Liebster Blog Award

Early in December, fellow blogger Randy Nishimura honored me by nominating my Constructive Thoughts blog for the Liebster Award. "How cool!" I thought. "It's nice to know someone actually reads what I write!" Being a specifier, I know how rarely that happens, and the relatively few responses to the hundreds of articles I have written suggests those articles don't fare much better.

The thrill quickly dissipated as I read the description of the award; it's for bloggers with fewer than 200 followers.

A Dickens of a Tale

Scrooge was an old man, set in his ways. And why not? He had been doing things the same way for many years, and the resulting success was sufficient evidence of the wisdom of continuing in that path. Whenever it was suggested that change might be a good thing, “Bah, humbug!” was his response. “I like things the way they are! I started this business, I’ve been doing things the same way for fifty years, and I don’t see any reason to change! All this new-fangled stuff is just a fad.”

One evening, a strange series of events befell our dear Mister Scrooge. Having had a particularly trying day, he tried to enjoy a rich repast and a few glasses of wine in an effort to forget his problems. As he fell asleep, he was thinking of how much fun he had had in his youth.

What lies ahead for architects?

The profession of architecture has changed significantly, but the perception of what an architect does has remained much the same. So what's the big deal? As is often said, perception is reality, and therein lies the problem. What architects do now no longer agrees with what the public, and even architects themselves think they do.

Most people don't really understand what today's architects do. They think architects know about planning and design, and how to create buildings that are responsive to owners' needs. In that, they are correct; architects by training learn how to do these things, and they do them well. Unfortunately, most people also believe the architect is still the Master Builder, who knows everything about construction materials and methods, actively manages the work, and tells the contractor exactly what to do. And in that, they are sadly mistaken.

Hollywood politics

I’ve been avoiding the political melee, but an article titled "Forks in the Road revisited" in Structural Engineer prompts me to ask this question: Who do you believe - and why? This issue is only tangentially related to this election; it pervades our lives.Even though the following quotation specifically mentions the President, it’s a comment on who we allow to influence us, and applies to all political parties.

How have the architect's responsibilities changed?

About a hundred years ago, when AIA produced the document that eventually would become the familiar A201, the architect was firmly in control of construction. The 1915 AIA general conditions state, in Article 9, "The Architect shall have general supervision and direction of the work….The Architect has authority to stop the work whenever, in his opinion, such stoppage may be necessary to insure the proper execution of the Contract." Article 11 required the Contractor to "give efficient supervision to the work", and Article 12 required the Contractor to "provide and pay for all materials, labor, water, tools, equipment, light and power necessary for the execution of the work."

Those basic responsibilities remained essentially the same until the 1960s. Since then, a lot has changed.

Are specifiers weak in faith?

The main reason we've been doing things the same way for the past hundred fifty years, is - that we've been doing things the same way for the past hundred fifty years. It's human nature to keep what's comfortable, even though it may no longer work, or even if something better is available. I'm fairly certain the original versions of the contract documents we use, and the way we write them, made perfect sense when introduced, but is that still true?

Along the way, there have been many changes in building products, construction techniques, communication, and other technologies used in construction, perhaps the most significant being the expanding use of computers. If we were starting over today, with the current status of products, industry and government standards, and the increasing application of powerful computers, what would our construction documents look like? There would be some similarities, but I suspect they would not be what we have today.

What happened to the architect?

We started this series of articles with a question - What happened to the master builder? - and went on to talk about how the architect no longer is the master builder of old, for a couple of reasons. First, the continual increase in construction products, methods, and computer technology makes it virtually impossible for any one person to know all there is to know about construction, or even a significant part of it, and, more important, there was a conscious effort to divorce architects from hands-on experience and technical knowledge. Finally, as we will see, architects themselves have, through contract documents, reduced their importance, at the same time increasing the importance of the contractor.

Today, no one expects a single person to know all about construction today, but a semblance of a master builder can be found in the collective knowledge of an architectural firm and its consultants. However, because of the lasting impact of the design-bid-build process, there remains a schism between the design and construction activities of architecture.

Which, of course, means that an architect, in the original meaning of the word, no longer exists, or at least is rare.

More than a club - #JoinCSI

In today's world of instant communication and global socialization, who needs to join a formal organization?

All organizations offer membership benefits - a newsletter, and perhaps a magazine, devoted to that group's activities and interests; discounted costs for activities and publications; and local meetings and educational opportunities. In addition to these tangible benefits, some organizations offer benefits that affect a much larger group. For example, CSI created MasterFormat, SectionFormat, and PageFormat, which are used not only by members, but by most of the building construction industry.

"That's all fine," you say, "but what's in it for me?"