Code
The problem of codification arises with the need to produce form in architecture and was fundamental to the invention of the project as a product of architecture practice. The project presupposes control over an idea and the need to communicate it effectively to the executors through a set of representation techniques.
Today the practice of architecture is a complex process that involves the cooperation of several expert entities. Naturally, a wide variety of architectural services and products emerge from this process where design, in the traditional sense, is only one of the necessary parts to build a building. In this ongoing atomization of the process, designers have seen their agency over the design lessened in front of contractors, engineers, BIM managers, developers, and other specialists. For this reason, this project proposes an alternative business strategy for the entrepreneur/architect where design is again in control of the process. In the same way, in which tech companies like Alphabet or Amazon have restructured their businesses from single entities into platform business models, the proposal is to replicate this model in the AEC industry and attend the growing demands of the built environment. This project seeks to expand the breadth of activities in which an architecture practice takes part by breaking the traditional product/process into smaller parts. Each one of these parts is an independent corporate entity, capturing different types of funding, clients, projects by offering a professional and specialized product.
Specifications shifted how they are communicated based on tools developed at their relative time periods. For example, in Europe, there was a shift from oral instruction to drawings when paper became an established craft. Specifications during the Renaissance line up to a parameter-based system and were typically designed by the architect. In comparison, specifications now have a legal system. In the U.S., they are not designed by the architect but produced by an outsourcing company. This [internal-to-external] shift begs the question - as architects, are we leaving behind or not taking advantage of designing our own specifications? Instead of a library, researchers in the future may
look to government repositories to find the specification of an architectural product.
Additionally, the form of communication changed with the rise in literacy. Beyond the written word, computer literacy has changed the way we stamp and submit drawings.
— Edgar Rodriguez, 2020; Alejandra Avalos Guerrero & Jeffrey Stevens, 2021
The problem of codification arises with the need to produce form in architecture and was fundamental to the invention of the project as a product of architecture practice. The project presupposes control over an idea and the need to communicate it effectively to the executors through a set of representation techniques.
Today the practice of architecture is a complex process that involves the cooperation of several expert entities. Naturally, a wide variety of architectural services and products emerge from this process where design, in the traditional sense, is only one of the necessary parts to build a building. In this ongoing atomization of the process, designers have seen their agency over the design lessened in front of contractors, engineers, BIM managers, developers, and other specialists. For this reason, this project proposes an alternative business strategy for the entrepreneur/architect where design is again in control of the process. In the same way, in which tech companies like Alphabet or Amazon have restructured their businesses from single entities into platform business models, the proposal is to replicate this model in the AEC industry and attend the growing demands of the built environment. This project seeks to expand the breadth of activities in which an architecture practice takes part by breaking the traditional product/process into smaller parts. Each one of these parts is an independent corporate entity, capturing different types of funding, clients, projects by offering a professional and specialized product.
Specifications shifted how they are communicated based on tools developed at their relative time periods. For example, in Europe, there was a shift from oral instruction to drawings when paper became an established craft. Specifications during the Renaissance line up to a parameter-based system and were typically designed by the architect. In comparison, specifications now have a legal system. In the U.S., they are not designed by the architect but produced by an outsourcing company. This [internal-to-external] shift begs the question - as architects, are we leaving behind or not taking advantage of designing our own specifications? Instead of a library, researchers in the future may
look to government repositories to find the specification of an architectural product.
Additionally, the form of communication changed with the rise in literacy. Beyond the written word, computer literacy has changed the way we stamp and submit drawings.
— Edgar Rodriguez, 2020; Alejandra Avalos Guerrero & Jeffrey Stevens, 2021