AF PHILOSOPHY
Twisting the Program
Programs always come with a bias. Teasing out a programs’ core, questioning its makeup, subverting its presumptions are all strategies for shaping a brief to promote the best outcome. The window for these maneuverings is often quite short and pressured from many different directions. We devote a great deal of energy during this stage to set the project on track. You often only get one chance.
Materials Research
We are interested in the use of ordinary materials in extraordinary ways. It seems the briefs with unlimited budgets seem to elude us. To compensate, we take the inexpensive and combine, change, manipulate their place and perception to create fabric. We eschew the fussy. We view one tenet of sustainability as related to economy. We are economical in the labour required to create buildings as well as the materials they are made of.
Politic
(Of person) sagacious, prudent, (of action etc) judicious, expedient; scheming, crafty ( Concise Oxford Dictionary – 6th Edition)
We dedicate a great deal of energy to our relationships. Staff, clients, politicians, authorities and community all primarily effect what we do. We are active listeners, discussers and leaders. We are not precious dogmatists. Good architecture has its roots in the making. We are not the only ones who make. Everyone involved has a part.
Process
Our process is both rigid and convoluted. We are given a great deal of constraints. Usually time and approval requirements are the big delimiters. We are skilled in manipulating what has to be produced and when to create the highest value. Setting the agenda, creating a robust structure and managing a projects’ flexibility are core concerns. We are actively promoting and investigating forms of procurement which protect value. These question the how and who of managing the project.
Public Space
Twisting the program always directs itself to the creation of public space. The nature of large projects is that we are creating unique new spaces, linkages which haven’t occurred before. For buildings other than public buildings, the impetus for these spaces is commercial. Ironically, for them to be successful, they need to be public or civic in nature. We mediate this line in all of our work in the city. For suburban and residential projects, the challenges are different. The car creates an accompanying isolation. Public space in this context is more a meeting place, intimate in scale. The program needs to twist to support these opportunities. The commercial equation always benefits from the quality of these associations.
Value
We create valuable work on a whole range of levels. The more the better. Our work is analysis, dismemberment and combination. We bring our learnings from all previous projects to the next.
