Few things created by mankind are more long-lasting than buildings. Years after a project is finished, we can proudly point to it and proclaim, “My company did that. And it still looks great.”
Such structures continue to exhibit the design elements and features that made it interesting upon its completion. A beautiful, well thought-out building will hold its own and continue to make its own design statement, no matter what else is added to its immediate surroundings.
And of all of the components that go into a building, it is the glass that adds esthetic beauty as well as functionality to it. Glass is not only the world’s access to the soul of a building or a decorative embellishment that makes it more striking. Glass gives the structure life!
It allows the outside in, while at the same time, allows those inside to still be connected to the outdoors. It is glass that brings in light. It’s hard to imagine anything more appreciated, more sought after, more demanded than natural light filling rooms inside a building. And it is glass that delivers that light.
On my first visit to the Giroux Glass L.A. location, before I was hired, I walked the hallway that separates all of the project managers’ offices. Glass walls lined the walkway. Clearly visible were project photos, artist renderings, and architectural drawings of current and past projects. I saw spiral glass staircases, amazing curtain walls, and extraordinary high-end residences typically only seen in high-design magazines.
Until this point, my professional experiences were in the fields of technology and office products. I was all about consumer goods, packaging, consumer trends, and following fashion and design trends — products that were fast-changing, or seasonal, with finite, predicted lifespans. From the moment the ink is dry on the package of some new consumer gadget, the product it contains is already outdated. There is a replacement product out there, one that is newer, faster, and full of more “bling” –- whether from a competitor or the original manufacturer. The product is old news, forlorn, a discounted item on a low retail shelf.
For a marketing person, that sucks. There is no basking in the after-glow, no riding on product feature laurels, it’s just a short hop onto the ride of a long product curve that never stops morphing. I wasn’t sorry to leave that part of my past work behind. Despite the fact that working in construction was about as opposite as anything could be to anything I had ever done, my life was about to change.
I thought about the structural components of a building. I considered the beauty that glass brings to a construction project. A building’s glass is not just the world’s access to the soul of a building, or the decorative embellishment that makes it more striking – it’s what gives it life. It allows the outside in, enables its occupants to still be a part of the outdoors, it brings in light. It’s hard to imagine any one feature more appreciated, more sought-after, more demanded – than for rooms to have light. And it’s glass that delivers that light.
After that first Giroux visit, I was sold. I wanted in on this. I wanted to contribute in some way to make these projects happen, and to share them with the world. I wanted others to see and feel what I get to see and feel at work or at a job site each and every day.
This is why I love my job and working in this industry.
Barbara Kotsos has been Director of Marketing and Public Relations at Giroux Glass since February 2014. She especially enjoys merging her marketing expertise with her passion for design and architecture. She invites your thoughts, which may be emailed directly to her at [email protected].