Architecture is not created by a single architect who remains in complete isolation. The final work of architecture is only possible through a design process, which is assumed to be a subjective, more intuitive thinking process. However, according to Kant, “generative productions of art and architecture are rooted in different regions of the human faculties of reasons,” supplying the notion that design is a culmination of indeterminate and logical reasoning. A synthesis of research questions, observations, and knowledge along with intuitive ideas, thoughts, and experiences formulate a “final product” of concrete form and space. Though distinct in their characteristics, research activity of propositional components and design process of nonpropositional components can interrelate. Through both articles, Design in Relation to Research by Linda Groat and David Wang and Disengo: On Drawing Out the Archi-texts by Peter Schneider, claim that research holds a high importance to the design process and though in different ways, can affect the piece of architecture as well as understanding architecture as a whole.
Design in Relation to Research promotes research activity to be essential in the design process. Research can inform the design process from beginning to end, posing questions, challenges, and thoughts to be considered by the architect. Intensive programming allows specific criteria to form, producing as much information and knowledge about a project as possible in order to generate initial concepts and ideas. Researching a present and concrete situation will provide assistance within the middle zone, or heart, of the design process. Jay Farbstein and Min Kantrowitz propose the design-decision research method, creating a single community of researchers and designers to confront a design solution. With post-data collection, research activity can lead to a greater understanding of a finished, existing, or future design. Without this activity, mistakes would not be found and there would be no attempt to perfect techniques and methods. This incorporation of research activity throughout the entire design process proves that the use of research can certainly impact architecture in a positive way. According to Groat and Wang, research activity assists to create a more sophisticated and skillful architecture as well as provide a more humanistic approach through the sensitivity to a community’s values and well-being. The writers provide many examples that illustrate a complete method to the design process using research. With every example, it can be understood that full participation in research is essential in understanding people, place, materiality, technology, history and so on. Designers need to keep an open mind within the design process and allow information and knowledge to spill in from every direction. Groat and Wang provide seven approaches to research, demonstrating a variety of ways to incorporate research into the design process: design and historic, qualitative, experimental, correlational, simulation, logical argumentation, and multi-method research. Consideration of research activity throughout the entire design process will not only create a more skillful approach to design and form an integrated, dynamic, and successful architecture of logical reasoning and experiential aspects, but will also impact and include the community of people in which the project is for.
Disengo: On Drawing Out the Archi-texts claims that research, through drawing and the crafting of the disengo, allows the architect to fully engage and advance in the design process. Just as Groat and Wang present research as essential to the design process, drawing is also a necessary aspect of design that architects have been practicing and defining for as long as history can remember. Essentially, a drawing demonstrates the thought process of the architect and thinking that informed the final product. According to Schneider, the drawing is “the singular vehicle and signifier that carries the echoes of the architectural ideas and architectural theories that inhabit it.” A drawing conveys a message, allowing conscious or unconscious ideas and thoughts of the nature and condition of a design to surface to one’s attention. Described in Design in Relation to Research, it is said that a design process cannot be fully explained, for the indeterminate aspects of design including the emotion, experience, and intuitive thought cannot be simplified into words. However, drawing as research discovers underlying architectural thought into an image and thus, a way of interpreting the indeterminate. As Groat and Wang state that research activity evolves architecture into a skilled profession as well as providing an opportunity to have the people participate in the design, so does drawing positively affect architecture. Drawing has become the means of investigating the possibilities of architecture and design. Drawings are not simply products of imagination, but are “works about the meaning of architecture and allow us to encounter it and assimilate it.” Specifically, drawings by Douglas Darden are images of pure, theoretical research about architecture and its nature, structure and value. Drawings pose questions that otherwise could never be discovered or truths that would never be revealed. In contrast to Groat and Wang, who believe there are many aspects and approaches to research that equally influence architecture and design, Schneider believes drawing is the primary research method that architects use to advance their understanding in architecture. Drawing and the use of the disengo is the true method to which the individual has complete control. Though drawing does impact the understanding of architecture and design, drawing takes place as an independent method of research, as a means of discovering an inner concept and idea.
Schneider’s article, Disengo: On Drawing Out the Archi-texts, seems to focus on one of the many research methods that Groat and Wang pose in their article Design in Relation to Research. Whether one particular research method or an array of different research methods is focused on, it has been proven that architecture needs research activity to be present within the design process. Each method provides a different area of knowledge and information about elements included in an architectural project, which are all pertinent to the final product of a piece of architecture. It is through research that architecture will continuously manifest itself in different, more creative, sophisticated, and community oriented projects.
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