Architect in the House - bringing good design to the British masses

The value and necessity of architecture is often lost on the layman. That buildings emerge from a skyline, or even in the neighborhood, appears the work of people who sling hammers, not those with sharp pencils. Thus, when costs must be saved – be it in designing the family home or the new civic center – an architect may not be the first call. Several websites report the decrease in pages published by various international architecture journals, and the decline of people choosing architecture as a profession.  So, do we need architects?

An initiative in the United Kingdom aims to heighten the prominence of the profession — one homeowner at a time. Architect in the House offers one free hour of architectural expertise to families considering a remodel or a new build project. In exchange, the family makes a suggested contribution of 40£ to Shelter, a British non profit organization providing for the homeless.

The concept is simple, and organized by the Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA). Now in its 14th year, Architect in the Home pairs RIBA Chartered architects with curious homeowners. The architects provide their time for free, offering design inspiration, green building tips, price-to-value analysis, help troubleshoot existing problems or guidance on steering clear of likely pitfalls. Consultancy beyond the first hour is at the homeowner’s expense. Interested families are asked to sign up by a certain date, then matched with a RIBA Architect in their area, with the consultation following shortly thereafter.  So far, more than 50,000 homeowners across the UK have participated.

Since inception, the initiative has raised 1,000,000£ for the beneficiary charity, Shelter. 105,000£ was raised in 2009 alone.  In 2009, participating architects worked double time: 3,000 families and 1,250 architects participated.

It is uncertain what percent of families who participated in the scheme would otherwise not have called an architect.

One case study on the Architect in the House website identifies a couple who live in a split level terraced house. Approaching retirement, the couple wished to live on one floor – a desire made impossible by the location of the bathrooms, upstairs. The house was redesigned with the help of their new architect.

The American counterpart of RIBA is the America Institute of Architects.

Ecosystem based management meets planning: South Carolina case study

The David and Lucile Packard Foundation has funded PlaceMatters* to run three pilot projects, with the purpose of combining ecosystem-based management (EBM) tools within traditional planning.

Three counties in South Carolina are approaching planning in a new way: the Berkeley-Charleston-Dorchester region is using new methods to assess their vulnerability to natural hazards, resource conservation, and socioeconomic factors. This analysis will then shape the BCD Council of Governments regional land use and transportation plans.

The approach is to get experts together, identify hazards, areas of biological sensitivity, and economic considerations. Then PlaceMatters worked with local partners to engage the community to come up with an actual plan based on the science. The team hosted a Tools Expo in April of 2008 in South Carolina that brought together regional decision-makers and colleagues who could provide new methods to achieve town goals. As the BCD process goes forward, feedback from stakeholders will be provided via an interactive website that provides feedback to the planning process.

Some key lessons learned and successes in the project to date include:
·    Creation of a Local Project Implementation Team.  This team connected PlaceMatters staff with local experts on biodiversity, sources of hazard data, as well as acting as liaison with local partner organizations. 
·    Biodiversity Expert Group. Initial outreach to biodiversity experts to ask for assistance in gathering data was challenging.  Eventually, a group was gathered for one afternoon to collectively determine conservation goals and discuss available data. 
Some key tools, used by the firm PlaceMatters, are:
·    CommunityViz to analyze various social and economic impacts and create a future build-out scenario
·    NatureServe Vista to analyze performance of the current conditions and two future scenarios with respect to conservation goals
·    NOAA’s Community Resilience and Vulnerability Assessment Tool to analyze hazard risk with respect to vulnerable populations and facilities

The results of the scenario analysis will be shared with the BCD COG and its consultant team in order to successfully integrate this information into the public engagement and planning process.

Project Website: www.resilient-communities.org
--Jacob Smith
Jacob Smith, is a PlaceMatters-Packard Fellow based in Denver, Colorado

* PlaceMatters is an organization that helps citizens visualize and shape the impact of development and changes in land use upon their communities, operating as a 501c3 organization. This section of the Internal Revenue Code denotes an officially recognized, American, not for profit organization.