I am 9, maybe 10 years old. It’s the middle of winter in the yard of a high-rise group of concrete apartment buildings, somewhere in a western Ukrainian city. In this cold, snowy and windy yard, I have a vision. I’m going to build a snow fort.

The snow has been falling for days and days, and there is a solid couple of feet on the side of the yard, where the falling snow is allowed to just be, as opposed to the walkways and driveways, where it is attacked by snow shovels and sand.

My vision is clear in my mind. It’s going to be epic! I will be able to live in it if I want to. It is tall enough to hide behind and it has strategically placed windows. My plan is a little vague on construction details, but I know how thick the walls need to be to carry the structural loads.

And so, sometime after lunch, I get to work. I outline the perimeter, which will soon be covered by a layer of snow. I start forming the snow into clumps that I pack as hard as I can against the surface. Later in life, I learn the English word “wythe“ that means one row of masonry. I have… half a wythe. By this time, I am getting tired and cold. My fingers are numb.

My building project is a little harder than I thought, but no matter. I decide that the fort doesn’t have to go all around the perimeter. In fact, it will be better if the front, defensive half of the fort is accessed directly from the side, unencumbered by walls. This was never intended to be a living space, but a strategically placed retaining wall for throwing snowballs and sheltering from incoming attacks. It’s a fort, not a house.

I get going on the second wythe. This brings my structure up to a whopping 6 inches tall (side note: at this point, my only concept of “inch” is derived from the Danish story of Thumbelina, which in the Russian version, is called Duimovochka, or “Inchette.”)

It is hard work, and I toil away, alone, with short breaks, riding the anxiety-inducing elevator back to the safety of our 9th floor apartment, thawing my fingers and toes, and then running back down the stairs to build.

The edge of my snow masonry wall takes on an uneven, jagged shape and as the weather gets colder towards the evening, the snow is refusing to cooperate. It no longer wants to stick together and form the wall. My faith is beginning to crumble with it.

By dusk, my vision of the snow fort is lost. I will not be able to hide behind it or bask in the glory of an idea transformed into a built object. At not even 11 years old, I am a washed-up failure in all things that matter in life. The curtain falls.

I never return to the scene of my failed attempt at building the snow fort. Its ruins slowly disintegrate and become one with the rest of the snow, which keeps falling. I am glad when I can’t tell them apart from the rest of the yard.

I still see the design of the fort in my head. It exists in the snowed-in corner of my mind in icy clarity, undisturbed by the failed attempt at building or the relentless forces of nature and time. In my mind, it’s still a possibility.

Only many years later, I wonder why it did not occur to me to ask for help. Why I overestimated my own ability to such a degree and why this lack of awareness lead to a failure to execute the vision. I could have asked my parents for help, or better yet, try to sell the snow fort future to the kids in the yard. With 4 or 5 kids working together, I could have built something.

What’s the moral of the story?

What lesson learned?

When setting out to build a fort, first build a team of likeminded people and empower them with a common vision. You can’t do it alone.

And going even deeper, the lesson is that architecture, as much as it is a creative pursuit originating in the mind of an architect, - ultimately, architecture is a team sport. We need others in order to bring the vision to life. We need awareness of our own limitations and humility to open the big idea to others, to embrace the help in both design and construction. To share our creation and in the process, understand that it is not ours alone. The contributions from others are not any less valuable than those precious ideas we, as creators, come up with ourselves. Architecture can exist only when shared with others.

The resistance to sharing comes from two sources: hubris and the fear of criticism, which in reality, are two sides of the same coin. Our grand designs and big ideas are perfect in our minds. Beautiful concepts that will surely demonstrate our genius and make the world a better place. What if, when exposed to others too early, they turn out to be less than perfect? Or worse yet, the others take them apart and propose changes we don’t agree with? How dare they meddle with our creation?

Architecture schools perpetuate the lone genius method. Studio projects are individual assignments that may get an occasional sprinkling of instructor advice, but beyond that, are created in the vacuum of the aspiring architect’s mind. To make matters worse, the presentation of these projects to the public, or studio crit, often involves deliberately negative feedback from such public. The folklore of architecture education dictates that we, as architects, have to temper our ego in the burning furnace of criticism.

What comes out of this experiment, however, is an ego that is even more fragile and incapable of collaboration. What artist doesn’t, deep down, want to be the hero of the misunderstood genius story?

While the concrete apartments are not so easy on an eye, in the winter these type of ice and snow installations are built for the kids and for the adults. Thank you again to Pinterest for the images.

Back to the moral of my snow fort story, though. Architecture needs to be collaborative to exist. The moment an idea is formed in the mind of the creator, it needs to be shared with others, without fear of it dying under toxic criticism. In the environment of a well-working team, where the goals are shared and ideas are free to be born yet rigorously tested, we all have the best chance of seeing our vision come to life. Let’s be fearless with our ideas and gentle with each other.

And let’s build a snow fort!