Gerhy’s firm, and his legal counsel, insist any problems with the building are the result of sloppy construction, not design. The general contractor, Skanska USA, insists construction documents were not explicit enough and that in some instances the design was unbuildable. If the initial third-party analysis is correct, it will cost tens of millions of dollars to fix the building.

The Stata Center, like every current Gehry project, was designed using Digital Project, an architectural expansion of CATIA, the 3D CAD product from Dassault Systèmes better known as the CAD behind Boeing and Airbus. DP and other cutting edge architectural products are making it easier than ever for signature architects to harness their imagination. But could it be that such CAD products are too empowering for contractors? One suggestion made in the Fast Company article is that signature architects should be much more closely involved in the construction process, to help interpret design intent and to insure consistent quality in adherence to the architect’s vision.

When the concept of Building Information Modeling first started gaining traction early this decade, there was talk of the need to revive the ‘master builder’ concept. Others, including me, speculated that BIM would be first and best embraced by design-build firms, where there is no tug-of-war over responsibility and liability and the lines of communication stay in-house.

Clearly, advanced design software is not enough to propel the construction industry into a new era of fantastic buildings. Vision is useless if it is not executable; there remains much work to be done to make sure that, across the industry, all the players can be on the same playbook. As attention turns to sustainable (“green”) construction, it becomes more crucial than ever that all the stakeholders need to work together to unite art and craft, vision with business, plan with product. 

Excerpts from the Fast Company article “Lost in the Funhouse:”

“This was incredibly dumb.” I am standing at a Stata Center side entrance with Joseph Lstiburek as he points out a brick wall that meets a glass wall with a superficial connection, allowing moisture to seep across the porous brick from outside to inside. Lstiburek (pronounced STEE-bu-rek), an engineer with a Ph.D., is a frequent expert witness in construction lawsuits and an international authority on leaks who gets paid tens of thousands of dollars to cut holes in the sides of buildings and inform the owners how theirs were built wrong. As an independent, unpaid, informal observer, he has had his eye on the Stata Center for several years: “It was obvious it wasn't going to work from watching it go up.”

So who is to blame? Lstiburek posits that the architects should have done a better job of specifying materials and techniques. And the construction firm should have been more rigorous in its quality control. On both fronts, though, these are fundamental errors of craft, not design. In other words, Gehry’s billowing sheets of metal and unexpected angles aren’t at fault: It’s how they were spec’d out and implemented. Two of Gehry’s more prominent creations—the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao and Seattle's Experience Music Project—haven’t had any construction problems.

“It’s hard for people to believe that something so simple is screwing up these buildings,” Lstiburek says. “But this is an industry-wide problem. It’s not because you have a famous architect.” He adds that basic errors like these occur in up to 20% of all new buildings going up, concrete boxes as well as soaring landmarks. (In another high-profile example, Daniel Libeskind’s Denver Art Museum has suffered leaks similar to the Stata Center.) “The more complicated the building,” Lstiburek says, “the more critical workmanship becomes.”
 

  --RSN

Ever wonder how the big Autodesk resellers attract the attention of company executives? We asked freelancer Scott Sowers to mingle with the swells at a recent Revit sales event in Washington DC sponsored by Autodesk reseller Microdesk. You can read his report in the new article, “A Night at the Embassy: An Inside Look at Selling BIM."

--RSN