Why are we in this situation in the first place? 

We’re the ‘sexiest profession’ charged with creating sculptural backdrops for the warm sunset to cascade across, while light plays with shadow. We’re the romantic problem-solvers, the weavers of utility with science and art. We’re the ones taking visionary aspirations & bringing them into reality. We’re the makers. The profession of master builders. The tech nerds writing a complex spaghetti of ‘if/then’ to spit out 100 solutions in minutes… The sculptors of space & environment. Aren’t we? 

If you take a step back from the self-perceived romanticism and stylized job descriptions – what are we really?

•  GCs see us as the guys who get the permits and take too long to answer a question – while supplying them with a low-detail set of drawings and 3 volume spec. So they have to figure it out themselves. 
•  Commercial developers seem to look at architects as the ‘necessary evil’ to get thru permitting on a fast-tracked development. 
•  For Residential Design – we’re not necessary at all (see above). 

If its not listed in the AHJ code requirements for building permit – usually we aren’t involved in the project type. It’s a crying shame. I’ve been involved with home renovation, deck additions, high-end green homes, furniture & product design. Even this last week – I finalized a ‘shopping list’ for a garage re-roof at the family cottage and knocked out cutting diagrams for 2 new outdoor steps (with max material use / limited cuts) and  plan sketches for redoing landscaping for my Mom.

Design isn’t an ‘exclusive’ practice. It’s pre-construction problem-solving, and expression. So WHY?

Every time I’ve explored this path – it unearths several things that aren’t fun to think about – but there is a value in buying (5) 2×6’s and not 11. I’m unemployed – $50 worth of lumber is way more appealing than $100. 

I’m not entirely sure the how’s and why’s of why architecture as a profession finds itself in a precarious situation. Maybe its the business model. Maybe its communication. Maybe its contracts. Maybe its our inability to advertise (probably right on that one – we don’t to be on park benches anyway). Maybe is a lack of ‘wow’ from homogenized massing and material choices. 

Somehow, in some way – the perception of the profession has fallen off. We’re a valued professional service, and usually hungry enough to want to design EVERYTHING. 

These things have been rattling around the brain pan for a while now, and I’ve got a few things that come to the surface. Some of them get touched on in the front half of  “Managing Design” which I’m in the process of re-reading. 

So. We’re in a ‘situation’. Business models, delivery methods and defining value. In my head, there are a few inherit contradictions in trying to make Goliath claims of value, especially nowadays when the preferences should lean to substance over style.

As an example, take the phrase ‘Integrated Design’. In reality – all that means is the disciplines who are not coordinating their documents, sit in the same room together. I have stories. 

Its disingenuous to make braggadocios claims, fall short on them and then wonder why the world views you as almost unnecessary. 

Trouble Area #1: Contractually ceding design to contractors & clients. 

Not a Eureka moment. If you want to prove that your profession has value – make it abundantly clear that you know what you’re doing. Regrettably, it still doesn’t go without saying. Rule #1: There’s nothing bigger than the little things. Make the effort, don’t take shortcuts – don’t suck. 

 Rule #1A: I don’t have one for refinement and duplication of efforts. It’s going to take revising AIA contract documents in a litigious society, increased effective communication with a selected contractor team and a larger design fee to cover added scope. This particular perception is going to take relaxed clients & developers and more informed design staff in order to ‘take back’ the role of design leadership. Either that or fold the GC under the architecture contract to get the components fabricated correctly before they’re delivered.

Under the current typical delivery system, with the automation of building code folded into the software – the profession itself is taking massive hits. Especially in the ‘late adopters’ category with BIM. 

Trouble Area #2: Design Access

That level of access extends to high-design, boutique and bespoke items as well. Anyone with an address can get nearly anything that they want shipped to them. See something that catches your eye in a magazine? Hop on Amazon and order one, or order a book about how to make your own. Architect’s aren’t the source anymore for cool stuff. We may have never been – but now it’s gone mainstream.

With that said – there’s a negative side. 

I’ve seen entire proposals come off pics grabbed from Pinterest and woven into an InDesign document for an aesthetic ‘look book’ for projects. Then its sent straight into the project by way of outsourced renderings. Without any sourcing for products, these selections then rest on the laurels of custom manufacturer’s to create shop drawings – skipping the design process entirely. If you mean it – find it or model it. I’ve been an ardent supporter of the idea that if its in your scope of services – you should have someone in your discipline that can model it. 

Of course – I’m of the ilk to model, categorize and schedule as much as is prudent in the scope of services. Essentially all that meant that I’m just building custom Revit families to catch up with what the client assumes is a rendered and completed idea. 

With that design workflow in mind – what’s to keep anyone who hasn’t had years of training from doing the same thing? 

How do you claim an added value to the design process, when for a couple hundred dollars in software – anyone can recreate what you just did? 

I heard a story sitting around a campfire one night when I was a kid, about the mechanical engineer that showed up to a factory to correct a problem with a broken machine. The invoice for the service came in to the manager’s office a week later for $10,001.29. The manager called the engineer to inquire about the strange amount, and the engineer answered. “Well, $1.29 is for the bolt I needed, and the $10k is for knowing where to put it.”

Value, is in knowledge and experience – but how does one bill an intangible?

Rule #2: I don’t really have one. Evolve? If access to tools and design items is everywhere – it makes everyone a maker/doer. As time goes on, I believe that it will become more prevalent. I have a ‘factory’ in my studio, and my office fits in a messenger bag. It wasn’t prohibitively expensive to do that. I’m not sure how to market an ‘added value’ by having access to the same things that any teenager has in their school, and a lot will have in their workshops in 10 years. 

Sell by experience? Sell by network relationships for purchase items at cost? Although that’s pretty much the definition of Dunder Mifflin middle-man, and a contractor will have better leverage. I don’t have a strong suggestion for claiming value here. 

Trouble Area #3: Over-specialization as a trap

“A filing cabinet for widows and young professionals.”

As I stated at the beginning of this exercise, I didn’t expect to come out of this with any choir-of-angels eureka moment, but rather to explore an idea on the page on just how to gain a true grip on adding value to what it is that we do as architects.

The preconception of what we do, is hurting. Design is the first thing to get tossed overboard in bad times. It’s seen as a disposable luxury. It’s also the last thing to rebound. 

The response to this is marketing & edification about what it is that we are capable of as a profession. Part of me feels like its reactionary to have to justify your existence – but its paramount to do so because we as a profession have ceded most of the responsibility over to those charged with a project’s construction .

I don’t like giving depositions, but I’d rather defend a position over a minor infraction than dumb down the profession to the point of obsolescence, but does that add value? 

Can value be achieved by establishing tools to speed up decisions and production so that you can go into further detail and invention? To deliver a well-coordinated project? 

It’s what I’ve always done, but is it enough to justify my passions as a 3D problem solver? Exploring nuance to spatial environments that can be constructed within a timeframe and established budget? Is it enough to stand above the competition? Given what I’ve seen of what’s out there – you’d think that would be, but talk is cheap. 

I don’t know about you – but I’ve never aspired to mediocrity on the long road toward the middle. 

Maybe the answer is revisiting Wright’s democratization of the profession and lose the perception that design is only for the elites. 

Maybe its the small projects to help out your neighbor. I mean I heard a story once about banks testing out ‘micro loans’ with massive success. I’ve heard stories recently about ‘pay what you can’ counters at restaurants increasing revenue. 

Maybe the answer is in the micro rather than massive sweeping institutional change. 

I have more questions than answers – but I believe that this is worth thinking about. 

I’m sure there will be more later . – JM