David, An excellent response. I saw this letter from the AIA about Repositioning, and it struck me as completely void of any indication of change.
I have to point out however, that while I think your response was well stated, I believe it is still too wrapped around the traditional business model of client-architect. Basically to me it is aimed at the struggle to hold on to the share of construction market traditionally occupied by architects which we all agree has been waning. A fight to hold the status quo is well and good, but I believe that we need to be expanding the domain of practice, not just holding on to what we have been loosing for decades. In housing that means the vast majority of houses that are built without any involvement of architects. And for architects to be meaningful participants in that wider market, that will mean buisiness models that are alternates to the traditional
client-architect service model.
SO I do agree with you message to the AIA, but I believe the mission must be broader, and the message to the AIA somehow even stronger. And by stronger I don't mean louder, but I mean better reasoned.
For instance you cited your often used argument about AIA "celebrating architects as gods and celebrating buildings as sculptures". We know this argument revolves around stylistic bias in award programs. The idea that the reform of these awards to include elaborate and expensive houses of other architectural styles to me seems like nothing more than celebrating gods of another style, and sculpture of another type. I don't think the example you made here serves your overall argument very well.
peace, Greg
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Gregory La Vardera
Architect
Gregory La Vardera Architect
Merchantville NJ
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Original Message:
Sent: 07-19-2012 08:28
From: David Andreozzi
Subject: AIA Survey: Repositioning the Institute - Phase 2
A wonderful interaction on a cross-post by Kyle McAdams, a member of the core team running the repositioning effort.
Link Here http://tinyurl.com/brg4swb
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David Andreozzi AIA
Owner
Andreozzi Architects
Barrington RI
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Original Message:
Sent: 07-18-2012 09:12
From: David Andreozzi
Subject: AIA Survey: Repositioning the Institute - Phase 2
This message has been cross posted to the following Discussion Forums: Housing Knowledge Community and Custom Residential Architects Network .
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(Preface) Original email below. Since replying to aia@aia.org isn't really responding to Mr. Ivy in person... here goes...
Mr. Ivy,
With all due respect, I fear that the results you get will not be answering any of the bigger questions. This survey's questions and answers only focus on the ideal vision of what the AIA wants the AIA to believe we are or could be. If you really want to understand the AIA... discover, understand and address its shortcomings, as we are trying to at CRAN. The lack of content, support and representation is why many drop their membership, and this why the AIA as a whole has let the public and their membership down for five decades. We at CRAN are now beginning to start to create that content and value for residential architects that hasn't existing since I joined in the mid eighties.
Further, how can you reposition the AIA based on what architects think, shouldn't it be on what the public wants?
Here is my survey answer. The role of an architect is analogous to an attorney. A highly educated professional that the public relies on to guide us through the building process and add value by better engineering spaces for function, understanding purpose, and adding resale value to our investment. That's it, the answer is about representation! Every client should demand our representation for every design problem. But they are unaware. Today architects are something else. The public doesn't know the value of our representation through the building process because we have spent decades celebrating architects as gods and celebrating buildings as sculptures rather than the process itself. How is this working out for us? We need to educate the public, our client base, that an architect's role is to protect them and their resale values like the insurance we buy for our house. It as rudimentary as that. Put down the glossy magazines and the corbu glasses and celebrate the architect as guardian of the construction process. Only then will the larger public understand our value and demand our services. Lets reposition that!
Stop celebrating the Architect,
Stop celebrating the Architecture,
Start celebrating the process and value of creating Architecture.
Peace,
David Andreozzi
Member of CRAN Steering Committee
(speaking for myself)