A Hierarchy of Firms

When I was a student I heard Peter Clewes (sp?) lecture. I don't remember anything he had to say except for his neat hierarchy of architecture firms. He said there are three types. Type one are grinders; they take every job they can get and generate product. They are workmanlike and architecture is just a job to them. Type two are the boutique firms who can turn clients away if they don't care for the project (or the client). Type Two firms usually have another source of income (teaching, publishing, inheriting, etc.) because it is very difficult to run a boutique firm on architect's wages. The third type are the firms who take what they can get and then try to do it better. His firm Architects Alliance was a Type Three Firm (and might still be but I don't know if it is still his or if they are still Type Three!!!). When I heard this I immediately thought two things - that is really true and I want to be in a Type Three firm. I also thought I was the one making value judgements and turning his typology into a hierarchy.

Which goes to show what a dumb shit I was and probably still am since it took me the better part of a decade to figure out what complete bullshit that is. It is true there are boutique firms. And it remains true I don't really respect them (even when I admire the shit out of their work, like Williams Tsien). But almost everyone I have ever met in this profession is trying to do it as well as they possibly can. The only thing that makes a distinction between One and Three seem plausible is economics. Some firms have people who can sell. Sell the client on a project, sell the product to the media, sell the firm to potential employees. Sell sell sell.

There are also more ways of doing really good work than are apparent to people like I was at that time - people who consume architecture thru books and magazines. There are firms I could mention whose idea of a really good project is one that runs right on schedule and has almost no change orders. Just very professional work all the way through. And if you don't know how difficult that is to do on a big project don't think it is "less than" because it isn't.

I used to work for a firm that are well on their way to having the ability to turn away potential clients and they are very talented people who work extremely hard. Between the group of them they collectively possess brilliant designers, artists (who make the pretty pictures to sell the projects), big thinkers, poets, and a facility with selling themselves and their work many architects would kill for. And the people I work with now would dismiss them as dilettantes and amateurs. Which is okay because they would dismiss the people I work with now as ambitionless hacks.

I think the reason I fell for Clewes simple typology was I like rules that are easy to remember. The world is too fucking complicated and I crave simplicity. Except, in my experience almost nothing you can say about architecture without pausing at least once for breath is really worth remembering. Well, you could say, "Bjarke Ingels is over-rated and his only real talent is manic self-publicizing". That at least, remains true.