A Winter Condition

The Blue Book Facebook page had a good question today: What's the coldest job site you've ever been on?  It reminded me not of the coldest site I've been on, but some of the effects doing construction in cold weather can have on a project.

We were fortunate to do a financial planner's office in the South Bend, Indiana area.  It was a new 3,800 square foot office building for two financial planners.  We had six round columns as part of the design.  Rather than create them with a column wrap, we decided to use sandblasted cast-in-place concrete columns.  Four columns were part of the main entrance vestibule and two flanked the reception counter.  We also took advantage of them to use as part of the building structure..  

Construction began in the fall of 2008, and the columns were poured into their Sonnotube forms the last week of December, and wrapped with warming blankets.   A few days later, the Lake Michigan lake effect smow machine kicked in dumping fifteen inches of snow on the area along and bringing a straight month of subzero temperatures.  The site could not be accessed until six weeks after the columns were poured.  

The contractor stripped off the cardboard forms, exposing the raised spiral rings which we planned to remove with sandblasting.  However the concrete became tempered to a point where the rings could not be blasted off.  We discussed options such as adding a skim coat of plaster to them to create a smooth surface.  In the end we decided to leave the columns as they were to keep the exposed aggregate, and used the rationale of "architectural honesty" to justify leaving the rings.

We find the rings to be fine and we're proud of the result.

Parish Center Addition

At Berneche2 Architecture we do both residential and commercial project types.  Most of our project are single-family residences (houses) but for the past two years we have been working with Queen of All Saints Parish in Michigan City, Indiana to develop a new Parish Center.  On Tuesday October 27, 2015 I presented the project to DuPage Referral Network to show an example of our non-residential work.

The initial call was that they wanted to add "a meeting room".  We visited Father Kevin and he showed us a modular classroom building that needed several repairs, and the thought was it would be more practical to do an addition versus spending $50,000 to repair a temporary structure.  So a meeting room became four classrooms, though these would now be used by church groups so Meeting Rooms was the appropriate term.

Next the thought was that a meditation chapel created in a 1999 addition was not very conducive to meditation because the school library was upstairs.  So it was decided to move that into the addition.

Finally, the existing 1965 church was designed with an undersized Narthex.  A Narthex is an entry space akin to a theater lobby, where people can meet and have fellowship before and after a service.  The Narthex for the church was more of an eleven-foot wide corridor that is not very conducive to groups.

The project has several goals:

1. The new facility will connect together a 1950 split-level school building and a 1965 church, which are 70 feet apart.  The addition main floor level will match the church.  

2. An elevator is required for accessibility.  The Americans with Disabilities Act exempts religious facilities from the need to comply as they are considered private entities.  However, other codes adopted by the state do consider churches as public facilities and therefore must comply.  It will be a two-sided elevator situated against the school and the school floor levels will extend into the elevator lobby to make the school wheelchair accessible.  

3. A two-story facility was eventually agreed upon.  The design went through two major versions.  In the first the gathering space was broken up into two parts, a large glass atrium off the main parking lot, and then a carped seating area closer to the church.  The chapel, meeting rooms, and toilet rooms were placed adjacent to the church for structural reasons.  The church committee felt strongly that the gathering space should be located right outside the church.  Concepts were developed to make this happen.  Both one and two story options were presented, the latter with intent to save cost.  While the two-story concept will cost a little more, it will take up less of the site and fewer parking spaces and outdoor areas will be lost.

4. Building codes allow churches to have minimal toilet facilities, likely anticipating that most folks are there for an hour and then leave.  For the 700-seat church there is a single men's and women's toilet.  This is inadequate for the current after hours uses, and will not be sufficient for groups meeting here.  The new facility will have two groups of toilet rooms, one on each level, and 16 new toilets/urinals will be available.

5. The four meeting rooms were designed to work as six rooms, two rooms divided into smaller rooms, as the size of the original rooms is much larger than required by most groups.  There will be two groups of rooms, one on each level, and each will be divided with operable partitions which can be opened to allow all three rooms to become one large meeting room when needed.  

6. Father Kevin truly wanted to have the glass doors between the gathering space and church to visually connect the spaces.  Originally we had these as solid doors with small windows in a three-hour fire wall to separate the two buildings.  However, this became important enough to where we will be adding a sprinkler system to the church, allowing us to eliminate the fire wall and use full glass doors.  We still need to maintain a two-hour fire wall between the school building and addition, and security of the school warrants the separation anyway.

7. One major issue being addressed are the site utilities.  When the building was constructed galvanized pipe was used for the school water supply.  The City is requiring a backflow preventer on this line as well.  There were also some utilities between buildings not documented on older drawings and some of these will have to be relocated.  The Civil engineer notified us that there is a major 

We first met with Father Kevin June 2013 to initially discuss the project.  With the initial concept we worked with their fundraising team to communicate the intent to the parishioners, which included hiring a 3d rendering company to develop a fly over animation of the project.  We were authorized to commence construction documents Spring 2015, and we are currently completing drawings and specifications to be released to bidders December 2015.  Construction is scheduled to begin June 2016 after the Parish Festival.  The construction phase is anticipated to last nine months.

It has been exhilarating, challenging, and very rewarding working on a larger project again.  I worked at a K-12 school planning firm 1995-2004 and it has been wonderful to work on a project of this scale with our own firm.  We look forward to doing many more.

Images of the progress can be seen on our Berneche2 Architecture Facebook Page.

Tim Berneche 

Taking this blogging thing seriously

I started a blog page four years ago and wrote a grand total of three blogs.  And my IT person suggested I change the blog name to something, well, English.  So we did that and we have our new website up and running.  Things are unbelievably busy as I write this in October 2015.  Of our 9.5 years in business this is the busiest we have ever been.  A good thing considering I have twin 17-year old daughters off to college next year.  Back to work!

“What is it about architects and designers that make us willing to work hard without reasonable compensation?"

I belong to several LinkedIn groups, mostly related to my profession of Architecture.  On one of the residential architecture pages someone asked the question of:

“What is it about our make up as architects and designers that make us so willing to work hard without reasonable compensation?”

It was my intent to merely respond on that page, but copying and pasting this into the site notified me that is was almost 1,900 words above the limit (far more now with this intro), so I decided to go to my long neglected blog, post it there, and post a link to the group.

I think it has to do with several factors, and it may even differ for those of us who have always loved designing from a young age.  I fall into that category, knowing in one sense or another that I wanted to be an architect since I was 9.  I always loved to draw and sometimes it is difficult to put yourself in the mindset that this is now a business.  And if we cannot get ourselves into that mindset we may feel it is difficult to get our clients to feel the same way.

I agree that architects in general can be weak on business issues.  I went to a university where the architecture college was next door to the business college.  There was a mentality that the business college was where the jocks and greedy went for a degree and that we as designers in our altruism were above that.  Once in a while an architect would give a lecture and encourage us to take business classes, and I for one ignored that.  While it was a mistake I’ve done a few things to make up for it.

When I went out on my own even years ago it was with intent to go into a partnership with two others, an architect who was I business for 20+ years and an engineer who I thought was equally savvy.  The more I worked with both of them the more I realized that while they knew a lot about running a business they were terrible at following through.  In the long run, the slow down I the economy was a good thing because with the lack of work the incentive to form what would had been a disastrous partnership went away.

Many times I would look at what I do and think that anyone can do this.  Then I see owner napkin sketches and an inability to visualize things and realize: no they can’t.  Even for clients that are savvy I can sell myself as someone who has seen various scenarios for 23 years and can apply my experiences to their situation.

I worked with a business coach for two years and he helped me get out of that mentality.  He reviewed my billings and my work and pushed me to charge for things I always treated like something I should do out of the good of my heart.  That mentality has helped me not only as a businessperson but as a designer a well, I feel.  If the client really wants to do something that you don’t care for, bite the bullet and keep in mind it is a business and you’ll get paid to do it, as long as the request is ethical of course. 

Some of the books he had us read I would recommend to anyone in any business.  The first is The E Myth by Michael Gerber.  It is a good intro that puts one into the mentality of a struggling small business person.  It does not spell out concrete solutions but gives one a lot to consider, the most basic premise being that one needs to think like an entrepreneur and less like a technician.  Mastering the Rockefeller Habits by Verne Harnish and Guerrilla Marketing by Jay Conrad Levinson were other books we used.  I briefly served as a marketing person with an AV integrator who is in the process of closing his doors, I feel specifically because he could never get out of the technician mentality.  I might be wrong about that, but of the three projects I brought to him, it took him a long time to get proposals together, and on the final home I brought to him it took him ten weeks to tell me that he’s decided to focus on commercial work.  Then four months later he’s out, whatever.

I also belong to a leads club and try to network with local and regional chambers and events.  The leads club is good, and even though I have not received very many leads from it, I surround myself with people who are business savvy in aspects where I am not.  We had a mortgage broker who was at Arthur Andersen during the Enron debacle and mutual disintegration, and I’ve learned a lot from him.  People in the business community know of me and I know them, so there should be some referrals from that.  Granted I have slacked off from it a bit lately because I have been busy, perhaps partly from lapsing back into the designer mentality.  We need to be sure to treat marketing and business development as equally important to the production.

Regarding fees I started raising mine based on a few things.  First I stared a simple excel file that tracks how many hours I have and how it relates to the fee I charged.  Perhaps this is something I could see through QuickBooks if I had the discipline to learn the software, but that’s another story.  That was an eye opener to get me to see that I need to make things worth my while.  So in upping my fees I haven’t seen a rate of acceptance of proposals go down, still the same – either acceptance or I never hear back, never anyone trying to talk me down.  Ironically he only one to talk me down was a design build contractor I regularly work with, but I think now that he sees the value I bring he doesn’t talk me down anymore.

Finally, my business coach encouraged me to put together a seminar to educate the public on the profession.  It is simply called “What an Architect Does and How You Benefit.”  I went to a seminar put on by another architect on the future of the profession which was very good.  But one thing that struck me was the mentality of many of the architects in the audience who complained that the AIA was not doing enough to promote the profession.  My thought was that I’ve heard this complaint for 20 years and guess what folks – if you’re relying on others forget it.  I’ve presented once to a group of 10 and I’m looking to present to other groups as well.  I should be putting it on quarterly.  I did received favorable comments from people outside of the profession not realizing all of the services, and specifically all of the work and aspects taken to arrive at a design.  Writing this is helping remind me to get back into the marketing and promotion, and stop being mere technician!

Having twins who are now 15 and will start college in three years helps me take the business aspects more seriously as well, not to mention things I wouldn’t mind being able to do someday like build my own house or get a new car, things to not even think about until after I get the kids through college.  Or at least know that I have the ability to reach those goals.

If you are interested in seeing comments from other architects on the topic you may do so here. 

Weltanschaaung to the next level

I have introduced the name to a broader audience.  On April 18 we issued our first Constant Contact newsletter, which we will also be calling "Weltanschauung."  Check it out!

Constant Contact : Emails : My Emails 

Dude, what's with the blog name?

Weltanschauung.

I was introduced to the word by a a history professor at Ball State my freshman year. He liked to use the word because he did not feel there was an English equivalant, and hey, anyone semi-familiar with German knows they have a lot of long compound words - remember farvergneugen from the 80's, Volkswagen fans?

Weltanschauung loosely translates to "world view", but it goes much further. The word specifically points to the world view of an individual, based on that person's specific life experiences - gender, socioeconomic status, race, relationships, careers, etc.

So in this blog I intend to write my thoughts primarily about architecture, with an understanding of the world I come from. A 44 year old white male who grew up in Kokomo, Indiana, a factory town where my parents didn't work in the factory; the oldest of three children with two younger sisters, who traveled very little growing up but got and took the opportunity to make up for it in college; married to another architecture graduate and parents of twin daughters who are now 13.

Let's Get It Started!

I attended two really good seminars yesterday sponsored by Pella Windows and held at the Pro Pella Event at the United Center in Chicago. The two education seminars for architects were given by Steve Mouzon, an architect from Alabama who is big on green architecture and new urbanism. He was a very knowledgeable speaker and I really enjoyed his two lectures.

The first was on things that make a building sustainable, looking not merely at the green technical aspects, but also emotional aspects about a building that drive us to WANT to preserve a building. Very interesting concepts to think about.

The second seminar was very useful for our times - new ways to think of marketing architecture in the new marketplace. There weer many great ideas - don't have business cards, but idea cards, graphically stimulating cards that immediately convey to your clients, current and potential, of what you do and how you stand out.

Probably the most interesting conclusion Steve presented is the importance of blogging to improving SEO (search engine optimization). I created this blog after another seminar I went to probably six months ago, but I figured that Facebook might serve as a simpler form of a blog. Steve feels that blogs are the best SEO booster out there.

So that inspires me to take the blog seriously. I had already been in the process of redesigning the business cards. My approach was to look at it as a way to sell the business including a slogan as well as project images (the slogan: "We create the box by thinking outside of it"). I will also add links to the social media: Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIN, and after attending this seminar we will include this blog site.

We will use the blog to demonstrate how we think outside of the box. I have experience with a wide gamut of architectural styles, schools, churches, residences, retail, health clubs, tenant space buildouts, doctor's offices, and many others. I will use he blog to explain some of my unique experiences, with hopes that some of you reading out there might be able to embellish on your own personal experiences with similar experiences.

We hope to create a blog worth while - please let us know your thoughts and suggestions and we will take those into consideration.