During the first week working from home, the firm signed up a couple of new projects and I have been assigned to work in one of them. I love the design process in JW Architects because as a trainee, I have the opportunity to be involve since day one in the project.
During my time in JW Architects, I had just started one other project during my first month working there. What we did for the first Design Time was looking for inspiration images and try to understand the lot/surroundings. So that part seemed kind of easy to do through zoom, each of the team had a selection of pictures so we talked about those and the preliminary site plan with all the zone regulations. After the meeting, I wrote down notes about what we had discussed and then each one could add theirs, so we were all in the same page. That was a good move, and the principal adopted that process to the rest of remote design times.
After Design Time#1, we started the Revit model just with the levels, floors, and walls so in the next session we could start with the lay out of the units. This part is the one I found more challenging to do remote, because we usually sketch over the site plan and try different schemes. Thankfully, we live in the 21st century and the technology is always there to make things easier. One of us was sharing the screen and navigating the Revit model, so we will be working directly there, what it is not ideal but what else could we do? We got a good lay out for the first day with some cool movements including some balconies and other features.
We have sent the schematic plans to the client and once we received his comments we will start working on the massing and window strategy, as well as the material palette. I hope the next session is successful and we all have a nice internet connection so the design process can go smoothly.
