Do architects have to like laying bricks?

Some of us like the details. Bricklayers are not subhuman! You architect if you want, or manage which is what agentic <whatever> seems like to me, I'm sticking to coding until I can't any more (or get properly sick of it all, which is likely to come first given everything is getting both more and more remote and more drowned in AI and I want neither) then I'm doing something completely different because I don't want to manage (people or agents).

There is the level of understanding of the concept of a Quicksort function, how it works, when to use it.

And then there is the level of understanding gained of opening up an editor and trying to write a Quicksort function in Go or C++ or Python or whatever.

I wouldn't consider the latter to be "laying bricks".

No, but architects can’t just make the plans and never look at the output, there needs to be someone that checks that the work is done properly and fit to spec.

Careful, LEGO style bricks were initially a product intended for professional architects. =3

Do architects start as construction workers? It's a completely different career. That's my point. OP should have studied to be a manager