Hey everyone

My name is Karen and I am a graduate student, majoring in architecture, in Wentworth Institute of technology in Boston. I am doing research on buildering for my thesis and I am looking for builderers to talk to about the subject. Any information would be really helpful, I would just love to know what the practice is all about for you guys!

If you are interested in chatting with me, via person, phone, email, or anything please let me know. Also if you know anyone that might be willing to help me I would really appreciate if you would connect them with me 😀

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15 Responses

  1. Jayness Reply

    Well this is new.

    If we tell you what we want, will you build us a builder building?

    Although you’re free to conduct your research as you see fit, I think your best bet is to just ask specific questions here on the site and hope to get some responses. If it’s interesting enough I’ll awaken Ard from his deep slumber.

  2. Kiell Reply

    Welcome Karen. Welcome to the superniche. I’ll agree with Jayness here though it’s pretty easy to reach me via email – photos at kiell dot com. Probably best to post here. If you give us an idea of the focus of your research we can start suggesting some reading material. A few to get you started: LA Clmbs, Nightclimbers of Cambridge, and Alain Robert’s recent book.

    There’s not many folk who regards themselves as builderers. Very few people do it and those who partake regard themselves as climbers who very occasionally climb a building for a bit of fun. I barely know anyone here in London who does it, never mind Boston. 🙂

  3. Jayness Reply

    I pointed a couple of my climbing buddies in Boston towards this thread – however in the United States especially we tend to stay under the radar to avoid arrests so I don’t know if they’ll say anything.

    As for the owner of this site, he only checks up on it every couple of weeks so it may take him a while to get in touch with you. Any other generic advice I could offer I’m sure Kiell has already addressed.

  4. Kiell Reply

    Ages ago I said I’d write a post about what makes a decent buildering problem. I never actually got around to it so this probably seems as good a time as any.

    Ard has mentioned this previously elsewhere but I’ve no idea where. Or when. Essentially there are two types of builderer:

    1. FREE SOLOISTS
    There are the likes of Alain Robert who like to scale skyscrapers. The moves themselves are typically repetitive and relatively easy. You need to be able to handle a huge amount of exposure and have decent stamina. Some of the climbs become difficult (especially those that involve pinching) simply because of the repetition. Alain Robert has climbed several 8a (5.13b?) routes and probably harder. So if climbing a building is a very long series of 4+ moves, he’s not going to struggle. Yes, there’s risk but the dude is so fucking strong and in control that he’s as likely to slip whilst climbing as you are walking along a street. Yes, it’s possible, but it’s unlikely. It’s just that the implications of a slip are a lot more painful than simply stubbing your toe.

    These free soloists are few and far between. I can’t name another one. There’s a nutter in Ukraine/Russia (can’t remember which) whose vids have been posted on a few threads here. Sift around.

    Since 2001, the consequences are probably a little more serious so that’s something of a deterrent. Most free soloists prefer to climb rocks as it’s a lot more interesting, gives a greater connection with nature and ‘the zone’, and is less showy. Soloing is rarely about being showy as it tends to create the wrong headvibe. And you can’t hit your flowstate if you have the wrong headvibe going on. My god I sound like such a fucking hippy.

    2. THE REST OF US
    So then there’s the rest of us. I’m constantly on the look out for stuff that:
    – is publicly accessible
    I’m pretty lazy. I don’t want to hike.

    – is not gonna get me into trouble
    Breaking into places or sneaking around is just a pain. I work with kids so I need a clean criminal record.

    – is not crumbling apart
    On more than one occasion I’ve pulled chunks of wall out and come very close to seriously hurting myself. I’m grateful for some parkour training that’s kept me out of hospital. And a huge amount of luck. I kept a piece of wall for quite a while as it was a nice reminder of my own mortality and how close I came to carking it.

    – is high enough that it’s interesting
    I like highball stuff. There’s a series of stages when climbing without protection that makes things a bit spicier. Light injury, serious injury, probable death, certain death. Big climbs with easy moves race through all of these stages quite quickly and you’re soon onto ‘certain death’. For me, the best routes have the best moves during this process.

    – is low enough that a fall isn’t going to kill me
    I don’t like dying.

    – has varied, interesting movements
    Most buildings are pretty uniform so it’s really satisfying to find problems that have a range of moves.

    – has a top out
    ie. you climb onto the top of something as opposed to just reaching something and then climbing back down again. I see tons of problems (routes) that are possible and seem interesting but they don’t have a definitive end.

    – has an easy means of getting down. Ideally walking.
    Down climbing what you just came up means that the route was way too easy. Useful as a warm up but that’s about it.

    There are a handful of problems in London that tick all of these boxes. Most are at a housing estate in Vauxhall. Some are on the banks of the Thames where some of the bridges cross the river.

    LA Climbs is an amazing book. I met up and interviewed Alex Hartley (top bloke) a few years ago and never got around to doing anything with it. Shame cos he’s a really nice bloke.

    So, two camps – exposure nutcases and us. I guess the third camp is the urban explorers. These guys have to climb a fair bit but that’s not the focus so I’m not sure how challenging their climbing gets.

    Karen, I’m not sure how much use that is to you but hopefully it will be useful as an introduction. None of us really give much thought to widths of stuff and materials. Concrete is a firm favourite (groan) because it doesn’t crumble like brick and gives decent grip, I guess.

    I need to sleep. More soon.

  5. ardarvin Reply

    Bravo!!! Top post in quite some time. Karen, my email is ardarvin@gmail.com, and my skype is ardarvin. Add me as a contact, and email me a suggested time to talk. I’m mainly available wed-fri evenings, 6-9pm PST. Thanks for the interest 🙂

  7. Kiell Reply

    Quick favour to ask – I’d love it if we could keep a load of the information on this thread. I’ve exchanged a few emails with Karen but intend to publish all of my feedback here as I think it’s a useful repository of information and research for the future. 🙂

  8. ardarvin Reply

    Agreed Kiell. “One of these days I’ll have to combine all this knowledge into a Buildering 101 section.” – Ard, 2006. Imagine what this site could be with some effort! But yes, a buildering 101 section wouldn’t be all that hard. Just add a category for it, and filter the main menu item off the category. Let’s use this thread for now. I can start breaking the good stuff into categorized stories later.

    Some related stuff I’ve posted over the years:

    Brief history of Buildering: https://www.buildering.net/letters/outsidemag
    Industrial Rope and Equipment review: https://www.buildering.net/node/800
    How to survive a long fall: https://www.buildering.net/node/833
    Institute of Buildering Curriculum: https://www.buildering.net/letters/instituteofbuildering
    Shoes (ever a popular topic): https://www.buildering.net/node/414
    Afraid of being seen: https://www.buildering.net/node/939

  9. KarenDrifa Reply

    Hey everyone

    Thank you all SO MUCH for all this info, it’s greatly appreciated and very helpful. I have added Kiell and Ardarvin on skype. Hopefully we can chat soon, maybe Friday afternoon/night? I have a quick pinup today of the info that I have so far so your responses will definitely be super helpful!

    Thanks again 🙂
    Karen.

  13. KarenDrifa Reply

    Hey everyone

    I am beginning to think of my final project now and it’s going to be a some kind of inhabitable structure that would make for an interesting buildering adventure. If you guys get a sec would you mind shooting me a reply and tell me what would be your basic needs if the climb could go on for a few days?
    F.e. seating, beds, bathrooms, storage for equipment, water fountains, library, etc? Anything you would want or need?

  14. Kiell Reply

    I can’t really get my head around what this structure would be like if you wanted the climb to go on for a few days. Bouldering sessions only last a few hours and buildering is usually pretty similar. How quickly a climber would get bored with a structure would depend largely on how difficult the climbing is in relation to the problems on offer. How big is this structure going to be?

  15. ardarvin Reply

    Oooh, an El Cap of buildering. Even the tallest buildings in the world only take a couple hours to climb. But if we could imagine a building big enough and difficult enough to require aid climbing (vs. free climbing), then that could slow down the pace enough to require a multi-day ascent. In that case, check out the gear sections (there’s 3 of them) on: http://www.supertopo.com/a/How-To-Big-Wall-Climb-Table-of-Contents/a139n.html

    All the gear would be more of less directly transferable to a buildering aid-climb. Beyond that, a masseuse station every 20 floors would be nice. And some entertaining scenes within the building as we pass from floor to floor. I’ve never seen Macbeth.

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