Architects have for years relied on a variety of vendors and specialized fabricators for technical information and guidance in preparation of working drawings and specifications. Each is conceded to know more about its products and their test certifications, industry standards, and underlying trade practices than individual architectural practitioners and their specification writers. However, when it comes to integrating those materials, assemblies, and systems within the building AS A DESIGN CONCEPT nobody is better qualified to be the arbiter of the process than a properly trained architect. That has been the core of practice for at least a hundred years, I believe - and still is. The technical environment has grown increasingly complex over that time, and in recent years specialization even more widespread with the advent of sustainability as a sociopolitical and industrial issue. Architects have responded to that reality in a number of ways, including increased reliance on an ever wider range of consultants.
None of this, however, changes the basic reality: the architect is the best coordinator of the building envelope, its structure, the spectrum of building systems, and use of appropriate materials. No matter how dependent a project's success is upon ultimate performance of any of its individual elements, somebody must make sure they all fit together with minimum conflict without sacrificing the design intent, including aesthetics. Architects may not be master builders, but are certainly the "master integrators", BIM or no BIM.
This requires, in addition to a thorough education, a baptism under fire, an internship to inform academic training with the realities of daily practice and technical applications rather than a widespread yielding of authority to contractors, least of all general contractors. I have yet to be involved in a project not in some way compromised by contractor ignorance, corner-cutting, fee-padding, or faux cost savings - or even undue influence with an owner. These events are likely less prevalent in high-end Type I construction and institutional and governmental projects, but such projects do not comprise the bulk of practice. In fairness, I've also never been involved in a project where the contractor, in addition to constructing the project, did not make a positive interim contribution of some sort, including spotting drawing errors (which they love to do!). Nobody, to my knowledge, has ever figured out how to produce perfect contract documents, but nobody but the architect has the range of skill-sets ideally required to marshal a project, overall, to the best outcome.
No party to Contract Documents cares more about the appearance and contextual response of a project's design than its architect; not even the owner. Everybody else is pretty much bottom-line oriented, as they should be, and this fact of life must be respected by architects. It is also the reason contractors should not, with limited exceptions, be preparing contract documents as a matter of course. Until I hear a better proposal for a substitute than I have to-date, the division of labor and responsibility via the Architect-Owner-Contractor triangle remains for me the superior geometry.
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Gary Collins AIA
Principal
Gary R. Collins, AIA
Jacksonville OR
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