A brief highlight in a recent Metropolis interview with Phil Bernstein.

On teaching new industry practices:

I also teach the Harvard Business School case about the Waltham project so they understand the technical and sociological aspects of BIM and alternative project delivery and see first-hand how things could be radically different. I have to do so, of course, acknowledging my conflict of interest but I can always rely on my students for a healthy dose of skepticism on that front. For several years I was the only source of information about BIM at Yale, but they are hearing and seeing enough of it out in the world that I’m no longer (implicitly) accused of pitching the idea alone.  My second-term seminar (which you have visited in the past) has several visitors like John Tocci, Peter Gluck, Scott Frank and others who bring a BIM perspective that just comes with their work. There is an emerging understanding of BIM in the studio and a decent appreciation of the issue in other classrooms.  And it doesn’t hurt that, in the current market, BIM skills make a recent graduate much more employable!

On architects learning means and methods:

Somewhere in Brazil right now I hope there is a young, brilliant architecture student wondering why office buildings in a modern city collapse, looking at the huge opportunities for construction over the next decade there, and realizing that she could help re-invent the very means of design and construction in a place where innovation is desperately needed to face the challenges of modernization.  (N.B. – one of our recent graduates is working for Tocci now as the “Design/Construction Integrator,” the bridge between the CM and the architects.  He moves fluidly with the designers and often works side by side with them, but carries the torch for the construction managers. Ironically, almost none of this work counts toward his IDP licensure requirements!)

The countdown to atomization continues. Laura Handler, Director of VDC, blogged her thoughts at (bim)x:

As the countdown clock continues [99 days, 2 hours, 12 minutes, 26, 25, 24 sec...], everything I read reminds me of the work that we need to do in preparation for Atomization. One component of Atomization that I haven’t given enough attention to is the start of our R&D department (although to be honest, it will likely continue to be neglected until the clock hits 0 – projects and people come first!). None the less, the pressure is on and my subconscious (and conscious) is feeling it! Here are just a few recent (okay, and less than recent) reads that make me think R&D:

Why Success Always Starts with Failure

These are great principles for an R&D department, but an even better perspective for the rest of company to have about R&D. Among other things, R&D is our ‘safe space to fail’, but we need to continue to incorporate that philosophy into day-to-day operations.

Seimens’ new iPad App

Cool, but these feels like an incremental innovation. I’d like to see more than the relatively static BAS interface. Show us some BIM. None the less, this is a step in the right direction, and I’m excited to take a closer look.

Augmented Reality

I think I saw this on Twitter a few weeks ago, but forgot about it until another Tocci teammate, put the print issue on my desk with a post-it, “I wanted you to see this. So cool.” The technology and potential is very exciting. But what is even more exciting to me is that BNB is doing amazingly innovative things, despite (or maybe because) VDC is already atomized. One of my secret atomization fears is that we won’t be able to sustain the same level of innovation. This made me feel better – thanks Dace!

Pictures taken last Friday at the Cambridge site – soil mix wall along the north foundation line.  Waterproofing and cap beam work at these piles begin this week.  Thanks to Dean, from Consigli, for the guided tour.

A proposed detail for one of our projects was constructed as a mock-up by The Waterproofing Company at SGH’s lab. The proposed detail takes the shear studs out of play, placing a termination bar vertically on either side of the shear stud. Schnabel provided the steel, scraped up to match conditions after excavation. Although the mock-up assembly was completed last Thursday, it will take some time for the liquid membrane to cure completely. The project team awaits the results of the water test!

Photo Credit: SGH

Thoughts from Tocci’s team on Salon’s recent article on “the architecture meltdown”.

Moises Berrun

The overall tone of the article rings familiar. Sometimes I feel the hierarchical structure of architecture is unnecessary, especially for a profession that has demanded less and less technical skill. In my various experience, the architects I worked for push the technical responsibility onto other registered professionals, i.e. engineers. The profession has trended to value creativity more and more ( a good thing) while still holding on to “dues-paying.” Creativity is often a result of extraordinary risk-taking and it does not fit well with a risk-averse professional path of study. So as the profession ventures more and more into the realm of artistry, I often think one of the problems is relying on the construction cost to determine professional fees, especially for a profession that is less and less knowledgeable of means and methods.