An Essay on Architecture School

That is Really Not at All About Architecture School

I’ve been circling around the idea of writing about architecture school for years. The creatively intense, demanding, and close knit setting is ripe for essays, short stories, a new Max series even. I’ve found though that over the years, when I think back to my time at Cornell, a lot of memories are tough. I wanted to write something to ultimately decide – was architecture school good or bad? What did it do for me? Was it worth it? I finally started writing earlier this year and quickly realized that the essay I’ve wanted to write about architecture school is actually not at all about architecture school. It’s about being sick.

Those five years of school were a really hard time for me – and I say this as someone who got A+’s in studio, had multiple internships abroad, and graduated with a job and a thesis prize. Not all five years were the same kind of hard, but looking back I see that the biggest reason it was so arduous was because I suffered from a chronic illness that I did not understand, could not figure out, and that some may have noticed, but no one, except my family and boyfriends, really knew about. What I suffered from was bad flare ups of dishydrotic eczema that started at the end of my second year of school, 2010, and lasted through 2023, when I was in my thirties.

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Let’s go back a little bit, to the summer before college, to set the stage for what would ultimately happen with my body. I was really looking forward to the fantasy of college, my epic years of freedom and fun – I now know that the people that publicize college to be this way probably didn’t go to architecture school. But the month before school started, I got my wisdom teeth out. The medicine during recovery made me sick to my stomach, which caused complications. As a result, I was on a liquid diet for almost a month before architecture school. I never weighed myself then, not wanting to get attached to numbers, but I was probably 15lbs under my healthy weight.

In my first year of architecture school, I gained something like thirty pounds, maybe even more. I ate to numb the stress of studio and to keep myself going during late nights, gained all of my weight back, and then some. I felt awful for most of my first year – severely sleep deprived, anxious, and foggy from constantly eating.

*

I was home for the summer between freshman and sophomore year, and got better. I lost most of the weight and felt renewed coming back for my second year. When I did come back, I started dating an architecture Master’s student, and looked forward to going to classes with him, even to the famously difficult and early structures classes. Things were looking up.

*

My body decided to make things interesting early that fall. I remember being in studio the night before a mid-term review – it was about to be midnight, which was when our college’s cafe, the Green Dragon, would close for the night. All of us working late would run over for the coffee and snacks that would get us through a night of work. The year before, I had started drinking soy milk for the first time. At midnight that night at the Green Dragon, I got a soy hot chocolate to take back to studio, and drank it at my desk while hand-drafting.

All of the sudden, around 2am, I felt a stinging and itchy sensation on my lips. I looked in the mirror – my lips probably swelled to three or four times their size. Imagine really badly botched lip filler! I was weirded out, scared, and embarrassed. I walked over to my best friend, my hand over my mouth, and said, “Do you think you could come to the emergency room with me?”

“Oh my god, why?!” was of course her concerned reaction as she looked up from the chipboard model that she was gluing together.

“Because of THIS,” I said dramatically, moving my hand away and revealing my lips for extra effect. We both started to giggle but were ultimately horrified. “Let’s go,” she said, grabbing her bag. All of you who went to architecture school will understand that that’s a good friend – dropping everything at 2am the night before an important review to take me to the hospital.

*

At the hospital, we found out that the culprit was indeed soy, and that I was pretty allergic. What was weird was that the allergy hadn’t felt like it had built up – it came on suddenly and very severely, which was scary. What else could happen?

I started to avoid soy, and have ever since, but I knew that something in my system was fucked up ever since my first year of college and all that insane stress-eating and weight gain.

*

The rest of the fall semester that second year went relatively smoothly. I did well in my classes. I wasn’t stress-eating as much. I settled into my new relationship and had a lot of fun in it.

And then, late in the spring, I started to break out in rashes – on my face, arms and hands.

Maybe five months later, in the fall of my third year, it felt like my body exploded. I started to have insane eczema on the palms of my hands that wouldn’t go away.

Dyshidrotic eczema manifested on me in small, firm, and very itchy blisters on my palms. When I scratched them, the blisters would burst and weep fluid, which would lead to crusting. Sometimes my palms would be covered in many blisters by themselves, but sometimes those blisters would cluster in one big bubble that was unbearably itchy, and when I couldn’t resist any longer and scratched it (which did provide momentary relief – scratching deflamed my palms, made me breathe better, and numbed some anxiety), I essentially created a wound, which would sting and give me a lot of anxiety. Sometimes I had multiple of these blister clusters at the same time. I was very uncomfortable when they healed after scratching, and my skin was peeling constantly.

Essentially, my palms were always bothering me. Imagine having to make a model of your studio project, or drawing something beautiful in ink on mylar, when your palms are inflamed and feel like they’re on fire. It hurt to wash my hands, to shower, to wash dishes – all things that were absolutely necessary, and so I suffered through the discomfort. When my palms got really itchy, I would feel it in the rest of my body too – a persistent burning sensation in my chest and breathing canal, my heart racing. The anxiety was constant and unbearable, and no matter what else I was doing, I was always aware of and bothered by my hands.

*

This lasted all of my third year. I don’t know how I made it through. The summer after, I went home to Colorado for a month before flying to Brazil for my first internship with Rizoma Arquitectura, and in that month, my mom and I tried to figure out what was causing my eczema.

We went to a primary care physician, an allergist, a dermatologist, and you know what they all told us? That they (they being the medical profession at large) “don’t really know” what causes eczema – it could be food sensitivity or stress-related, or all of the above – but the best thing to do is to use a few different kinds of steroid creams. They prescribed one for my face for less frequent flare ups, and a stronger one for my hands. But the thing about steroid creams is that you can’t use them for more than two weeks because there can be serious side effects like skin thinning, withdrawal symptoms (so my eczema could get even worse), and internal health issues.

Looking back on this knowing what I now know, I want to say, “Shame on you,” to all the doctors that I saw because no one bothered to do tests to get to the bottom of what else might be happening with me (an allergy, a hormone imbalance, etc). They just pushed pharmaceutical products on me, to treat the symptom.

*

I thought that my third year would be the worst of it, and it seemed like things were getting better at home. When I was in Brazil, the eczema was bad, but still better than it was during school. My mom and I eventually figured it must’ve been a combination of food allergies and stress, and that was what I thought for a decade.

*

But then, a miracle happened! For the fall semester of my fourth year in architecture school, I did a semester in New York City that was optional in our curriculum. In the city, my hand eczema went away completely. I was eating very specific things in New York based on what was available for take out close to the studio. I was subletting from this super cool psychoanalyst on the Upper East Side who had a whole wall of books that I read. I managed my time in the studio pretty well and was sleeping better, and I figured the city was just good for me, which solidified that I had to be here after graduation.

Little did I know that my health was going to get so much worse.

*

After my summer in Brazil, and my fall in New York City, I was headed for a Spring semester in Rome. I was looking forward to traveling every weekend, eating pasta and pizza, enjoying aperitivo with my classmates. When I got to Rome however, my eczema went apeshit.

My hands were in terrible shape, and I had to go to my studio professor and show him and ask to be exempt from making physical models, because when I wasn’t in public, I was wearing cotton gloves, my hands slathered with Vaseline.

Eventually, things got so bad, I could barely get out of bed. I never had any energy, and I was embarrassed because of how my hands looked – that affected my behavior socially. It sucked – I was in one of the most culturally rich cities in the world, traveling all over Italy, and this layer of doom just hung over me the whole time. I was never present, never enjoying the moment for what it was. I was always itchy, anxious, and tired. I didn’t drink and I tried to avoid gluten – in Rome of all places – cooking myself sometimes just rice for meals.

Looking back on it, I’m sure I also suffered from depression that semester as well – the relationship that had started in my second year was on and off at this point, I wasn’t friends with many of my fellow architecture students, and I almost failed my studio course (I locked myself in my room, cotton gloves on, the week before final review and completely rethought my studio project, which thankfully led to a rave review and a passing grade).

Rome, Spring 2012. Always hiding my hands.

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Will you believe me when I say my health got even worse when I interned in Vienna that summer? The eczema was by then all over my body – in addition to my palms, I had very dry, red, scale patches all over my neck, arms, legs, and stomach. I was taking cold showers that were under ninety seconds to not irritate my skin further. I was wrapping my hands in whatever I could when I slept to absorb the oozing. I felt so bad for my boyfriend who I lived with that summer, and who watched me suffer and probably suffered in his own way alongside me. We broke up at the end of that summer. And this whole time, doctors just continued to prescribe me steroid creams.

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When I got back to Colorado for a month in the summer time before returning for my final year in architecture school, my mom and I really treated this again as a project. We went to another allergist who also said “we don’t know why this happens,” but prescribed me an oral antihistamine, and everything went away – my body was clear of red eczema patches, and my hands were doing better. The feeling of my body looking like it was supposed to after being so bad for so long was incredibly exciting and confidence boosting. I felt so attractive returning back to school, feeling like I could finally wear tank tops and use my hands. The hand eczema did come back that year but it was not nearly as bad. I had a pretty fantastic fifth year – I was in a new, fun relationship, I was taking classes with all of the professors I wanted, and I loved working on my thesis.

That was the weirdest thing about my symptoms – the intensity would fluctuate unpredictably – really bad one week, not so bad another week, almost gone the third. I attributed all of this to stress, and as I look back now, though stress wasn’t the cause, it was probably exacerbating things.

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I moved to New York after graduation and for the next nine years, my symptoms would fluctuate – they were never as bad as my third year of architecture school, or my spring and summer in Europe, but there were times when my hands were pretty bad. One time at an early job, I had to wear the white cotton gloves all day, so that I could have a lot of cream on to calm the itching. Of course everyone asked about it. There were a lot of Minnie Mouse references. My boss at the time, bless him, told me I should tell everyone I was a hand model and was just getting my hands ready for a shoot later that day.

Through these nine years, I was still thinking it was stress and food related, and new allergists and dermatologists continued to tell me that I should keep using steroid creams. My allergist did test me for all kinds of food and environmental allergens and I did find out I was extremely allergic to all kinds of pollen, lots of fruits, and hazelnuts (so stress-eating whole jars of Nutella during my freshman year of architecture school explains a lot) but ultimately I figured this was the hand I was dealt for life, and I should just learn to live with it and manage it. But again, the weirdest thing was, the eczema was never consistent. If things like alcohol or stress could make it worse, why did my hands all of the sudden get better after a night out with three cocktails? But another night out like that, and my hands were bad again?

*

I finally, finally got my answer, completely accidentally, in 2022. I had only met two people in my life who also experienced something similar on their hands. The first was a colleague at an architecture firm, who sent me to a nutritionist that she saw and that made her eczema go away. I did go to that nutritionist, and at one point I was gluten-, dairy-, and soy-free, but my symptoms did not improve.

And then, seven years later, I met the second person who changed my life. She was a massage therapist at a spa retreat I went to in San Diego, taking time off after a year of crazy travel and an intense schedule. I was at the spa for three nights, and one of the complementary treatments was a reflexology massage. After working on my feet, once she got to my hands, she exclaimed, “Oh, I had this! You need to get yourself tested for chemicals. I found out I was allergic to this one chemical, avoided it, and my eczema went away.”

I kick myself now that it took me a whole year after that encounter to get to my allergist to test for chemical allergies. I had told myself that my eczema was from food and stress for so long, and had accepted it at that point. But, after a bad bout of gastritis for the first time in my life in the summer of 2023, I remember thinking, “That’s it – I am doing every test imaginable because I will not let being chronically ill distract me from my life anymore.”

I got my chemical test done, where they put the patches on your back that you wear for three days. I found out that I was indeed pretty allergic to a few chemicals – decyl glucoside, cocamide DEA, methyldibromoglutaronitrile, and methylisothiazolinone/methylchloroisothiazolinone. Do you know what these chemicals are in? Hand soap. Dish soap. Shampoo. Everything that went on my fucking hands, over and over, daily. This explained so much. My hand eczema was caused by whatever I was washing my hands and dishes, and the intensity fluctuated so much based on which products I was using. Now I understood why it would start to get better at a boyfriend’s house for example, who used a certain kind of hand soap, and get worse at my apartment, when I used a different one.

I was incredulous. I just had no idea. I had no idea that we could be allergic to things that we interfaced with so often! And that companies, knowing that these chemicals are irritants, continue to put them in products. And, that not a single doctor had told me that I might be allergic to something my hands were coming in contact with.

At first, I was both relieved and panicked – my diet was already restricted, I had asthma and used inhalers when I ran, I can only use certain skin care products and lotions…and now this?! Checking every ingredient on a list and having to find all kinds of new self care products?

Thankfully, it didn’t take long to adjust. There’s a lot online about products without the ingredients I’m allergic to because, guess what, many are allergic to them and some of the chemicals – like the combination of methylisothiazolinone/methylchloroisothiazolinone – have been banned in Europe. What’s annoying is that the chemicals I’m allergic to can be called different things, but I have a pinned note in my notes app listing all of them and I pull it up every time I try a new product.

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In a crazy coincidence, after I wrote the first draft of this essay in January, I was pointed to Mel Robbins’ work which I mentioned in my previous newsletter. I had been listening to her podcast for a week or so when an episode dropped titled Why 80% of Autoimmune Diseases Happen to Women and Solutions from a Renowned MD – I listened to it all and this was the first time I realized that what happened to me is unfortunately so typical. In fact, it’s absolutely maddening. According to the episode, most women suffering from chronic illness go undiagnosed for seven to fourteen years. That’s me! Dyshidrotic eczema also apparently affects mostly women, between the ages of twenty and forty (I was exactly twenty when I started breaking out and finally found out the cause when I was almost thirty-three). Suffering as I had for twelve years – and very unnecessarily – when a simple suggestion for a simple test from an ethical doctor could have made me suffer for a year or less. I think that too many doctors these days treat symptoms, and don’t get to the bottom of the cause. I don’t know if that’s because of influence from pharmaceutical companies, or because they are slammed with trying to get in as many patients as possible, but shame on the doctors who just push drugs on people instead of treating them.

This brings me back to reflecting on architecture school. I’m sure I would have had a better time if I hadn’t been suffering through all this. My eczema was the worst when I was there, and I am disappointed that when I look back on some semesters, and especially my semester abroad in Rome, I only remember the layers of sadness, anxiety, and frustration. A few years ago, tired of being sad every time I thought about my time in Rome or architecture school, I made myself a list of all the things I loved about architecture school and I would go back to it regularly to remind myself, “See? It wasn’t all bad.”

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I do wonder though, if I hadn’t had the fog of chronic eczema, which exacerbated the stress of studio, would I have had more joy? More energy? More friends, more nights out? I think the answer is yes, and every time I think about this, I mourn the experience I wish I had. I think I had a little bit of a fantasy vision of college – so many people talk about college being the best time of their lives, spending a lot of it reading under trees and having fun with friends (these people definitely did not go to architecture school). I also remember seeing the girls in sororities out in college town in tiny party dresses, being young and having when, at the same time as I was returning home late and delirious from studio, and anxious from my eczema and covering it up as much as I could.

At the same time though, my time in architecture school did have so many unexpected positive consequences – I met so many fantastic international people, many of whom were my early interviews for Madame Architect. My thesis advisor recommended the firm where I first worked to me. Because of the people I met in my semester in Rome, I travelled to Guatemala for a dear friend’s wedding, helped my best friend pick out an engagement ring for his husband. Meeting another girlfriend I made in Rome led to many fun nights out and stories in New York, in which I myself finally wore those tiny party dresses.

I realized that architecture school was mixed, just like life is. Nowadays, I’ll have a good year, then a not so good one. School was just like this – the first year was just an insane adjustment, second year was a lot of fun. Third year I was really sick. Fourth year I was really sick for one semester, and completely fine and loving New York City the second. And finally, fifth year was wonderful, fun and productive. Those five years were full of ups and downs just like any five year period, and architecture school was altogether good and bad and stressful and productive and exhausting and creative.

What it ultimately was though is a beginning to my adult life in New York City, a life that I love and that I made. One of my favorite quotes ever is from Diana Vreeland, who says, “the best kind of life is the one you know that you want, and you make it yourself.” Cornell Architecture was tough, but a beginning to an incredible unfolding – and I’m glad I learned some big lessons early to take with me to build the life I had wanted to.

I learned not to let a health issue, or a relationship, remain in uncertainty for too long anymore. Sheela Sogaard talks about dedicating time to mission critical in her Madame Architect interview, and I have lived this lesson too. Nowadays, I like to approach things head on and be decisive about steps forward.

And, I’ve also learned to share. If the massage therapist hadn’t shared her experience with me, who knows how much longer I would be managing a chronic condition. This is why I needed to write about this, in case it’s helpful to any of you. I’m so relieved to write this essay because the issue is finally resolved and in the past. Sharing makes us all better.