Discussion points

1. Is design about ‘sparks’ of ideas or patient methodology? Why should building designers challenge the notion that ‘the customer knows best’? Why do different designers think of different solutions?

2. Will increasing labour shortages and use of prefabrication lead to standardization of new buildings? Will standardization eliminate the need for ‘one-off’ building design? Will factory production lead to ‘perfect’ buildings which never wear out?

3. What criteria could or should be used for judging the quality of the built environment? Who is entitled to judge the quality of a completed building? How should building designers and developers respond to public opinion?

4. What is the value of innovation in terms of user benefit? What are the main barriers to innovation in the construction industry? Does design guidance stifle good design and limit expectations?

Pre-contract and post-contract stages

The building designer’s involvement varies with each type of development depending on defined levels of responsibility required by the client. At the picture illustrates the main differences between the design and build and the traditional procurement processes. The traditional stages in the creation of a new building can be defined as pre-contract prior to commencement of work on site, describing the building in theoretical terms and post-contract once construction has commenced.

An outline of the design and construction process

As I described in the previous posts, the procurement of new buildings takes place in a variety of alternative ways, including:

•    Speculatively
By a developer on an entrepreneurial basis for unknown clients or occupants who have no specific involvement in the design or construction processes.

•    Design and build
By a developer who provides all necessary design and construction expertise to a specific client based on negotiation or competitive tender.

•    Project management
By a manager who does not have any direct, personal involvement in the building works, but co-ordinates the design and construction teams on behalf of a specific client.

•    Consultant management
By a contractor for a specific client based on information provided by consultants, who may also supervise construction.

•    Private finance initiative
By a contractor or a consortium of contractors who finance the development for a specific client who subsequently rents or leases back the building when it is completed. This method may also include a facilities management contract to maintain the building in use for an agreed period of time.

•    Partnering
By several separate companies, or client and developer together, combining their expertise and financial resources in a joint venture.

The development teams - Contractors

A contractor is a person who undertakes or contracts to provide the materials, equipment (plant) and labors required to construct the new building. The contractors personnel may include:

•    Managers
Directors, contract or project managers, site agents or general foremen and trade foremen.

•    Finance and administration
Estimators, programme planners, buyers and valuation surveyors.

•    Site engineers
For setting out and dimensional co-ordination.

•    Operatives
Trades people (bricklayers, carpenters, joiners, plumbers, etc.), laborers.

•    Subcontractors

Subcontractors are independent companies employed for the duration of their work on the specific project for specialist trades such as roofing, steel frames and cladding.

The development teams - Authorities

The authorities advise on design and construction, and have statutory duties to exert control with respect to their individual responsibility. The authorities involved in building development include:

•    Local Authorities
County, District, Borough, City and Parish Councils who have interests in Planning, Building
Control, rating and licenses, grants, domestic drainage, environmental health, waste disposal, street cleaning, highways and transport, highways drainage, street lighting and street naming.

The development teams - Consultants

The consultants supply design and management expertise and can include the following:

•    Measurement surveyors and investigators
Land surveyors for the measurement and production of information about the site; sub-soil exploration subcontractors and laboratory testing consultants; ground contamination experts; photographers of underground pipe work and aerial views; building surveyors for the preparation of reports on the condition of existing buildings.

The development teams - Clients

Creating a new building involves contributions from many individuals, exchanging ideas and instructions as the project is developed. They can be grouped as clients, consultants, authorities and builders or contractors.

Clients

The client is responsible for commissioning the new building and must approve design decisions as work proceeds. Different types of client include the following:

•    Owners
Clients may be individuals, partners or shareholders who’s ownership permits them personally or collectively to make decisions.

•    Representatives
Directors, managers or in-house specialists responsible for day-to-day activity may have the power to make decisions, but may also be required to seek the approval of the owners.

•    Committees
Clients may take the form of a management committee, comprising professional or lay membership, making collective decisions based on professional advice or on their own experience or feelings.

•    Users
Prospective purchasers or even tenants may fill the role of the client, making decisions based on their specific preferences. For example, a residential developer may give their prospective purchasers the opportunity to determine aspects of the design and construction of their future house to suit their own particular needs.

Issues of good practice

Other issues are matters of good practice, which can be summarized as expectations of behavior as follows:

•    Operating in a professional manner
Undertaking work on the basis of reputation, capability and experience.
Avoiding giving advice on matters which require specialist qualifications.
Offering necessary and appropriate services under the circumstances.
Acting in the best interests of the client and the future users of the building.
To avoid damaging the reputation of others.
Liaising with other advisers appointed by the client.
Having adequate resources to meet commitments.

The professional quality of building design

The term ‘professional’ can be applied to those who offer goods or services for financial reward, which they attempt to maximize in response to prevailing market forces. The business arrangements associated with commercial design, including general office practice, conditions of employment, efficiency and profitability are essentially private matters to be agreed between employer and employee dictating the costs or fees that can be demanded or negotiated. Being ‘professional’ in this sense is about ‘making money’ and is already well documented by other authors.

Judging the success of design

The success or ‘value’ of design clearly depends on the relationship between the product and the judge. Many products are created for general sale to customers for their own personal use. These products can be described as consumable with a limited lifespan and consumers accept that when they are finished with, or worn out they can, and will be replaced. The speed of this process of planned obsolescence varies; some products such as newspapers and magazines, for example, are intended for immediate consumption, replaced swiftly by the next issue and retain little or no value after the initial purchase, but other products like clothes, cars and furniture are each expected to last longer before requiring renewal. If they are carefully looked after or restored, they may well retain a significant second-hand value, but in a commercial context, the principle measure of success for the designers and manufacturers is at the first point of sale, and user demand is an important indicator of the perceived merits of their work.

Design guidance

The theory and practice of building design and construction continually develop through research and testing. Existing and new ideas establish principles which can help to inform current performance. For the building designer, there are many sources of reference to help to create the best possible design solutions, ranging from providing inspiration, best practice advice and mandatory requirements, illustrating how things could, should or must be done’. Typical areas of design guidance include the following:

Risk in building design

The concept of ‘risk’ in building design may seem to be an alarming one. The word suggests danger, catastrophe, something to be avoided because it is unpredictable or that has an uncertain outcome. That could be our view of almost anything in life of course; crossing a busy road is ‘risky’, but we accept the risk because we believe that we can approach the task in such a way that we will be safe; the risk can be eliminated through understanding and management. Crossing the busy road is a finite risk too; once we reach the other side, we are safe until we need to cross another road. Whether or not we are safe from the risk of permanent traffic fumes is another matter.

A series of problems facing the construction industry

Although not directly relevant to the creation of the new car-dealership, it is worth noting this government initiative in response to demands for faster construction and pressures caused by skills shortages, which is designed to improve the quantity and quality of housing construction through the use of off site prefabrication leading to faster construction, fewer housing defects and reductions in energy use and waste. Such a strategy could become commonplace in the construction industry in the near future. The initiative attempts to address a series of problems facing the construction industry generally. They are subjects of interest and debate including the following:

•    The need to increase the speed of the construction process.
•    Promotion of off-site prefabricated manufacture to help minimize site defects.
•    Matching industry capacity, particularly in line with shortages of skilled labour.
•    Health and safety improvements through less worker time spent on site.
•    Increased energy efficiency in response to changes in Building Regulations.
•    Reduction of site waste and total number of trips to a building site.
•    Stabilizing or lowering capital and running costs.
•    Changing public attitudes and promoting market demand.
•    Responding to Planning pressures, notably Planning Policy Guidance Note (PPG3) requirements for  greater density.

Few design proposals involve radical innovation. Very few architects actually manage to break the moulds. Paxton’s Crystal Palace, the first ‘skyscrapers’, Le Corbusier’s concrete Chapel at Ronchamp in the Alsace Region of Eastern France, the all-glass houses of Mies van der Rowe are examples of whole-building advance. Richard Rogers inside out Beaubourg Centre in Paris, Norman Foster’s Lloyds Building in London and the concrete structures designed by Santiago Calatrava in Valencia all re-examine the way in which buildings are ‘supposed’ to be designed and built. Less obvious innovations come in the form of new materials and technology continually developing in response to market demands. The use of unplasticised polyvinyl chloride (UPVC) and other plastics, optic fibres and high-energy glass become commonplace once they are affordable. Innovative design is essentially an attitude of mind, of enquiry, a ‘what if’ mentality which searches for improvement or seeks to do something differently from the expected norm. The design team should remain willing to rethink consumer needs, ask questions, challenge the status quo and try to develop realistic, but imaginative solutions to design problems. In the best cases, this approach adds value. Occasionally there will be a need to take risks, which is of course the way that ideas and practice move forward from generation to generation.

Innovation in design and the design process

Design and the design process may be difficult terms to define but they clearly involve ‘thinking’, and apart from the most mundane, mechanical problems, creative thoughts which sometimes lead to changes in the way those things have been done before. The design and construction of buildings has continually evolved as ‘new’ materials and processes have enabled the creation of ‘new’ structures. Even vernacular styles of architecture include useful developments when they become generally accepted. Such advances can be described as innovative, considered at the following different levels:

Design co-ordination

The location of the entrance door to the shop described above is a relatively straightforward design decision based on analysis of a limited number of pertinent constraints. It is perhaps not difficult to imagine that the complexity associated with larger buildings, or those containing specialized processes such as the car-dealership, necessarily means that design decisions become dependant on understanding many more elements and threads. The co-ordination of multi-disciplinary contributions from many different design specialists, subcontractors and suppliers responsible for systems and individual elements simply to establish a workable design proposal is difficult enough. Bringing everything together to meet time, cost and quality control limitations requires clearly focused, structured management.

The best design solution that designers choose

For all but the simplest of design tasks, the process will not be in the progressive linear form of start, analysis, synthesis, appraisal, feedback, finish, completing each stage before moving on to the next one. It cannot even be categorically stated which comes first, as ideas and decisions are influenced by each action and there is constant need to go back and test solutions against requirements. For example, preliminary analysis may lead to a practicable solution for the shop front design, which can be presented to the Planning Officer for appraisal.

The design process - The aims of design

From the outset of a new project, the designer’s preliminary work can be based on very limited information which may be sufficient to justify putting forward ideas for consideration. However, it is very unusual to find that the finished design materializes effortlessly, translating initial ideas into reality without any revision.

The categories of all the elements of a new building

All the elements of a new building can be found in these categories, and some will be affected by all of them. It is not possible to decide whether any particular element of the building should be by looking at only one area. For example, consider the front wall of a shop in the high street:

Significant elements in creating new buildings

Historically, architectural or building styles survived for long periods of time, gradually evolving over hundreds, or even thousands of years as empires expanded and then contracted. In the UK, design and construction of buildings periodically incorporated the ideas of dominant European civilizations such as the Romans, Vikings and Normans, and later the more peaceful discovery and absorption of the sophistication and beauty of continental architecture, notably at the time of the Italian Renaissance. Many splendid Victorian structures were built by the entrepreneurs of the Industrial Revolution to demonstrate their new wealth and self-importance in society. The use of materials and structures typical of time and place, described as vernacular architecture was familiar to designers, builders and users, unifying the built environment and creating a certainty in the way in which it was understood.

Creating buildings

In principle, the elements of buildings are the same as the elements of any product; materials, processes, forms and appearance, selected and arranged to meet the demands and needs of manufacture and use. Although a building could be regarded as one product, it is in fact an assembly of many individual products, some of which are purpose designed to suit special requirements but many of which are obtained from suppliers, chosen from ranges of pre-designed alternatives. Many of the raw materials and components already exist, and it is the way that they are put together that creates the new building, influenced by all the issues previously identified for product design, based on an understanding of the purpose of the building and the needs of its users.

The constituent pieces of a product

A product can be regarded as the sum of decisions taken about its constituent elements. Look at the pages in any book once again; any piece of paper and any random typeface would do to make a page, but because other elements are missing, or decisions taken about them incorrect, then it may appear to be unsatisfactory, crude or incomplete. Inclusion of more elements can develop and improve it, making it more practical, attractive, readable or even beautiful. The performance and quality of the finished product varies because clients, designers and users take different views about the selection or significance of specific elements. A good designer will create a competent result and may even say something new, exciting or inspiring, depending on what is required or what could be possible, reflecting what both client, designer and user expect of the finished product.

Process is one of the principle elements of any product

The principle elements of any product are materials, processes, forms and appearance, each influenced by numerous factors within three broad areas of concern. Marketing analysis and brand understanding help to determine what the product should or could be like in an ideal situation, technical constraints reflect controlling standards and realistic investment costs and commercial viability assesses the potential for sales and profit. The response of clients, designers, manufacturers and users depends on their perception and evaluation of the importance of any particular factor, which will of course, not necessarily be the same as each other.