Designing for co-evolution

Abstract

An authorial and hermetic concept of buildings no longer responds to shifting contemporary needs and lifestyles. 
A linearizing vision of the building process tends to limit technical design to the simple translation of design considerations into construction drawings. Any possibilities to define a broader framework of co-evolving relations between ideation, construction and the possibility to adapt what we build to unpredictable functional, social and economic changes are set aside.
Rethinking the methods, contents and objectives of technical design presents an important challenge for extending the survival of a building. More important than the survival of an idea or form, this is a key element of the social, ecological and economic sustainability of making architecture.