New software helps Rice architecture students to think practically

New software helps Rice architecture students to think practically

Software developed by Trelligence Inc. for project control and cost management is helping Rice architecture and business students better understand the real-world process of designing and constructing a commercial building.

Marketed as ”Affinity,” the software was used this past fall in an innovative class that brought Rice architecture students and MBA students from Rice’s Jesse H. Jones Graduate School of Management together with well-known construction experts to work on a real-world, urban-development design project. In the class, Urban Design/Investment Building Design Studio, students were taught how to balance architectural design with practical building constraints, including cost management, code restrictions, site plans, client goals, user needs and existing building techniques.

Affinity helps bridge the gap between the architecture students’ focus on design and program requirements with the economic considerations of the MBA students to make the project financially viable. The focus of the project last fall was the design of a mixed-use commercial, academic and research building set in a central urban site. The architecture students used the software to capture and manage all of the figures for space requirements, usage, site information and project goals. Then the MBA students took the data and cost reports, merged them with their own cost estimate information and ”crunched the numbers” to calculate the economics and revenues from the project.

”Our goal was to challenge students to develop schemes beyond mere buildings — designs which are both visionary and feasible, similar to the task faced by [the designers of the new World Trade Center complex],” said William Cannady, professor of architecture. ”Affinity assisted us with this goal by encouraging students to think practically.”

Lars Lerup, dean of the School of Architecture and the William Ward Watkin Professor of Architecture, noted the evolution of the architecture profession has created the need for computer software like Affinity.

”Architects who leverage technology demonstrate the true value of this transformation,” Lerup said. ”It is urgent to bring these tools to architecture schools to spawn a new generation of architects capable of reclaiming their long-lost position at the forefront of the building industry. At the Rice School of Architecture, we are hitting the ground running with programs like Affinity.”

For more information about the School of Architecture, visit < www.arch.rice.edu >.