Architect or Designer: Which is Better for Your Self Build?

There’s a legendary story about Frank Lloyd Wright – probably the best-known architect of the modern era – that goes a little like this. A rich self-build client, Edgar Kaufmann, commissions Lloyd Wright to design a one-off house on a spectacular sloping site in Pennsylvania. He waits months for a design to materialise, and nothing turns up. So, keen to see how his pet project is getting on, and possibly to try and put a bit of pressure on the famously difficult architect, Kaufmann phones the Lloyd Wright offices and tells them he’s driving over immediately for a meeting. This three-hour warning finally sparks our architect hero’s creative juices and, in 180 minutes of frenzied activity, a design is completed from scratch. The result is widely regarded as his masterpiece — Fallingwater, one of the most famous individual houses of all time.

It’s a fun story, and certainly one that the brilliant self-publicist Frank Lloyd Wright was happy to spread. But it’s when you look at two details that things get more relevant to those of us building new homes in the 21st century. Firstly, his fees. Lloyd Wright, the world’s most famous architect, charged $8,000 in design fees out of a build cost of $147,000. Ignoring the issues of inflation, that might strike you as pretty good value — 5%, give or take. That’s half of what you might expect on the RIBA scale of charges – more of which later – all for one of the most iconic homes ever built. Or, looking at it another way, that’s a lot of money for three hours’ work.

Secondly, it’s also worth noting that Fallingwater wasn’t exactly a success in practical terms. Its iconic cantilevered balconies were beset by structural problems from day one and its maintenance and re-engineering proved exceptionally costly (SEE BELOW). To this day, many architects have trouble with Frank Lloyd Wright’s designs because they look great on paper and in pictures, but they are almost unbuildable. Added to that, Frank Lloyd Wright was a traditional artist/ architect, in that he was pretty prescriptive about the concepts he delivered. There was little room for amendments and negotiation here. You either liked the lowish ceilings, dramatic inside/outside spaces, and you lived the way Lloyd Wright intended, or you went elsewhere. It was a good job our self-builder Edgar Kaufmann was happy to indulge him.

Things have changed quite significantly for those of us building or renovating today. For a start, we’re a lot less deferential to our architects. A few of us might be happy to give over the concept of our new home to a trusted architect, but the vast majority demand a lot more control. The truth is, with the boom in interest in house design in the last 15 years, through magazines like this and TV shows such as Grand Designs, we all have a pretty good idea of the home we’d like to live in, and what it should look like — and probably also have precious lifestyle visions in our mind to hold a floorplan together. We need that artist/architect less and less, but we need that architectural engineer, that technologist – the missing link in Frank Lloyd Wright’s chain – more and more. That’s true also because of our new desire to push our homes to their engineering limits, in terms of open spans, energy efficiencies (solar gain, etc.) and so on. Architecture is more about engineering than it’s ever been.

Which brings us to the current choice for today’s self-builder. In general, you’ve got three options. The ‘Architect’ (written with a capital ‘A’ in architectural circles), who’s spent seven long and expensive years studying to become a formally qualified ‘Architect’ and has to work pretty hard continuing his ‘Professional Development’ throughout his career, just to keep up with the game. There are in excess of 4,000 registered architects’ practices in the UK. Then there’s the ‘architectural technologists’. They are fully qualified architectural technologists and have spent three to five years getting their title, and there are about 9,000 of them.

After that, there’s the people with professional qualifications who can do design work. This includes some ‘chartered surveyors’ (RICS) and even ‘structural engineers’ (IStructe). They are usually specialists in particular details — historic buildings, remodelling work, and so on. Lastly, and by far the largest constituency of our design world, are the unqualified house designers. The Yellow Pages lists them under ‘architectural services’ (no capital ‘A’ here) and that’s exactly what they offer. They might have 30 years’ experience and be brilliant designers; they might be recently unemployed builders who fancy making a living off drawing up houseplans. You or I could set up as a house designer tomorrow, in the same way that you could set up any other business.

And there’s the rub. Speak to any representative of the above formally recognised groups of designers and they’ll all start off by saying exactly the same thing — within any group, there are good and bad, and a title is no guarantee of picking the right person. You need a football manager? Well, there’s a world of difference between Sir Alex Ferguson and Bryan Robson, but they’ve both got the same coaching qualifications, and they’re both ‘football managers’.

And that’s why going out with the intention of engaging with an architect or an architectural technologist or even a house designer is probably missing the point. For a start, the differences between what the two formal bodies claim to do really aren’t that striking. Check this out from the Chartered Institute of Architectural Technologists (CIAT):

“CIAT members:

• assess the needs of clients and agree the project brief;
• produce and evaluate feasibility studies;
• develop project briefs and design programmes;
• advise clients on methods of project procurement;
• prepare and present design proposals using CAD or traditional techniques;
• administer contracts and project certification;
• maintain adequate Professional Indemnity Insurance;
• undertake structured Continuing Professional Development (CPD)”

The Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) offers an almost identical description of what an architect will offer.

The traditional perception of the difference has been that architects have design skills and are able to come up with original concepts that can really make the most of a client’s brief, whereas architectural technologists, as (architect) Julian Owen says, “Might acquire design skills during their work, but they tend to be in the minority.” In a way, this is back to the Frank Lloyd Wright idea — that he would have benefitted from a technologist to tell him that Fallingwater would have failed, but a technologist could never have had the creative vision to come up with Fallingwater in the first place. But according to Hugh Morrison from CIAT, “CIAT Chartered Members in private practice can undertake a building project from inception through to completion in the same way an architect can. CIAT and RIBA members work together in practice and also in competition as would architects with other architects and chartered architectural technologists with other chartered architectural technologists in practice, so we do not view our members as being in opposition to those of RIBA.” According to RIBA, however, there is a difference. Here’s Richard Brindley, RIBA’s Executive Director of Professional Services on the subject: “The role of the architect and the architectural technologist are discrete. The latter forms the link between the architect’s concept and the completed construction; together through the design development process they bridge the gap between idea and reality of a building in functional and aesthetic terms.” He’s using that Frank Lloyd Wright thing again, but you could argue that he’s not doing architects many favours, effectively propagating the idea that architects are just fancy dans whose houses – should they ever be left to design them themselves – would probably fail instantly.

It is, despite this, a pretty fair conclusion that the roles are merging, and that the titles mean less and less. In just the same way that it’s true to say many technologists are pretty effective in the design stakes, you’d be wrong to assume that all architects don’t know how to design houses that stand up. If they get the job done, and you end up with a house that looks great, is built within your budget, and stands the test of time, then you’ve got just as good a result whether the designer is an architect, technologist, surveyor, engineer or humble draughtsman.

Fallingwater: Almost “Fall-in-Water”
What happens when concept and reality don’t meet.

Frank Lloyd Wright’s 1936 masterpiece one-off home in the Pennsylvanian hills is one of the most iconic homes of all time — but it has been beset by structural problems from the very start. As the wooden supports were removed from the famous concrete cantilevers, the first floor terrace immediately sagged 45mm; over the next 70 years it sagged a further 240mm. During construction the chief engineer argued with Lloyd Wright as to the amount of steel reinforcements needed. Although he lost the argument, the engineer quietly doubled the amount of steel reinforcements from 8 to 16 — a move which Lloyd Wright blamed for the failure (arguing that the extra weight of the steel was the problem); later analysis showed that it did in fact save the house from complete collapse. Additionally, the famous waterfall which the house is built over is problematic in itself — not only does it provide issues with mould in the house, but in stormy conditions falling boulders have been known to clatter into the structure.

Whilst cracks appeared almost immediately, the possibility of complete collapse was not recognised until the mid 1990s, and the owner, a conservancy trust, commissioned a major renovation, reinforcing the beams with an invisible system of tensioning steel cables and ensuring, at a cost of $11m, the future of the design classic.
fallingwater.org.

ABOVE: You can see the wear and tear to the terraces in the right image; the left image shows the beams on one of the terraces before renovation.

Further reading:

• Architect or Designer? - Advice From the Experts
• How to Get the Most From Your House Designer
• The Essence of Good House Design