The evolving story of a profession. Being an architect is not just about designing buildings. An architect is a holistic master builder and skilled polymath. Being multi-disciplinary trained makes you find different solutions. The architect as business optimiser.
Architect as Master Builder
Due to specialisation, the profession has been increasingly compartmentalised into roles, resulting in cacophonic disharmony instead of the intended more skilful harmonic resonance. The majority of architects have done little to heal the fracture in the delicate balance of usefulness, beauty, firmness, and economics.
The attention to a holistic (human) approach to the three fundamental architectural principles, Functional (UTILITAS), Technical (FIRMITAS), and Aesthetic (VENUSTAS), as the Roman architect/master builder Marcus Vitruvius Pollio, known as Vitruvius, already mentioned around 25 BC in his Ten Books on Architecture, has been hollowed out and overshadowed by using Economics (OECONOMITAS) as the main guiding principle in the last decades.
For the Romans, architecture encompassed everything in humankind’s physical and intellectual life. Also, the ancient Greeks regarded the role of the architect as impressively broad. In contemporary architecture, instead of an integral approach to the Triple P principle with nature and people as a starting point (Human-centred approach), the emphasis is placed on Profit while Planet (ecological) and People (psychological/sociological) come second.
We added a fourth principle, Economics, which means keeping your house (financial) in order. It is about balancing the functional, technical, and aesthetic with the economics.
Many policies converge in the learning/work environment, such as Finance, Operations, Sales and Marketing, Human Resources, and specific programs relating to sustainability, safety and security, and health and well-being. By rethinking the conventional approach, architecture can become a catalyst for positive organisational and social change.
Buildings, the places where we spend roughly 90% of our lives, must be at the heart of the solution to foster wellness. The built environment can cause health disorders and stress but also can create curative and preventive measures. The latter requires an interdisciplinary approach. Architecture is not about buildings; it is about people. About places that work well and feel good.
We live in an era in which the world is changing very fast. This means many organisations should become far more resilient, adaptable, and inventive than typical. Their existing learning/work environments are solidified policies from the past. A more eco-system approach to the physical, digital, and social environment supports the transition to a new fit-for-purpose. Encouraging and engaging in creativity and originality is now needed like never before. Creating spaces to share ideas, think the unthinkable out loud, and find support and inspiration.
“You never change things by fighting the existing reality.
To change something, build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete.”
(R. Buckminster Fuller)
You cannot influence just a part without also moving the whole. Each part is, therefore, potentially an entrance to initiate a change in the whole.
The best way to get the entire organisation moving is to crowdsource the problem. Ask all of your people to hack the old model, give their ideas on how to change it, and then start running local low-risk experiments. It’s immensely empowering to say to every employee, “Here’s your chance to help design the learning/work environment in which you spend most of your day/most of your life.”
As an organisation, dare to think big but start small and expand incrementally. Innovation is impossible without experimentation. Experiment and gradually find out which form and speed of implementation suit the organisation best. Have faith in the process. Like anything new, it takes a bit of trial and error before you get it right, but the payoff is worth it.
Inspiration
As business consultant architects for a learning/work environment, we give new substance to ‘the architect as master builder’, and we are inspired by the following:
Vision gives us the ability to live according to our imagination instead of our memory
Central to our actions is man as a creative, independent individual with all his diversity. From Real Estate to the Real State of Human Beings. In the organisation of the future, people with their knowledge, experience, talent and passion are the most important capital. They determine how they can contribute most sustainably to the company’s objectives. Successful organisations know that they do not own (the knowledge of) people and aim to gain access to the knowledge and ideas of the best talents, which can also be customers—intangible assets (knowledge, creativity, innovation) versus tangible assets (buildings, operating assets). Creativity breeds disagreement, and disagreement is very productive for new thinking.
Gemstones and precious metals merge into a jewel that is more than the sum of its parts
We see it as our mission to create value with the learning/work environment as a master builder and alchemist. Value for the users, owners, and their environment. Value in all its dimensions: economic and social, aesthetic and functional, for now and for later.
We chart new paths with innovative ideas and surprising approaches, paths that also invite others to excel. Successful innovation is about remixing and reapplying existing ideas to new contexts. By integrating our business and real estate expertise, we support our clients in achieving their goals.
It's not just about a different mindset, but also about resuscitation of the heartset
Buildings play an essential role in economic and social processes. We believe that buildings and their environment influence how people feel and behave, how businesses and institutions function and perform and how cities develop.
We always seek the balance between ratio/logic and emotion/experience, mind and heart, because this balance contributes to the organisation’s goal and people’s well-being. Successful organisations of the future not only create financial value but multiple values such as sustainability, health, well-being, work/life balance, and social contribution. They focus more on a meaningful goal (mission) than being the best or the greatest. From Real Estate to the Real State of Human Beings. Change is possible. Be the change you want to see in the world.
Balance between mind and heart
Both the left and right hemispheres of the brain influence how we see, experience and judge things. The influence of reason and emotion, as well as of mind and heart, determines each choice process.
A left-brain approach emphasizes the quantitative aspects of accommodation. The intellect of the mind. The hard rational and economic approach. (How does the accommodation perform?) On the other hand, an approach from the right hemisphere of the brain mainly emphasizes the qualitative and experience aspects of accommodation. The intellect of the heart. The soft psychological and social approach. (What does accommodation do to you?) The truth is not the middle but a dynamic personal balance of a left and a right-brain approach.
Passion is the energy of the heart. Passion is the fuel that gives you the energy to achieve your dreams. Vision is the power of the head and is the roadmap to the manifestation of your dreams. Or as Nelson Mandela put it: “A good head and a good heart are always a formidable combination.”
It is a proven fact that your mind doesn’t live inside your brain. The reality is that your brain is just a sender and receiver of information. To and from the place where what you call your mind is actually located: the collective Field. Not only does your mind live in the Field along with everyone else’s minds, but all of those minds work in concert with yours to create the reality we collectively experience unfolding around us.
The most exciting thing about that revelation is that it means you have the inherent ability to exert much more conscious control in guiding the creation of that reality than you likely realize or can even imagine.
Business spirituality
“Business spirituality is a model in which realism and idealism have a business interaction. Successful companies have both corporate expertise and corporate spirituality”. –Prof. Dr Paul de Blot SJ
Spirituality, in general, is the physics we haven’t understood yet. Bridging the gap between science and spirituality to form a new balanced unity is about bringing the two sides of the same coin back together. Self-actualization and workplace spirituality lead to a holistic work-life balance. The purpose of business is not only for profit but also pursued with the highest levels of Corporate Social Responsibility.
Entrepreneurship is one of humanity’s most essential energies for walking new paths. Entrepreneurship in which the relationship between masculine and feminine forces is in a good balance is crucial to society’s next release. Being entrepreneurial is, above all, making an innovative contribution.
Empowerment of people
The quality of education, research and facilities stands or falls with the quality of the employees and the way in which they cooperate with each other and the organisation. You can have a lot of summary data, but that doesn’t really tell you what’s going on down on the ground. We’ve tended to take all our rich data and move it up rather than saying, how do we equip frontline teams with the data they need to self-manage?
New technologies can be used to reinforce the existing but also to re-invent an organisation. This way, new ideas and funding decisions are distributed and made by the tribe rather than ideas fighting their way up through the management pyramid only to have an executive say yes or no. Make employees bring their creativity to work.
Gary Hamel, a faculty member of the London Business School and co-founder of the Management Lab, calls this HUMANOCRACY: Creating Organizations As Amazing As The People Inside Them.
Ubuntu - humanity towards others
We are inspired by Ubuntu, an ethical/humanist philosophy from Africa, sometimes translated as “I am because we are.” If it’s not good for everyone, it’s no good at all. As humanity, we are interconnected. We are open to and accessible to others because exchanging and sharing diversity brings prosperity to all. When making decisions, there must be consensus and human ethics. Connecting the dots of the new era of the purpose economy.
Learn/work environment as ecosystem
The learning/work environment ecosystem is much more than just mindful resource management as advocated in the cradle-to-cradle philosophy, sustainable design that endures over time and building energy efficiency. It is an ecosystem consisting of 3 interconnected areas: The physical environment of real estate and facilities, the Digital environment of ‘smart’ buildings plus online learning hubs in a digital classroom and the Social Environment of usage, behaviour agreements, human connection and social bonding which are essential for corporate culture and learning.
A blended learning/workplace ecosystem is based on classrooms, offices, homes, and other locations, including digital space, that are regionally relevant and internationally interesting. Learning/work environments should provide inspiring destinations that strengthen cultural connections, enhance learning, encourage bonding among colleagues, students, and customers, and foster creativity and innovation. In short, they should encourage students to discover and develop their talents and take control of themselves.
A workplace is no longer a single location but an ecosystem of various places and experiences that support flexibility, functionality, and employee well-being.
A blended learning/work environment is an environment that makes it possible to meet each other, even without having to travel, collaborate and learn together, both physically and digitally. It is an environment where students and employees feel at home. Let’s give the emperor some real new clothes.
“Architects are trained to take all kinds of different needs and requirements and design structures that will accommodate them all (lift human spirit, sensible efficient plan and economically feasible).”
John Portman, Architect/developer/investor.
Geometrical patterns store information
Matter is not a thing. There are no things in matter. The only reality is the vibration of energies, so-called quanta or particles being condensed forms of fluctuating energy. So, matter is made up of energy fields, as are humans. Everything is energy, and energy is everything. Energy is vibration. The higher the vibration frequency, the more information it holds and the more complex the pattern becomes.
Different geometrical patterns and shapes store various kinds of energies or information. The information is passed on through resonance, and biological life forms respond to it. The geometry of a space influences the way atoms and air interact and move within a given area, just as a vortex in water behaves differently according to the shape through which it flows. Geometrical shapes do have a corresponding effect on the human body’s own geometry. Thus, rooms of different shapes generate different energetic environments that are capable of influencing the senses.
The energy continues to emit as long as the geometrical shape is there. Like a magnet, which radiates magnetic energy which affects things that are in resonance with this energy. Freddy Silva states: “Geometry and strategic angles were used in temples and churches – inside, outside, overtly or invisible – to initiate a process of sensory manipulation that begins to open the body’s electrical circuits, making it more receptive to finer, more penetrating frequencies and vibrations.” The built environment influences behaviour on a subconscious level, bridging the energies between the natural environment, so-called matter and human beings.
Geometry is a visual representation and structural manifestation of vibrations, as sound is an audible manifestation of vibration. Architecture makes energy vibrations visible for all to see, use and enjoy. It is about spatial alchemy, rethinking the environment we live and work in, the materials our buildings are built from, the spaces that confine our daily lives, the technologies we use, and even the people we interact with.