Small Project Design

  • 1.  Design Review

    Posted 10-16-2014 09:12 PM
    At a recent  Special Permit hearing in my city the Board of Aldermen stepped into the muddy waters of design. A banal addition was being proposed - a 2-story "colonial" addition to a 1-1/2-story "cape." The homeowners had been advised to get an architect but they chose to ignore the request and save on fees. Most Aldermen being lawyers, the discussion focused on the requested 1-ft setback request and whether a different  configuration would by-pass the Special Permit requirement. Some liked the plan, others didn't, but they couldn't articulate the issues "Design's just a matter of taste," one said. And the project was approved.

    There is no public conversation about Design in this fairly sophisticated city 8 miles from Boston. No design review, other than in historic districts. No debate about proposed new developments, other than some like parks, others want parking in its place. No articulated vision about what makes this city unique. And so I'm curious:

    What are the mechanisms for design review in other cities and towns?  What projects trigger design review? Who makes the decisions about what is and isn't acceptable?  Are there incentives for good design, and if so, what are they? This question is really about the ways that architects can influence the context in which things get built - other than in service to individual clients. 

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    Deborah Pierce AIA CAPS
    Principal
    Pierce Lamb Architects
    West Newton MA
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  • 2.  RE: Design Review

    Posted 10-17-2014 05:38 PM

    This is to Robert Reinhardt:
    Robert, I have extensive experience dealing with dealing with insurance companies in rebuilding a historic home as I had to spend 3 years study
    ing it when my own Historic Home was destroyed.  I will be happy to share with you if you contact me off line.

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    Stephen Olson AIA
    Principal
    Olson Architects
    Santa Monica CA
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  • 3.  RE: Design Review

    Posted 10-17-2014 06:12 PM
    Deborah -- I LOVE this topic you've raised.  The Emperor quite frequently has no clothes, and the public and most architects are loathe to point this out. But we architects, as those few in the population who are trained to envision the built environment, have an obligation to inform our communities about this, in my opinion. Most people actually think appearances matter, but our legislative and regulatory review procedures for the most part are set up as if appearances are not at all important.  The legal system is fixated on being "objective" about these concerns, and despite tons of design review criteria and guidelines in many places, we still act in most places in America as if there can be no objective or subjective critique of what anyone is planning for one's property; and as if what is done to one property can have no possible impact on adjacent or nearby properties, even though we're actually a lot smarter than the, I believe.  The legal system makes us adhere to this design visualization fallacy.

    There are many policies and procedures that can be put in place to guide and control design choices, but all require a steadfast, consensus-building, educational approach on design and heritage. Many, many examples in New England, even outside of Boston. Most are defined around establishment of historic districts, but can also be developed around other specified redevelopment criteria within designated redevelopment districts. 

    These are not easily accomplished in single-family suburban housing settings, but in older towns and villages there is more often an appreciation for some set of standards. It could be as simple as a community endorsing but not requiring adherence to the Secretary of the Interior's Standards for Historic Rehabilitation, or could involve setting up a local historic commission and.or historical review board under state legislatively-enabled local historic district ordinances.

    So much more can be written about this, but I'll stop here for now. 
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    Eugene Aleci AIA
    Architect / President
    Community Heritage Partners
    Lancaster PA
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  • 4.  RE: Design Review

    Posted 10-20-2014 06:28 PM
    It's all about the appraisal. Our capitalist economic system rewards companies for creating the most desirable products. Mercedes, Gucci, Rolex all exist as high end companies because their products are valued based on what the consumer thinks of their products expressed by what someone is willing to pay for their products. Real Estate is valued in a way that is more similar to a socialist economic system. In any given market area, a house is valued based on the average of what other houses have recently sold for of a similar size and configuration. The worst cookie cutter house with 4 beds and 3 baths is given the same value as the best one. When everyone gets paid the same regardless of how good of a job they do, this creates a race to the bottom. The builder who sells 40 houses a year at the lowest price will make profit based on volume of sales. Since their sales are the lowest, their next appraisal will always be better than their actual sale as they are averaged out with everyone else who posted higher sales. The team with houses that sell for top dollar will have their appraisals always come in lower than the actual sale as they are averaged with everyone who had lower sales. When you have a system that rewards the company that does the worst job and punishes the company that does the best job, then what do you think will happen?

    Americans love their materialism, status symbols, bragging rights, etc. When the banks and their appraisers start holding spec builders accountable for their own sales and stop allowing those with the lowest sales to use the sales of superior competitors to justify values they did not create, then we will see branding in Architecture. We will see a Mercedes sell as a Mercedes and a Honda sell as a Honda. Until then, those of us that create the most desirable buildings will be punished for a job well done.

    Remember, a house designed for a homeowner is not a sale and does not count toward property values. Residential buildings establish the value of the neighborhoods. The value of commercial buildings are often driven by what people are willing to pay to live in certain areas. Since spec houses represent about 80% of all the new houses being built and are the only houses counted as new sales (highest value per sf), they often drive the value of Architecture. How many of us are designing spec houses? How many of us are contributing to the sales data in the areas where we practice? If more of us could show consistent sales data regardless of neighborhood or builder, then we could make a more credible argument about why we add monetary value to Architecture. Until we can undeniably prove that our involvement in the Real Estate game creates more monetary value, then we should expect to continue being punished for doing our job.

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    Eric Rawlings AIA
    Owner
    Rawlings Design, Inc.
    Decatur GA
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  • 5.  RE: Design Review

    Posted 10-21-2014 05:46 PM
    Eric - I empathize with your frustrations.  But it is really the marketplace that determines a houses value.  Just because a home is unique and designed by an architect does not mean it will sell for more.  I have seen this with my summer parents home (recipient of an AIA award) that has sat on the market for 2 years with only a few showings.  We have lowered the price 10% and will probably accept the first offer we get!

    It is unfortunate that people rarely appreciate architecture.  I suppose the same can be said for art, literature, poetry, and classical music.  Ho-Hum.....

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    Edward Shannon AIA
    Architect
    Imprint Architects
    Des Moines IA
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  • 6.  RE: Design Review

    Posted 10-22-2014 06:45 PM
    Actually, that is my point. Very few people purchase a house out of pocket. Even wealthy people finance houses through a bank. Since the bank is the actual purchaser of the "product", they will determine the loan amount based on what they think it's worth. The bank could care less if the house is an Architectural gem or another cookie cutter, builder box. They don't care about style. Their only concern is about how much they can sell it for if the borrower defaults on the loan. The Appraiser is only looking at market sales data and tries to remain objective in terms of their personal opinion about the design. This is why the appraised value is typically an "average" of the recent sales of similar or Comparable houses. If the buyer wants to spend more than the bank says the house is worth to them, then they can pony up more cash out of pocket to make up the difference, so they start out "underwater" on the their mortgage.

    My point from before is that MY sales data is a better indicator of what MY next house will sell for than using the average sales of houses other builders are selling, especially the guys whose business model is to sell as many houses as possible by undercutting the "competition", essentially out Walmarting everyone. Since about half of my projects are unique speculative houses, I have a mountain of sales data that indicates my houses are typically the highest sales in their neighborhoods regardless of who the builder is. If all I designed were homeowner houses, I wouldn't have this data to back up my claim. The consistency is undeniable. This is no special feat and any half competent Architect could achieve similar results shooting fish in a barrel like I do for a living. If many more of us were doing the same thing, we could prove to the banks that a Mr Potato Head, mass produced house is not as desirable on the open market as one of our houses. Unfortunately, most of us design custom houses for homeowners directly, thus our projects are not sales and don't count toward property values until that homeowner sells the house as a used item. Only a brand new spec house counts as a new sale, which is one of the more despised project types for the average Architect. Because of this, the new Walmart Houses are considered the most valuable per sf and custom designed, homeowner houses that eventually sell as "used" are considered less valuable per sf. This skews the perception of value and what's valuable. It's ironic that the cheapest built houses are considered the most valuable per sf.

    The more we avoid designing spec houses that sell on the open market to unknown buyers and the more banks and their appraisers continue to blindly average sales results among an entire community of competitors, the more this self fulfilling prophecy continues. 

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    Eric Rawlings AIA
    Owner
    Rawlings Design, Inc.
    Decatur GA
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  • 7.  RE: Design Review

    Posted 10-22-2014 08:27 AM
    You are dead on Eric and until real estate appraisers become real appraisers rather than researchers the problem will continue. There is no incentive for sustainable or energy efficient design because houses with these features will at assess at the same value as houses without. Sure there may be utility bill savings but that's not much help when you are trying to get a mortgage that is pegged to the "assessed " value. It is time that appraisers become a real profession with mandatory educational prerequisites and continuing education that include how to place true value on a home's economic worth. ------------------------------------------- Thad Broom AIA Architect Thad A. Broom AIA, P.C. Virginia Beach VA -------------------------------------------


  • 8.  RE: Design Review

    Posted 10-20-2014 07:11 PM
    Here in California, Bay Area, design review is applied in many situations in many cities.  I've seen it in one form or another for at least 25 years.  There is one limited situation where I think it works well:  special historic districts.  In those situations there are often written guidelines derived from known historical styles and details, as well as peculiar local adaptations of those styles.

    Beyond that situation, design review is a mess and I'd be happy to see less of it.  Here are my reasons.

    1.  Architects can be as unimaginative as everybody else and they are just as prone to argue and disagree as everybody else.  So, as I see it, architects are not magical arbiters of good design.  All architects will agree that some architects are fine designers and others are not.  Interestingly, some architects will appear on both lists.

    2.  The most hated, and sometimes the most ordinary, buildings often become loved with time.  I think architects should not be condescending.  It only undermines our influence.  Furthermore, diversity in architecture (diverse creations) are every bit as useful in understanding what works over time and what does not, as diversity in Nature is.  For several reasons here, we should allow some things we really don't like to be built----unless everyone does not like it.

    3.  If design review is handled by a city agency, it must inevitably permit other stakeholders to participate.  That's just political reality everywhere.  Nobody is going to allow architects to be elevated to priestly status.  So design review boards are often populated by people like city planners, real estate agents, landscape architects, contractor's and developers, lay people and political appointees, many of whom wish they were architects too.  The result is a committee that works with the actual architect to find a compromise(d) solution all can agree on.  This is not the road to good design in my opinion.

    4.  I've seen the results and it's hit and miss.  There's a really awful new hospital in town that was tossed around to little positive result.  I've also seen many residential projects that though review, look like the dog's knockers.  I've also seen some nice projects emerge, but they are almost always due to strong design talent in the project architect team.  

    My conclusion, after years of observation, it that design review boards sometimes allow superb projects to be built, which would have been superb without design review.  It causes some pretty decent projects to be horribly compromised.  And in no instance that I can think of, does it turn a design challenged architect into a prince.

    Here I'm not even mentioning other very real objections many others have, chief among them that it add yet another layer of bureaucracy, regulation, politics, cost and delay to projects.  All that might be fine if the results were stellar, but generally they are not.

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    Donald Wardlaw AIA
    More Than Construction, Inc.
    Oakland CA
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  • 9.  RE: Design Review

    Posted 10-18-2014 01:10 PM
    I would guess in the majority of our Country there are no Design Reviews.  You are correct in saying Historic Districts have very good reviews but not in other areas of cities.  They have Design Reviews in housing developments down by home builders of then focusing on the wrong things like all should be wooden and brown.  
    In our City the authorities are trying to dilute the Historic District Commissions ordinance and review..!!
    And, if you get a seat on the Planning Commission or the Zoning Board they say you have a conflict of interest in condemning some designs.
    It is a sad case of America's evolution.

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    Nelson B. Nave AIA
    Owner
    Nelson Breech Nave, AIA Architect
    Kalamazoo MI
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