Category: Design Industry

The 2030 Commitment and the AIA Sustainability Advancement Working Group

Posted on by Jon Bell

Sustainability is a watchword in the architectural community, one that has broader implications than just energy savings and lowering carbon emissions. According to the Framework for Design Excellence, sustainable design is more than just lowering energy use and includes considering the “triple bottom line” of social, economic, and environmental value. Sustainable buildings should contribute to a diverse, accessible, walkable, and human-scaled community; support biodiversity and connect with regional habitat restoration; conserve water and material resources; be economical, and balance first costs with long-term value; support occupants’ and the surrounding community’s physical, mental and emotional health; be adaptable over time and address future risks and vulnerabilities from social, economic and environmental change; continuously improve upon discoveries made in previous projects; and be a beautiful addition to the built world that future generations will want to keep around.

As a profession with so much responsibility for shaping the built environment, architects have always had an interest in sustainability and all that the word implies. But in the day-to-day rush to get projects in and out the door, it is difficult to incorporate all of the diverse interests, information overload, conflicting data, and demands for sustainability that eager designers encounter. What do we concentrate on first? And how do we incorporate sustainable goals in the face of occasionally indifferent owners and tight budgets?

AIA Colorado supports many committees working on subjects of importance to the architectural community, including the Sustainability Advancement Working Group. Formerly the Resiliency Knowledge Community—with a concentration on how to ensure the built environment can respond to fires, floods, climate change, and other disruptions—they are now concentrating on promoting the 2030 Commitment and assisting design firms with adapting their practices to meet it. The 2030 Commitment envisions building projects achieving Net Zero energy use by 2030. Being carbon neutral means that carbon produced through a building’s operations will be offset by the project generating as much renewable energy as the building consumes.

2030 Commitment

In 2018 alone, firms participating in the 2030 Commitment saved 17.7 million metric tons of CO2, which is equivalent to the carbon emissions that would be avoided by taking all the cars in Georgia off the road for an entire year. Signing onto the AIA 2030 Commitment involves a commitment to gather information and evaluate the impact design decisions have on your project’s energy performance, allowing you to track improvements in the energy performance of your firm’s projects over time. Design firms joining the 2030 Commitment will gain access to confidential data from leading AIA firms’ projects worldwide. They will also be provided with the support, education, tools, and analysis that can help them improve their expertise, develop new sustainable approaches to sell to clients, validate their design approach, compare their data to other firms in the region, and help combat climate change while improving the bottom line. See this link for more information:

Firms joining the 2030 Commitment must submit a Sustainability Action Plan within 6 months. The SAP guides firms in creating their approach to sustainable design and provides an opportunity to strategically and methodically translate your sustainability goals into a comprehensive approach for transforming your practices and portfolio. The Sustainability Advancement Working Group provides additional educational resources for architects who want to improve their abilities to create sustainable architecture. The committee has already waded through the massive amounts of information and resources available to provide architects with a better understanding of how they can improve their projects for their clients and communities.

Members of the Sustainability Group emphasize that sustainable architecture doesn’t have to cost more. For example, optimizing the massing and orientation of a building can have a huge impact on energy costs without requiring additional funds. Energy modeling is a lot more sophisticated and user-friendly these days—previously, practitioners had to perform the math calculations for their solutions themselves, and now the computer programs can provide these automatically. Many people use these programs to inform their design as it progresses, and daylighting analysis has also improved, giving designers and their engineers vital information before floor plans and elevations are fixed. LEED standards and building codes have also greatly improved the energy performance and indoor health of buildings. Public clients often require LEED certification, and the industry has moved further into green architecture to accommodate these requests, offering marketing opportunities for firms interested in sustainability. Designers today are much more aware of the need to control waste, lower energy use, and increase material conservation and indoor air quality, while new non-VOC building products that weren’t available even 5 years ago are ubiquitous today.
While the 2030 Commitment concentrates on reducing operational carbon, a focus on embodied carbon is trending among sustainable practitioners. Some materials naturally contain more embodied carbon than others; for example, concrete structures require more energy to produce than a wood structure. Where material comes from is increasingly important. As the 2030 Commitment begins to reduce operational carbon, interested designers predict that a continued focus on sustainability will gradually shift to reducing embodied carbon as well.

My focus professionally has been on using Lean methods to integrate cross-functional teams in the design and construction of buildings. Lean dovetails perfectly with sustainable building—both practices acknowledge that having integrated teams early in the design process is key. It has often been stated that in the first 10% of design, almost 70% of all costs and environmental impacts have already been determined. Primary materials, the structural system, fenestration and massing and orientation are often determined at this point before engineers even start their work. Having a set floor plan that engineers must then “fit” mechanical, electrical, and plumbing systems into creates a piecemeal approach to design, ensuring that the project will ultimately perform as less than the sum of its parts. Contractors brought in late in the design process—even by the Design Development phase under a CMGC contract—have very little room to make recommendations that will greatly improve the project, and on most traditional projects do not provide specific trade knowledge from those “Last Planners” who will ultimately install these systems. Bringing engineers and even major subcontractors on early gives architects the knowledge to create the optimal project for their clients using a whole systems approach.

Intimate knowledge of how a building will be built is key to providing true sustainability that can actually be measured. A design/build firm specializing in bringing Passive House principles to their projects described one commission from a prominent learning institution that required them to design and build the mirror image of an existing college dorm building across a quad. Using Lean and sustainable principles, they managed to create a mirror image of the building—only the new structure met Passive House standards while costing $5 per square foot less than the building built 5 years before. Passive House concentrates on designing and building a façade that controls the passage of air and moisture. The HVAC system is sized to accommodate the façade. Hence, the new dorm only required a 20-ton mechanical system, which was much easier and more economical to build and operate than the previous dorm’s 70-ton system.

Holistic thinking is central to sustainable architecture. Yet in current practice, many engineers design for a “type” of building (not the actual building being designed), using rules of thumb that grossly over design the system, especially the mechanical and electrical systems. For example, when designing a school, interior designers who choose paint colors with a high light reflectance value can reduce the number of light fixtures required to light the room, which also reduces the need for cooling. Expensive, efficient windows can provide occupants with a comfortable environment while also eliminating the need for a perimeter heating system. Unfortunately, sustainable projects still usually calculate payback on line-items and not on systems as a whole, leading to poorly considered decisions that eliminate those “expensive” windows without calculating the additional cost for the mechanical system.

Hence, if the mechanical engineer is designing for a building “type,” he/she will design for the worst-case scenario without collaborating with others: The month is July, the building is at full capacity, the weather is the hottest on record, all the lights are on at noon, and his mechanical system can still cool the building—then they add a safety factor! By bringing in everyone early to discuss the actual building being designed, using multi-disciplinary teams that include MEP engineers and contractors and the architect working together, you can create a whole that is better and cheaper than the sum of its parts. The team should make decisions together, then design to those decisions. Contractors keep a check on costs, and ensure that constructability is an input to the design and not an outcome inevitably leading to weeks of scope cuts and “value engineering.”

One obstacle to adopting this process is that a typical architect’s traditional fee structure—with design fees peaking in the Construction Documentation phase—does not easily allow project teams to bring important people in early. Owner expectations are an issue; designers must show that there is great benefit in spending more time and money early in the design process when the most value can be created cheaply. Trade partners early in the process can work together with designers to deliver the building earlier than is possible when contractors are brought in too late. The team can compress submittal and RFI review times, or perhaps even eliminate submittals altogether with the cooperation of trades and owner groups in the design phase. All while delivering a sustainable building that costs less to operate and is better integrated into its environment.

One book that combines a Lean approach to a new vision of sustainability (where building designers aren’t just satisfied that their buildings have a “lesser” impact on their environment, but actually enhance the environment they stand within), is “The Integrative Design Guide for Green Building: Redefining the Practice of Sustainability.” If an architect would like to jumpstart a sustainable culture in their firm, read the book, sign up for the 2030 Commitment, and then contact the Sustainability Advancement Working Group for more educational opportunities and assistance. With a little commitment, we can all do our part to decrease the impact the built environment has on climate change and pollution!

Equity in Architecture: A Frank Conversation with Annicia Streete

Posted on by Jon Bell

Annicia Streete

“Every generation has a responsibility to the next generation—and accountability to the previous.”

By Amy Dvorak, Assoc. AIA

Annicia Streete is an architecture and construction practitioner at Catena Construction and Sprocket Design+Planning. She’s an adjunct faculty member of the College of Architecture and Planning at the University of Colorado, serves as a faculty advisor for the American Institute of Architecture Students, served in the ACE Mentorship Program, and is on the founding team of the Colorado Chapter of the National Organization of Minority Architects. She’s also a Black immigrant.

With statistical odds against her—there are just 17 registered Black architects in the state of Colorado—Streete emigrated from Trinidad and Tobago in 1998 to pursue her education and career in architecture. And she’s done quite well. She remains committed to improvement and enhancement through education and opportunity, as demonstrated through her service in the ACE Mentorship Program and her recent participation as a panelist for the AIA Colorado event, “Let’s Talk About Race.” 


Afterwards, we caught up with Streete to discuss ways to achieve a more equitable profession. Read on as she dives deep on representation in architecture, accountability, and the racism that still exists in our state today. 
 
 

Representation in architecture: Why is it so important? 

Michelle Obama gave a quote at the AIA Conference in Architecture in 2017: “You can’t be an architect if you don’t know architects exist.” For me, that is so specific in what the intent is there. How would we know what we can be if we don’t have an example? 


In Trinidad and Tobago, there were no female architects designers—no influence for me, mostly men. My father was in construction, and my uncle was in engineering. Particularly looking at younger generations, those are formative years to anyone who’s been where you want to be to figure out how to get there. 
 

How has the architecture profession built roadblocks to participation for people of color? 

When I think about pursuing basic opportunities when first starting my journey into the profession, for me I always have a student’s perspective. Even before higher ed, giving students in communities with lesser access to resources that might exclude them is a hindrance and it trickles all the way up to the profession. I say that because the profession has resources to reach communities. If we expect the profession to be fed by communities, we must nurture communities. 


Some other things that have been noted is that licensing—being able to do that in a timely manner, access to study materials, cost of licensure—it’s a hindrance to some. When some get into the practice world, they’re not making enough to even cover normal or daily expenses. Compensation rates when I first entered the field didn’t seem at all commensurate after doing due diligence toward a degree. 
 

What needs to change in the architecture profession to better combat systemic racism?

It should be cyclical. What as a profession can we give into the community so that they’re nurtured, so the product—the students—can be fed back into the profession? It’s extending resources at the community level, making sure there’s adequate mentorship and scholarships for upcoming practitioners and designers. 


The thing not so tangible is the relationships, especially for minorities in the field, so that they have an equitable position in the practice. One of my mentors said, “We’re in the business of architecture, construction, or design. But we’re basic human beings, so we have to be able to relate on a human standard with each other.” It’s not always business as usual.
 

Why is it that we’re so uncomfortable talking about race?

A lot is systemic. Usually when I hear words like systemic racism—and now more frequently—I try to stay rooted in what the words actually mean. There is a system put in place that people have been taught to treat another race differently. Some don’t know how to engage or interact with another race. When that’s been engrained, how would you expect someone to engage on a basic human level if you haven’t been taught that? 


There’s not so much of a willingness to understand another perspective or culture, so the instinct is to shy away versus engage. Some people don’t want to go there. There are three different types of people: Some see themselves as allies. Some see themselves as racist, some as non-racist. And many people are non-racist but don’t have the courage to speak up. You have these systemic factors and some are more personal in how they engage with other people.
 

What opportunities do you see for those who want to create change but aren’t in leadership positions?

Start by adopting activities of not just mentorship but empowerment. You can be mentored in a firm, but the next step is empowerment. Give opportunity for those you mentor to exercise their skills, and there needs to be accountability with that, where you don’t leave someone out to dry. 


I had a good mentor on a well-known project in Denver. During a client meeting, he was tired from talking and he asked me to run the next part of the meeting. I was an intern. He empowered me. By the time I was done with the meeting, I felt proud and accomplished. Just one experience changed the whole outlook on empowerment. 


You have to recognize that you’ve been given a platform and opportunity to make way in  industry, and that has to be redeposited into the industry. If we’re talking about equity, everyone deserves the opportunity to have knowledge passed on. 
 

A lot of pressure has unfairly been put on BIPOC to create the necessary change. Whose duty is it to make firms more equitable?

All of us—but not all of us have the same opportunities or the same platforms. 


It should come from a position of conscience, from responsibility, to see your fellow designer succeed so the entire field can succeed. When someone is oppressed for so long, fighting and fighting for so long, chances are you want people who have been oppressing to take some action and responsibility. 


Part of the exhaustion comes into play. When being an ally and approaching someone to see how they’re doing, making sure you’re being aware, you might not get the response you think you’d get. You can’t take it personally. There’s so much you might not know about what that person has been through and is different in how everyone handles certain levels of pressure. 
The word that keeps coming to me: needed. 
 

In response to the panel discussion—a prompt for the architecture community to have a conversation on racial inequities—someone commented, “Too late. Action is what’s next.” How do you respond to that? 

Any discussion is always good as a way to make sure you’re putting out the right messages and being heard. I partly agree; action is what is needed. When you think about the amount of years of oppression, we’ve been talking. When I think about people who are not aware, I always give people the benefit of the doubt. That’s my approach as a human being. If you show me respect, expect to get that. People who are unaware, we have to educate and inform. So the discussions become a starting point that should have happened and been acted on years ago. But as a catalyst, let it work as a catalyst, not as an escape that might be used. 


When we think of where we are as a society, we’re late. We’re a few hundred years late. And while it’s never too late to do anything I believe, you have to back it up with action, you have to acknowledge that you’re late. Nothing wrong with acknowledging it using words like listen and engage. 


If your intentions are sincere from the beginning, even if you don’t know what the next step is, you need to understand there is action that can come behind your fence. It’s not that everyone is taking the same action or the same scale of action, whether donating or skills-related or protesting and being present, there are different scales of support to be lent, but to me it’s the core of your intentions. 


I want everyone to be aware. If you realize that this is an ever present battle and stigma. Just because it’s not on news, that doesn’t mean it’s not history. People need to understand that this is an ever present issue. That’s why it’s systemic. It’s been 400 years, 500 years, and still today in modern times, we are still faced with the issue. This isn’t just going to go away. 
 

What concerns you for the future of the profession? 

I had a run-in with a white gentleman who took something away from me. He used the N-word and said, “Trump is gonna get all you out of this country.” I was getting gas in Capitol Hill. He grabbed the hose from me and just went off—in my own neighborhood. Here I thought I had security. This happened first thing in the morning on my way to work. I thought, I have to stand up to this. I spoke intelligently, said what I didn’t appreciate, and asked what examples he was setting for the kids he had in his car. I’m not even safe in my own domain, my own neighborhood, place of work. Then I got to thinking about my family, my students, my black colleagues—are they experiencing the same treatment? 


It’s hard to shut down my brain at night. I try not to live with too much fear. Scriptures are something I really hold onto. One speaks about fear and not letting it take over, but overcoming fear. That helps me calm the mind and think about possibilities.


I think about those kids, sitting there, hearing that. They absorb everything. That’s systemic.


It’s a loaded general concern for loved ones, for friends and family, how they’re going to not just move forward, but also how they may thrive in society as it is right now. 
 

What else do you want those in the profession to know?

We need to just love and understand each other and treat each other for basic human respect. Take steps that promote each other in being able to succeed. Some firms need to have training on diversity on how to be able to do that. And people need to show up. By your actions, we can tell. If your actions don’t align, then I can’t see you in a certain light that you’re an ally or committed to seeing change. 


If you’re white, and you’re seeing these stories on the news, don’t be in such a position of opposition just because it’s being publicized. I see some very non-understanding responses, and it’s unfortunate and unfair, and some of it is disgusting. If I asked you to put the same scenario on yourself, you’d want me to be understanding. 
Every generation has a responsibility to the next generation—and accountability to the previous. 

Virtual Connect: COVID-19 Restaurant Design Considerations

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Virtual Connect: Alternate Means & Methods Including Mass Timber

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Licensure in the Time of Coronavirus

Posted on by Jon Bell

By Avik Guha, AIA, Project Manager at Roth Sheppard Architects and Jered Minter, AIA, Campus Architect at the University of Colorado Denver, Office of Institutional Planning

Although not the topic we expected to be covering, please read on for an update from the NCARB/AIA Colorado Architect Licensing Advisors. 2020 is a transition year, with both outgoing Avik K Guha, AIA, NCARB, CDT and incoming Jered Minter, AIA both active in the role together.

We send our sympathies to all who are directly impacted by the virus, and everyone in the architecture community dealing with the economic effects and unusual workflow for our collaborative industry.

For Avik, it has been especially disappointing as he received an Architectural Education Foundation travel scholarship in 2019 and is canceling 70+ reservations for a trip planned to start on April 16, 2020. The trip included a loop around the world through five continents; you can follow him on Instagram (@thearchitecttraveler) and at https://architecttraveler.com/ when his travels resume in 2021. His office, Roth Sheppard Architects, has all staff working from home with their full computer workstations. The firm stays in touch with weekly scheduling meetings and happy hours where all employees have face-to-face interaction via video chat.

Jered has been adapting to working at home also. He and his wife are able to work full-time and spend a large part of their day on the phone/online. They are doing well while blending work and family life but there are real challenges. Their two-year-old daughter is home and so their work schedules no longer follow a typical workflow. They both find themselves working nights and weekends to find balance in work/family life. The good news is their daughter is working hard to learn Revit so she can pick up Jered’s redlines!

For our Colorado candidates who are testing, please see the below on NCARB’s modified policies on testing and timelines. Here’s what you need to know as of now:

  • Effective from March 12 and continuing through the end of April, all ARE appointments can be rescheduled at no cost to you. This window is subject to extension.
  • A 90-day rolling clock extension was applied retroactively to all valid passing scores as of March 1. All extensions were granted via NCARB’s candidate management system on March 24. Visit https://www.ncarb.org/pass-the-are/start/rolling-clock for more on the ARE rolling clock.
  • Prometric has temporarily closed all test centers in the United States and Canada for 30 days, beginning on March 18. This date is subject to extension.
  • If you already had a division scheduled between March 18 and March 31, NCARB should have applied a seat credit within 72 hours of your appointment, allowing you to reschedule at no additional cost to you. In the case of issues, contact NCARB customer service at the link below.
  • On March 31, all appointments between April 1 and April 15 were automatically canceled. NCARB will apply a seat credit to your appointment, allowing you to reschedule at no additional cost to you. In case of issues, contact NCARB customer service at the link below.
  • If you have an appointment scheduled before the end of April, NCARB encourages candidates to login to their NCARB Record and reschedule existing appointments for late-May at the earliest. If you had/have an existing appointment with Prometric and do not reschedule on your own, you will receive instructions directly from Prometric to assist you in rescheduling your appointment at no additional cost once it is safe to resume testing.
  • When testing begins again, candidates may be permitted to wear medical masks and gloves while testing, but these items will be subject to visual inspection upon entry to the test center.

To stay up to date on changes and for more clarification and FAQ’s on Coronavirus impacts on licensure, please visit:

https://www.ncarb.org/press/prometric-are-rescheduling-update and

https://www.ncarb.org/press/2020-coronavirus-update

You can contact NCARB customer service at: https://www.ncarb.org/contact or call 202-879-0520

In general there are no changes to the education and experience components of licensure in regards to NCARB policies. For those who may face difficulties in obtaining ‘A hours’ in a licensed Architecture setting, please visit https://www.ncarb.org/gain-axp-experience/experience-requirements/setting-o to learn about ways to complete Other ‘O hours’.

With more time indoors, it may be a good time for candidates to prepare for exams to knock them out once testing resumes. Even with everything going on right now, it is possible to stay on track for your path to licensure!

For those who are unfamiliar, the Architect Licensing Advisor is a state-level joint NCARB and AIA Colorado role that lasts three years. The Advisor provides presentations to university classes and AIAS groups about licensure, collaborates with DORA for presentations at AIA Colorado, and provides personalized guidance for licensure questions and cases at axp@aiacolorado.org. Please feel free to reach out if you have a licensure or Colorado/DORA specific licensure question!

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