Crowdsourcing architecture

Throughout history significant architectural work has been always crowdsourced to multiple designers via architectural competitions. With the advent of the internet and advanced information technologies, the traditional model where anonymous architects would work individually on a given architectural challenge has been morphed into a collaborative effort where clients, the larger public -for public projects-, and even contractors may work together throughout the competition process. For example, the designers can have intermediary submissions, which can be rated by clients and/or the larger public; and their feasibility evaluated by contractors. The outcome can then be taken by designers to develop and generate the most rated and fittest design solutions.

Architectural Competitions

Online crowdsourcing platforms in general offer an alternative to traditional architectural competitions. As in any other crowdsourcing initiatives, such platforms allow smaller scale projects to make use of the fair competition process.

Questions remain to be answered:

• What is the difference between architectural competition and crowdsourced architecture?
• What business models can support and produce liable end results?
• What are the heuristic evaluation criteria for crowdsourced work?

Business Models

An unprecedented business model for crowdsourcing architectural design was launched by Cambridge, MA based high-tech company Arcbazar in 2010, and adopted by the European company CoContest, in 2012. The business model builds on traditional architectural competitions and provides an online competition platform for small-to-medium scale architecture, landscape, interior design and remodeling projects; and, builds on the triumvirate of clients, designers and contractors. It connects clients with designers through architectural competitions, and links contractors with construction projects.

Criticism

Crowdsourcing architecture has been heavily criticized by professional architects, and architectural guilds. Dwell (Magazine), America's leading home and architecture magazine, called the launch of Arcbazar "the worst thing to happen to architecture since the internet started." This statement caused many heated debates among architectural bloggers worldwide. The Architects' Journal Great Britain's leading professional architecture magazine wrote an article on the disruptive business model: "Architecture crowd-sourcing website criticized: Architects have slammed a threatening new crowd-sourcing website in the US which promises to reduce clients' costs."

External links

• Crowdsourcing Architecture and Home Remodeling Projects Arcbazar.
• The New World of Building Design By Aarni Heiskanen at AEC business, February 18, 2013.
• Architecture for the crowd by the crowd Interview by Eric Blatterberg at crowdsourcing.org, October 21, 2011.
• Architecture crowd-sourcing website criticised Article by Merlin Fulcher in the Architects' Journal, September 29, 2011.
• Moving Architecture Online Public interview at Venture Café, Cambridge, MA, June 21, 2011.
• Crowdsourced Architecture by ID/Lab -wayfinding, wayshowing, placemaking, legibility, and human behaviour in navigation, January 18, 2011

References

• Shepherding the Crowd: An Approach to More Creative Crowd Work by Steven Dow and Scott Klemmer
• Is crowdsourcing changing the who, what, where, and how of creative work? by Mira Dontcheva and Elizabeth Gerber
• Structures for Creativity: The crowdsourcing of design by Jeffrey V. Nickerson, Yasuaki Sakamoto, and Lixiu Yu

See also

• 99Design, a similar crowdsourcing platform for graphic design projects.
• Innocentive, a crowdsourcing service in science.