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As a portion of the many discussions that I’ve been having lately about a return to employment, there are 2 common themes that seem to be ‘evergreen’ complaints about this profession. They’re being raised by those doing the hiring about the people that they’re interviewing.
The two largest things that seem to be an issue with those on the hiring side of the table are:
Firstly – that no one has a grasp of building code.
Secondly – that a knowledge base of detailing, isn’t there.
In my experience, I can see where they’re coming from – but it got me to thinking about the path that I took and the chance that I might offer encouragement & help anyone who find themselves missing opportunities because of a lack of one of these or the other. Maybe this could be useful information.
Nobody graduates from college and gets a year or two in and suddenly has a depth of knowledge on more intricate aspects of the career.
In the environment that I was in during college – if you spent even a little time on things like a structural grid, or code, or anything of the sort – you’d be told that you don’t have to worry about all that right now. I can’t speak to what’s happening in studio lately, but expression of design concepts and execution of that concept was miles more important than what your occupant load was. I had a residential drafting job out of high school, and designed in framing dimensions… guess who’s projects got glossed over no matter how well I turned metaphor into form.
It’s an endless discussion topic and both sides tend to blame each other… Profession wants more technical education. The education spins that off to what IDP is supposed to be teaching – more intricacy of the profession, placing training on the firms to provide that.
Code. I know, I know… eyes are already glazing over, right? I do the same.
I say that as someone who had a job writing 70+ page due diligence reports for retail properties all over the U.S. These things covered local codes, municipal ordinances, critical path items for obtaining a fast-tracked building permit, as well as a host of building codes for each region the property was located in.
Here’s why its important to know and to get it right:
Codes are literally the rules of the game. They state all the requirements for turning a creative endeavor into a reality. It’s a lot. I get it. Depending on the locality and adopted nuances – it can be a heavy undertaking.
But if you have the knowledge and experience to navigate them, you’re ahead of the game. If you can design with these things in the back of your mind – its a big value to be added to the project.
In 2003/04, I was working in Milwaukee and had a project that stalled out prior to development – just as the state adopted the IBC. The entire thing would have to be reviewed under a new set of rules. I was unlicensed, with limited knowledge of the building code, and at that time – nobody in the state really knew it.
My project manager and mentor, Gregg, grabbed one of the two 3-ring binders we had, and a set of the project drawings and told me to take both of them and go home and figure it out. So I did.
I read that thing from cover to cover. Sourcing all the applicable sections for future reference, and redlining the entire project – page by page for full compliance with the new building and life safety codes. I used a copy of the CAD drawings to do all the square footage take-offs, occupancy calculations, egress, energy codes… everything.
After that exercise, I could argue interpretations with the people reviewing drawings better than they could. I also gained a greater understanding of applications and some of the ‘why’ behind all the rules.
Think about it like this… If you’re lucky – at least you’re not drawing PLINES around a floor plan to do square footage take-offs of a 2D CAD drawing and then have to flip a book open to a chart on a page and grab the construction master calculator to figure out how many toilets you need in a space.
This was my primary reason to develop a package of scheduling tools for Revit that would do live calcs for occupancy, egress and plumbing count – I HATED the boring PLINE exercise. Taking a day to gather that information was daunting, when invariably, there are more fun things to do on a project.
At this point, I should probably point out that I have zero experience with the Upcodes plugin, although its something that I would really like to play with.
Codes have gotten more complicated, but access has been made easier.
If you live in a municipality who has them published online – they’re easy to reference. If you can get a hold of a PDF copy, they can be keyword searched for relevant information much easier than I had with that 3-ring binder. And now you’ve got a TON of reference material out there like Frank Ching’s “Building Codes Illustrated” and illustrated versions floating around out there of the international construction code directly from the publishers.
If you’re looking to add value to your resume and your career – get familiar with the rules.
Now, that’s not going to require an encyclopedic instant reference to line and verse of the text. But it helps to know the book, have a base level understanding of the rules, and design with an understanding of what is or isn’t going to get permitted and why.
If you’re still rolling your eyes – approach it from a liability standpoint… how understanding are the client (and the firm you’re working for) going to be if your project is delayed a month because something got missed?
OR
Imagine you’ve spent 3 months developing a design, getting it rendered out, attended countless meetings and discussions and FINALLY gotten approval of the concepts and the construction budget to move forward turning this vision of perfection into reality… and a week later – it comes unravelled because of code-related design problem.
I know, I know. If we all wanted to spend all day reading legal language and contracts – we’d be lawyers (and probably employed). Trust me – the knowledge base is worth it.
Grab an old set of drawings. Look up the base code on the ICC digital code website and give it a go. Crack open a Revit model and do some SF take-offs and a little math. It’s worth it – and judging by what I’ve been hearing for 20 years now – its a popular complaint among firms.
My advice is this. Just detail, forehead.
(If only it were that simple.)
One of my favorite sayings of anything that I’ve heard or read is:
“The little things, There’s nothing bigger in life than the little things”
Its a common theme, and that particular arrangement of the wording came from the movie Vanilla Sky
The reason that I like it so much is that there’s almost a universal application for it, and in this case, I’m referring to the art & science of detailing.
Granted, again, this is something that comes largely from experience gained over time, and isn’t something that comes with a diploma in many cases.
I took building sciences in college, and I had a detailing course about materials & connections. It covered a lot of ground, but obviously you’re not going to get 10+ years of experience and practical application out of a semester of classes 1-2 days a week.
I had already redone the entire typical residential detail library that was used by the company I had that architectural drawing job with. I still had no idea what the hell I was looking at the first time that I saw a section thru a hollow metal door frame.
Anything can happen in renderings, and ideas that exist in digital form can be as fantastical as you can imagine them to be…
BUT
In the case of the built environment:
Objects have weight and dimension.
Lights have cords. The magazine image of that great computer setup isn’t going to show you the 3 miles of cable routing that no one accounts for or the 12′ power strip that you’ll need to make sure everything operates.
Gravity is a universal constant. That 1500# stone fireplace you designed to hang off the ceiling, that’s not going to end up looking like the picture without some serious behind-the-scenes infrastructure. Those amazing pictures of spaces in the magazine that hang seemingly extend forever? Thank the creative design & engineering team for that one and the detailing that hides all structure from sight. Defying the universal constant requires the right budget and 3x the effort to make it simple and elegant.
It helps to have an understanding of these principles. No, you don’t have to be able to do all the math to make it all work (unless you’re a residential architect sizing framing members for a builders drawing set).
Water gets into places. Expands when it freezes or doesn’t dry off and can destroy a building. Helps to understand the common practices to keep that from happening.
Code requires compartmentalization. Things need to be separated. People need to be able to exit if there’s a problem. I’m pretty sure that all of us would greatly appreciate an exit if there was a problem, regardless of how much it impacted that amazing facade that it took a year to detail.
It’s a feature, not a bug.
The best part about learning to detail? It doesn’t take much. Everything around you everywhere possesses detail elements that can be observed, studied, and borrowed from.
You can spend months delving into the delicacy and craft of how an architect designed connections for a project, and there is a beauty to that connection of materials resisting forces that we’re lucky enough to understand and get nerdy over.
God knows that I have in a lot of areas in my life/career. “How did they do that?” has led to just about every hobby and craft that I’ve got in my personal arsenal.
Its one of those cool things that only a select piece of society is knowledgable about.
After a while – everything you look at becomes a study in how things went together. Of course the downside of that is that when it’s not a good installation or resolution – we can figure out why. If you’re so afflicted (as I am) it really starts to gnaw at you.
Case in point: The Milwaukee Art Museum addition by Santiago Calatrava. The downwardly arched glass wall facing Lake Michigan has a mullion EXACTLY at my eye level with the horizon. I have to bend down to see the lake’s horizon. I understand it, but it bothered the hell out of me when I was at the opening years ago.
All things considered – noticing these things make you a better designer / detailer / architect. It’s worth investing time and effort in.
My advice: Buy something that requires assembly, don’t look at the instructions and figure it out. Play.
In my case, when I was a little kid, I was given a socket set and a mangled frame of a motorcycle to strip for parts when I was ‘booooorred’. That lead to building, rebuilding & re-rebuilding skateboards, bikes, computers, automotive & construction + the whole guitar shop startup. I researched, sourced material, read articles, watched videos (when that became a thing) and dug in.
I still do that. Not knowing something bugs me. So I dive into it, try to get at the ‘how’ of it all, and then once I understand it – its followed by the “that’s not so hard – I should try that.” (at this phase – KNOW beyond the shadow of a doubt that things can and will go wrong). Do something just to screw it up. It’s called learning, right?
Read some code. Apply it somewhere.
Take something (non-vital) apart and see how it goes together. Watch the billion videos on youtube of people making things. Its cathartic as well as educational.
As always, hit me up here or on twitter. I’m more than happy to share resources and any knowledge that anyone might need. I don’t know everything, and I never claimed as such. The point is exploring and learning.
Happy Tinkering,
JM
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