A Collaborative Architectural Design Process

4 Principles for Promoting Project Success

By Ian Fishman, AIA, NCARB
January 12, 2023
Design

My personal design process is guided by four principles that help me keep sight of a project’s objectives and work as a true partner with my clients. This article discusses these principles and how they work in concert with the more commonly understood descriptions of the architectural design process (the project phases) to drive project success.

First, the Basics: Project Phases

The architectural design process is commonly understood as a progression of several discrete project phases.

The Classic Architectural Project Phases

Pre-Design/Programming: Gathering basic information about the site, scope of work and space requirements.

Concept/Schematic Design: Exploring and creating basic ideas of layout, form, and adjacency.

Design Development: Refining ideas and tweaking to make everything just right.
Construction Documentation: Specifying and clarifying the project so it can be permitted, contracted, and constructed.
Bidding/Negotiation/Permitting: Soliciting, analyzing, and selecting contractor bids/proposals. Attaining municipal approvals.
Construction Administration: Observing construction, interacting with the contractor, and verifying construction complies with the contract documents and achieves design intent.

The project phases listed above are useful benchmarks for managing complexity and achieving specificity. However, these project phases describe the idealized, overall course of the generic design process, and rarely proceed in an orderly, linear path. They answer the question of what is the design process, not how do you conduct design.

It’s important to remember that while these project phases describe the overall course of the generic design process, each project is absolutely unique. Just as you, the project owner, are a unique individual, your projects are each unique as well. Even two seemingly-identical projects are distinctive in their precise location and the moment in time in which they are designed and built. So it’s a mistake to think that design can be conducted according to a concise formula or algorithm. Design phases are a procedure, not a process.

Instead, I’m guided by the following four fundamental principles throughout the duration of a project. I find that applying these principles and embracing the unique circumstances of you and your project, promotes collaboration and yields project success and immense value.

4 Principles of Collaborative Design

1. Communication

Sharing ideas and information through open, honest communication forms the backbone of collaboration and continues throughout design and construction. Listening to your needs and expectations for the project allows me to plan the project in order to maximize the value returned to you. Likewise, by providing a steady stream of clear and actionable information back to you, I keep you engaged in the process so we can work effectively together to make decisions, overcome challenges, and discover opportunities.

How I Maintain Effective Communication

Generosity

We might not know what information is important to convey. We might then hold back information because we don’t understand its relevance. When unsure, it’s better to be generous with information than to withhold. It also never hurts to ask a question, even if it’s basic or we think we know the answer. I never assume I know a fact—or someone’s thoughts—unless explicitly stated.

Engagement

High-level communication deserves time and space. I like to plan important conversations when all participants can fully engage, preferably face-to-face. I’ll avoid texting, except to schedule those meetings.

Humility

No one knows everything. I am always learning, as are my clients and colleagues. People are imperfect and mistakes happen. For example, as a project transitions from design concept to physical construction, it is normal and expected for mistakes to manifest, which can strain communication among the owner-architect-contractor team. When this happens, I’ll be direct. I’m not afraid of hard conversations or bad facts.

By fostering robust dialogue between the owner and architect (and eventually with the contractor as well), I build trust and enable proactivity, which reduces risk and promotes design opportunities.

2. Alignment

Design and construction are specialized—and often esoteric—endeavors, with practices, codes, technologies, and jargon that change over time and varies by location. Common words can take on totally different meanings depending on context and personal experience.

That is why throughout the design process, I verify alignment between your project goals and my design activities.

One simple method of achieving alignment between the owner and architect is through the use of page-turn drawing review meetings. These meetings ensure that you know and understand the content of the drawings and specifications produced for your project.

Another important source of alignment is through intermittent cost estimation. Construction costs are difficult to predict, and often present a moving target, so it’s imperative to check in with contractors or cost estimators at intervals to ensure a project design aligns with your budget.

3. Interpretation

My critical role as an architect is to interpret your ideas and desires into physical form. Interpretation is where the magic happens. It’s the process through which abstractions become physical realities.

My personal creative process begins with an aggregation of data and information. I methodically gather technical information to develop deep understanding of the defining parameters of a problem. Next, I try to relax and let my right-brain drive a generative search for solutions. This phase takes the form of loose hand sketching and rapid digital model prototyping.

Next, I share my ideas with you, the project owner. This moment is the start of an iterative, collaborative conversation between us, and is when our communication reaches it’s maximum importance and power. We must get to a point where the design aligns with your strategic project objectives. The resulting design should feel natural and inevitable.

4. Value

Ultimately, the most important aspect of any architectural design project is that it returns maximum value to you, the owner. The value created is the direct measure of a project’s success.

All owners have goals for value, which varies from project-to-project. For example, a developer who commissions an apartment building likely places raw economic value as a primary goal. The cost of construction and operation of the building must be low enough, and the appeal (and therefore rent potential) of the apartment units must be high enough, to perform according to the developer’s financial pro forma. Secondary to the economic value, the developer might want the building to generate brand value, and perform as a marketing tool. However, if that same developer were to commission a custom residence, they would have a completely different set of values: uniqueness, comfort, beauty.

It is therefore essential for value to be a central driver in the architectural design process. Value goals must be discussed early, and be well-understood by the architect and the owner. The best projects are collaborations between architects and owners, acting together as partners to generate greater value together than either one of them could create individually.

Conclusion

Custom architectural design is rife with complexity, affected by an endless list of factors. While some simple projects roughly follow the contours of phases and prescribed methods, no project follows an exact formula or roadmap. A collaborative architectural design process, with a high level of owner engagement, offers the best way to boost the chances of a successful project outcome.

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Tagged Design, Process, Value