Rows of Houses That Are All The Same

The Monkees










Okay, this is not creative writing. I’m not even going to pretend that this is masked as some kind of fiction. This is pure and unadulterated ranting. Those of you who know me, which is I figure almost anyone reading this, know that I have, for work, been dealing with architects for about a year now. If you’re reading this fairly faithfully you read the description of the last bunch of arrogant architects last week.


Well, last night, relatively late, our building committee made a unanimous decision as to which architect we will hire for stage 2 of our project. Stage 2 will be schematic designs. It was NOT the firm I described last week.


It was also NOT the firm that we hired to do Stage 1. I, for one was greatly relieved at this. The architect that did our Stage 1 (a feasibility study) I think was horrible. There were a series of events that lead me to this conclusion:


First, he created a design for us which had a terrace that I violently didn’t like. I was to miss the meeting that this was to be discussed, but I had made my opinion quite clear and was assured it would be represented. After the meeting, the minutes clearly indicated that my position was expressed and that after discussion the terrace idea was nixed. A week later drawings came – with a terrace. I said, no, this isn’t right. This architect, will call him Silver, replied to me that it was all agreed. I said, no, I sited the minutes. He then wrote the committee asking about it. Clearly implying that I didn’t know what I was talking about. It created a huge issue, discussion, and it was decided it was all a moot point, we were not at that stage. But it did not endear me.


Next, we were to both prepare a presentation for the town. He called me to ask me to put together his presentation. I was polite, but said I couldn’t. We had a conversation in which I needed to explain to him about jump drives, usb transport etc. He still had no idea what I was talking about, but told me he’d have his secretary do what he’d just asked me to do, she would know, and it would be fine. When we arrived at the run through, he told everyone about the usb drive as if he knew all about it, not like I’d had to explain it the day before.


This run through was followed by a town meeting. The real show. He called me at 3 that day nervous about the set up for the 7 pm meeting. He wanted to meet before hand for set up. I agreed. He called me twice to confirm he’d meet me by 6:30 pm. I was waiting. At 7pm, as the meeting was being called to order, he breezed in, handing me the jump drive and said, you do the presentation. I said no. He said, you saw the trail run, you can just do it. I said it was not my presentation. He was supposed to have altered some things… I was not comfortable with this. He got angry and ordered me to do it. Now… you, readers, who know me, know exactly how well that went over. I refused, much to his surprise. Clearly, if he didn’t do it, it was not going to be done and I didn’t care. The meeting started and he was left with no choice but to do it himself. But we were both furious.


The stage passed and we got permission to move on to Stage 2 and we put out another call for architects. Silver showed up for this process, he didn’t speak to me even when I said hello. That was fine, I had just been trying to be polite. After an hour of tour and presentation, Silver came up to the other person running this event and asked for a list of who else was in the competition. My companion agreed and was then called away. At that point, Silver turned to me with a grin and said, “so I guess you’ll be typing up the list for me.” I guess he really wanted me as a secretary. I smiled sweetly and said no. He had talked to my companion, it was my companion’s mission and I didn’t know who in HIS office would have the task.


In the meanwhile, I was discovering that the work Silver had done for us, in my opinion was incomplete. There is a building next to ours which Silver had suggested we incorporate into our building project. While there was some desire for this, when this information became known, many people came forth to point out that the deed on that other building forbade such action. Now, in my non-architect mind, I think that if one is hired to do a ‘feasibility study’ part of that might be to check the deeds on the other buildings on the property? Particular if you are going to suggest that a building on the property be used in a particular way. So in my uneducated opinion, he failed at the feasibility study. I might have excused this lack of deed investigation as oversight IF he had not proposed using the building.


So, by the time we were going to decide who was on our short list for round 2, I did not want Silver, hands down. I was very nervous about this, as most of my negative experience had been personal and done out of the public view. But as it turned out, two factors besides my view came into play. First, Silver had done 3 other like projects. As it happened, no one liked the three other projects he had completed. It was also learned that one of those three projects had a significant structural problem. Given that in our pool we had other architects who had completed 20-40 like projects and we did like them, there was little discussion. Silver was not invited back.


Today, the applicants, including Silver, were informed we had chosen a candidate. Almost immediately all the people whom Silver thought were on the committee got an email. It said he was shocked that we had not chosen him or at least given him an interview. And he was shocked (exclamation points) at the firm we had chosen. He told us he had gone above and beyond for us and his firm was devoted to the best service, but ‘from all appearances this was forgotten.”


Oh the things I would like to say to him. If nothing else, I’d like to say this unprofessional e-mail was a perfect example for why I didn’t want him! But the arrogance of these architects is still astounding.