...thank you John, very well stated.

Architects, let's remember, are not responsible for means and methods. The contractor no doubt sold their collective souls to get this job, and any other job that promised this kind of cache.

If they can't build it, don't bid it.

although maeda is too forgiving about leaky buildings. buildings should not leak, be them cubic or complicated. but it probably is more of a contractor issue than an architecture issue. maybe i just think that though because i'm still in school and i think architecture is all about designing cool crazy stuff and haven't yet learned about flashing details...

The funny thing to me is: suing Gehry over a leak is situated exactly between suing Picasso for a bad painting (art) and suing Paul Rand for a bad logo (business). This is architecture: we straddle both disciplines. And this is why we can rarely please everyone.

Some very nice thoughts in that letter re: striving higher and taking risks. Thanks for sharing it, Paul.

well said lb. I like exactness.

there is enough technology and wisdom available to create a roof that doesn't leak. period.

Yes, we can blame the contractor (who is ultimately responsible for shoddy workmanship), but the specifications hold the key to a leak proof future. (maybe Gehry's folks wrote a bad spec). Especially in complex situations, like the Strata center, it is worth including 'electronic leak detection testing' or similar into the spec. Flood testing creates twice as many leaks as it detects due to the destructive nature of removing the temporary dams. I've seen demos of the electronic vector testing and it's quite amazing at finding even the smallest pinprick.

MIT needs to examine their project management decisions - they may have chosen to save money and eliminate a cheap alternative to the costly repairs. A penny saved sometimes is pound foolish.


oh john, hope you're not allergic to mold.

thank you paul for sharing!

This is from an MIT announcement about Stata's Opening:

Frank Gehry recently wrote of Stata, "it reflects the different groups, the collision of ideas, the energy of people and ideas. They each have their own sort of vectors and they will all be colliding with each other, some accidentally and some by contrivance. That's what will lead to the breakthroughs and the positive results."

The words - collision, colliding, accidentally, may have tipped them off. This is fucking art people and art is a fucking chance.

Remember: MIT is suing Gehry Partners (not Gehry personally) and Skanska (the contractor), Skanska issued a press release publicly blaming Gehry Partners, claiming they had a paper trail to back up their claims, and the media (Maeda?) frenzy ensued. This is far from over, folks.

Sometimes the most dangerous thing an architect can say is, "Build it how its drawn."

I don't get forgiven if one of our projects leaks. True, our office may not be God's gift to architecture, but we still have to be accountable and step up to assist in the resolution, even it is a field workmanship issue. If you don't proactively get in there and try to resolve it early, the lawyers will get in there and then everybody loses, except the lawyers.

This is a problem now because Owner, Architect, and Contractor couldn't partner sufficiently to either make sure that it wouldn't leak, or that if it does leak, that they can effectively deal with it.

Step down off the pedastal, do your best work, and be a team player.

Architecture is an art, a science and a business. All three have to succeed or else none succeed.

C'mon people. Commodity, firmness and delight; remember? Your skill as a designer is making all three happen simultaneously!

I would be interested to know what the contractural arrangement is before anybody wades into either the architect or the contractor. Who had ultimate responsibility for designing and implementing the details? Something tells me it wasn't Frank-O (hmm that has a familiar ring to it...).

have architects stepped too far from the actual process of building?

hey bernini's towers at the vatican were a disaster but no one would(unless they are an idiot) argue against his supreme artistic genius. well except maybe borromini who was just as much of a genius.

maybe some architects, luis, but let's not get TOO general.

off to a job site today, one i visit about once a week to help work out solutions with the contractors...

--

i'm curious WHERE the leaks are. if it's roofing, that would send one kind of message about responsibility. if it's flashing slopey wall to slopey wall, that's another thing. if it's windows butting into inside corners, that's yet another. are the leaks all under the umbrella of one trade or are they at the places between the work of two trades (i.e., sheet metal and masonry)? these are the things that the litigation will have to determine and, ultimately, may be the things that establish liability.

and, as maeda points out, these problems are things that can happen just as easily to a cube. we focus on this kind of building because it looks like it should leak, not just because it - like so many other much more ordinary buildings - does.

implementation is not the architect's concern, unless i missed something when studying for my ARE's. as for the details and specs, i would assume that a project of this magnitude would have a high level of oversight and involvement with the specific vendors, but killa if i remember correctly you worked at gehry, so i defer to you on your experiences there.

so the the architect has his liability insurance, the contractor fails to build it correctly and the vendor oversells his product, and the client's desire to have another signature building to their stable is satisfied. all of this points to one thing; $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$!

you cannot have a productive collision of ideas in a freaking box. jesus.

(Thats my favorite jesus quote)

I actually talked with Bill Mitchell about this a few years ago, right when Stata opened up. The thing is this: they had a box. The building they tore down to build this one was the ultimate in unplanned modernist flexibility: a uniform grid of space that could be knocked around and reconfigured at will. It was originally meant to be a temporary building, put up around WWII, it was never torn down until Stata.

They didn't want that, they wanted idiosyncratic space with lots of individual, specific qualities, sounds hard to detail, right?

But yeah, the clients literally felt like you could not have a productive collision of ideas in a freaking box. Jesus was correct.

i'm not sure maeda's response really sheds any new light on this that wasn't already discussed in the other thread, other than he personally thinks that gehry, because of his reputation, is above the prosaics of detailing.

look it shouldn't matter if it's gehry, hok, or bob the architect; a mistake was made either in the drawings or in the field, and either the architect or the contractor is responsible. period. what is the debate?

-- vado may be right about that, but only in a relatively few cases.

An unfortunate aspect of this case is that the rest of us - we, the great unwashed "ordinary" architects who don't produce art, but do produce buildings in which our clients aspire only to live, work, learn and recreate - suffer from negative PR whenever this happens. Whether we like it or not, the rest of us are painted by this same brush of irresponsibility (whatever the truth of the matter) especially in those instances when we're trying to sell our clients something unproven or out of the ordinary.

I once had a business colleague who liked to say "the path of innovation is littered with the bleached bones of the dead" Most clients - the sort who live with ordinary budgets and tight schedules -- just want a building that meets their functional requirements, can be built on time and within budget, and that doesn't leak or fall down. This is the characteristic of mainstream architecture -- and for most of us its a craft, not an art.

Well said, quizzical.

I don't think Maeda's latter is proposing that Gehry be given a free pass. I think he's only saying that innovation is good, taking risks is good, and we need to cheerfully deal with the consequences when things don't quite work out. Better to reach for something new than stick with the tried and true (which can also, as in his cube building, sometimes fail). And what are universities supposed to be doing if not trying to further our culture?

I think it's interesting that Maeda refers to the Stata Center as innovative....to be innovative, don't you have to do something new-ish? But does this count as "new" for Gehry, when he's been doing this for several years now? So I would say that maybe anything innovative for him would be something swoopy that doesn't leak....

.....just a thought.

Hahaha good point DubK!

Don't they usually come up with some tax break / donation deal? Like, let's say GC and or FOG make a generous donation to some MIT affiliated nonprofit which happens to use the STATA. MIT uses the donation to pay for the "cost overrun" (fix problem) caused by challenging roofing conditions. Everybody wins type of deal. Or is it more profitable to milk the insurances? Even lawyers need to eat, right?
Where are the tax/money savvy architects on this forum that know more about this type of deal, we (architects) need to come up with ideas since we will face this problem sooner or later (there is no bullet proof CD)

"implementation is not the architect's concern, unless i missed something when studying for my ARE's. "

my apologies for being so general. and of course, your case is not unique Steven, still though this question remains a concern for me... paying someone to figure or not figure out how to make your crazy shit work similar to the average edifice, i.e. keeping the leaks to a minimum is irresponsible.

I remember when I was learning some Catia, a guy from the Ghery Tech crew came to show us their software...if I remember correctly, he showcased the Strata Center Catia model as one they used to communicate with the contractors-sub-contractors. What does this say about moving towards parametric software/solutions in order to better communicate and facilitate the construction process?

The letter is stupid...sounds to me like someone wants a Gehry-designed house (at a discount). A bad logo wont ruin your computer (unless you stole it from a crafty web designer) and picasso owners don't need he money.

You take 15 million in fees and do CA, you own it...

BTW, complexity is a characteristic not a quality.

granted, buildings do leak. lets get that past us. someone will probably pay for it. most likely the contractor unless there was some serious negliance to cautions by the gc and oversight by the architect if he didn't inform the client.

Now, i'm talking architecture fundamentals here, not detailing or construction, but it seems like Gehry lacks some common sense that architects should have a knack for (designing in cold/we climate - probably not the best place to place an icy sloping death trap without some mitigation; south facing facade with somewhat dense residential across the street-probably not the best place for a gilmmering titanium facade without mitigation for the glare). Seems like with all the form driven whims, the very basics get glaringly overlooked.

should he be sued for this? thats a good question.

I don't think that this whole issue is news worthy at all. Buildings often leak. Clients often sue. These are certainly litigious times. The only reason this is in the news is because it is Gehry, who typically has high quality construction, finishes within the deadline, typically on or near the budget (though all are obviously high budgets), and even pays his interns. This story is just so uninteresting.

you know what i think? i think everyone here wants to work for frank gehry.

it is like homophobia. if you have Gehrifobia, it means you think he's the greatest. i bet, like this image:



you want Lord Frank, The Master, your own personal Jesus Christ, to put his hand on your shoulder and guide your pencil along the parallel bar (please note: you are the guy with the tie). frank gehry, like jesus, is a jewish guy who makes buildings. coincidence?

Best post ever, bossman!

can i get that on a t-shirt?

Exactly, AP. I think we've got our next Archinect T.

i love it. can I get one in black?

so you worked for a specialist in waterproofing? or was he a regular architect who happened to be good with waterproofing?

wither way, so what? maybe gehry should have consulted him. my guess is that he consulted someone of equal quality, or he has similar person on staff. to imply gehry's buildings all leak is specious.

i think maeda is making a point that orthodox boxes can leak too. therefore the problem is not one of form but of construction. conflating and obfuscating the two is not helpful unless another agenda is being pursued. that is just disingenuous. if gehry fcuked up, then he deserves to be sued (maybe), and the problem has to be fixed.

but we still don't know enough, any of us, to make an intelligent comment and all this is personal not objective.

as for the lolly columns. that is a great story. we are privileged to be i a position learn new things about buildings everyday. but i don't think there is any reason to be ashamed or upset if you don't know everything. that is not in the job description. i took a course on historical preservation in grad school where we went through 5 old buildings and did a report on remediation methods and was shocked and impressed by the breadth of knowledge required to even begin that work. it was an amazing learning experience and if it ever comes up i know who to ask to help out. but i don't mind that i can't personally write a book about the subject. it is alright to say, "i don't know". then follow up with "but i'll find out".

not that that has anything to do with frank gehry.

I've heard Gehry lecture a few times, and each time he emphatically and angrily has said: "my buildings don't leak."

again, architects are not doctors. stop comparing the profession with those of doctors. doctors save lives, architects.. not so much.

architecture was a craft, is a craft, and will always be a craft

Learn to detail, bitches!