Ruth Reed, President of the RIBA, opened the conference, discussing what she has discovered in her visits to practice since taking her position. The removal of fee data, the challenges of lobbying politicians, the issues of public procurement (particularly for small practices) and the inability of practices to provide sufficient experience for Part 1 and Part 2 students are all pertinent areas for practices in the UK at the moment.

The first session was chaired by Vicky Richardson, editor of Blueprint magazine, and looked at the benefits of collaboration with other architects, professionals and organisations.

Collaboration is the ideal state of architecture

Richardson’s opening address discussed the collective effort involved in producing a building, and how architects can be the leaders of collaboration in the design process.

With reference to small practice in particular, it is suggested that there is now no real advantage of being a large practice - smaller firms now have as much of an opportunity to work with a multitude of professionals and agencies. We are reminded that a collaboration is only ever as good as the people involved, and sometimes there may be a tendency to try to find the most extreme collaboration, or perhaps for the sake of including it as a box ticking exercise around the latest buzzword.

http://www.blueprintmagazine.co.uk/

Serendipity

Paul Monaghan explains how his practice (AHMM) produced a series of RIBA exhibitions in the early 90s, leading to potential routes for collaboration and diversification of the sectors that the practice was able to find work in. By putting on an exhibition entitled ‘Design for Doctors’, inviting other practices to submit, along with presenting one of their own schemes, AHMM were then asked to design a series of healthcare projects. The production of a design for the ‘Classroom of the Future’ led to further work in the education sector.

There is an emphasis on needing to be in the right place at the right time, and by embracing opportunities for collaboration, maintaining contact with architectural peers, taking initially small jobs and not always working with the easiest of people, bigger opportunities will emerge.

http://www.ahmm.co.uk/

Unintended Consequences

Simon Foxell discusses the process of public procurement with particular reference to the Building Schools for the Future (BSF) programme in Birmingham. He discussed the seemingly large number of architects that can be involved in the process (architects producing a reference scheme, design managers, CABE enablers, bidding architects, the CABE review panel). The benefit of this number of architects in such a variety of roles is that they are all passionate about design, with the emphasis of the BSF programme being on “what design can do for education in Birmingham”.

Appearing bigger than you are

Andrew Waugh presents the story behind Stadhaus (a housing scheme in Hoxton, London), the world’s tallest timber building, a collaboration between Waugh Thistleton Architects, Techniker Structural Engineers and KLH Timber.

By working closely with the engineers and manufacturers, the possibility for an alternative to a concrete framed tower was explored and presented to the client in a convincing manner, with relation to the cost, environmental and time benefits of the cross laminated timber panel method. The team produced a sketch for the client, comparing the construction methods, making the benefits apparent in terms of density, weight and programme.

Working with the local authority, it was established that by using the timber structure CO2 savings equivalent to 210 years of alternative sustainable technology (solar panels resulting in a 10% saving of the buildings emissions) could be achieved, and this would meet the demands of legislation whilst saving the client additional expenditure on sustainable technology.

http://www.waughthistleton.com/
http://www.techniker.co.uk/
http://www.klhuk.com/site/

Session 1 Panel