable. How long can she continue to combine working in the bakery with starting her own practice? Then again, stability may be a lot to ask for within a year of graduating. As a former 'lost architect', the programme has worked perfectly to find out what else is possible in spatial design. And lost architects are exactly the category of students she would recommend INSIDE to.
"If you already know what you want and you are mostly waiting for digested knowledge to be brought to you, this is not the right course. This course is for people who want to explore, to go wider rather than narrowing things down." And the current format of INSIDE makes that quite possible with a first year with lots of meetings with representatives of diverse design cultures and a second year with the opportunity to go in depth with your chosen approach. She would not name the summer between that first and second year as a vacation but as a necessary "time of productive relaxation."