How to create an architecture portfolio

For those that have not created an architecture portfolio before or who may be looking for some tips on how to improve their current one. The below 8 stages outline how to best prepare and create a new architectural portfolio:

01 -Choose your projects

You should aim to show only your best and most relevant work, and this may be tailored to the audience that will be viewing your portfolio, and/or be a selection of successful projects and experiences.

You are (and must) showcase your talent and so careful selection is key, the projects you choose should demonstrate your range of skills, diversity of experience and be available to present in a variety of media’s.

02 - Select appropriate drawings and images

As mentioned above, the range of media you choose to present your work is just as important as the drawings themselves, diversification is important in order to demonstrate your varying skills and talents.

When selecting your drawings and images, you should aim for quality not quantity, one well produced and presented drawing or image is much more powerful than 5 average examples.

If you choose to present hand drawings, then make sure that the scanner you use is of high quality. You can take your drawings to print shop if needs be, and have them scanned professionally.

03 - Choose a format

We mentioned here, that your portfolio should be focused on an A3 sheet size, as anything larger becomes too uncomfortable to carry and physically present, and anything smaller becomes too limiting.

A lot of practices and institutions will require you to firstly send either a sample or the full document via email before you get selected for an interview. An A3 document enables your work to be easily printed out to scale, or downsized to an A4 without too much trouble and detail being lost.

Slightly unfortunately, the easier you make it for the recipient to view your work the more likely they are to engage with it …it’s not always initially based on the quality of work.

04 - Create a portfolio template

Creating a template unifies your portfolio and creates consistency for the viewer, it also makes the whole arrangement process much easier and efficient, as you are effectively creating a concept for your portfolio.

The general arrangement is a personal choice, but be mindful to not over saturate your pages with information, less is more here, and quality over quantity!

In our opinion a simple white background is best, unless a particular project specifically calls for an alternative. But be mindful to not overbear your work.

Programs such as Photoshop and Illustrator can be used to edit and revise your drawings and images, and Adobe InDesign is without doubt the best desktop programme for organizing and producing documents such as these. (Links to these can be found at the end of this article).

Other web based programmes such as Behance, Issuu and Calaméo are also available, however as discussed below they can have severe limitations.

05 - Arrange in a visual format

The order in which you choose to arrange your portfolio in, should run chronologically and demonstrate each of your key skills.

Order and neatness are vitally important, and help to tell the story of your professional development and career to date.

This process does (and should) take time and therefore should not be rushed and left to the last minute. Ideally you want to produce several drafts, and then leave and come back to them, show your peers, ask for opinions and get feedback.