This was my first time submitting my own, quasi project before a design review board. The experience was highly rewarding on many levels and a stark reminder why it’s important to hire a professional.
Architects are somewhat outcasts these days. They cost too much, they take too long, they never respond; on and on it goes. Home owners, or even small business people rarely go to an architect first. They typically go to a contractor. Architects, also know as building professionals have some sort of special knowledge about building that most people don’t have, yet everyone seems to know what they do when it comes down to it.
Owners go to contractors first, ask how much, then architects, and say can you draw this, when they need a permit or something similar. In residential design anyone can design a house (as the law says) and nearly everyone is designing homes. Ranging from Joe to Sally and everyone else who has never taken an architecture class. The problem is nearly all of the people designing homes have never gone to school to study architecture. That would be terrifying if everyone who was having dental work was being serviced by a none dentist. That would be pretty scary. That’s how residential architecture exist today. Architecture is more than just sticks and stones, it’s about flow, perception, precipitation, lights, air, volume, and much more.
Not everyone is an architect, and actually probably fewer people than you think, are actually licensed architects.
I realized just after I submitted my drawings that what I had done was astounding on some levels for the little sprawl remodel. I had corrected all errors, created a fly around, renderings, and a entirely new set of drawings. Unfortunately I did this all by myself and there isn’t anyone I know who could have done that entire set of modifications in that time. Indeed a vivid reminder or the importance of interacting with the architect first and consistently. All in all though architects are critical to the project, and consistently we are being driven away from the product, and forced to accept lower standards of professionalism because everyone thinks they can do our jobs.