What about a holistic approach?

To admit defeat and focus most of our energy on a single element of a building is to kill any idea of holistic design.

Good design is holistic. That means that everything within the building is designed with all other elements in mind. The structure works with the mechanical, which works with the interior, which works with the envelope, and any other possible combination of those elements. The resulting product is coordinated to the point that nothing appears out of place or incidental; the building feels like a whole, not the sum of its parts.

   

I maintain that the architect is the only qualified member of the project team that genuinely cares about all aspects of a building. Even in a system where our role has been so greatly eroded, it is our responsibility to have a hand in every aspect of the design—even if we don’t control it directly—because we are the only ones who have that holistic picture in mind. Even if we aren’t the ones to put pen to paper, we still have influence. I think we should use that influence to ensure the building comes to together as a unified whole. To focus all of our attention to the envelope is to reinforce the public’s surface understanding of architecture—that our role is to keep the water out and make it pretty. In reality, the magic of today’s architecture is the absolute coordination of all elements. If all of our design energy goes to the envelope, we have one beautifully resolved element that may or may not relate to the rest of the construction. To fight for influence in all aspects is to protect holistic design; it is to create a beautifully resolved whole.

     

The architect’s role has continually been diminished for the last several decades. To accept that our role is solely to design the envelope is to continue this trend and give up on the polished, completed projects holistic design creates.