Slowness is a symptom about something being wrong in the design process.
Have you ever worked with an architect or designer that seems to take a very long time in something that should be done in a fairly simple and quick manner? Have you ever felt that you were not at the top of your designer’s priorities?
If you have, you’re not alone.
Architecture is ranked 2nd place in the industries with the most unsatisfied clients in the United States - This piece of data brought to my attention by a friend and fellow architect, didn’t shock me as much as I expected. As a matter of fact, around 40% of our clients come from a failed relationship with their former designer. So what is wrong with this industry? Well, there are many out-points but there’s a main one, and that is poor planning.
Planning starts with knowing what we have in front of our eyes in terms of space, whether it’s an empty lot or an existing building to be renovated, we need to collect all the available information before anything else is done.
At Levy Design Group we call this step of the process “Capture and 3D Scans”.
Let’s take a home renovation as an example.
With the use of advanced technology, we are able to capture the current state of the property and transform it into 3D with visual information that can be shared with anyone involved in the process as a virtual tour and 3D models. The result of this phase is the “As-Built” plans, meaning how it’s built.
Now it’s time to look at the second part of the information: the available resources and limitations.
Here’s where we lay down every aspect about budget, available space and time, structural aspects and so on, making it coherent with each other just like you’d do in a big puzzle. We could say that space is the most important aspect in architecture, because it is directly related with the long term success of the project, and where money and time invested should react accordingly.
Here’s also where we pull permits and take any necessary legal action to get approval for our project.
Once we’ve gathered all the information it’s time to have fun and jump into the creativity of the project. So within the known barriers it’s now time to feel free to get as creative as possible, making an amazing design that fits every aspect of the criteria.
If all the previous steps are correctly done, then this stage of the process is what everyone actually dreams about in working with a designer. This is where we get to get involved in creative talks with the clients, make sketches, color palettes, 3D models and all sorts of communication tools. We also get the engineers and specialists on board, which makes it like an orchestra that is getting ready to play the show.
By now everything should make sense and we should get ready to start building as an activity to create, instead of the usual activity to fix or solve unforeseen issues.
Plan well and it’ll be fun and challenging. Plan poorly and it’ll be the biggest headache of your life.