"...the latest version of the building was not just designed in AutoCAD, it was designed for AutoCAD." (Loukissas 164)
When a new tool emerges, it allows different methods of production that may generate ways of thinking or formal strategies previously unimagined. AutoCAD functions largely a digitized version of the ancient tools of compass, straightedge, and square. Although speed of production is greatly affected, the geometries possible within the domain of the program are similar to those possible etching marble by hand. A building designed for AutoCAD is probably radically different than a building designed for CATIA, whose domain ingrains design by constraint and parameter rather than by static spatial definition. When the designer no longer spends time tweaking lines, but setting rules and mediating the myriad generated iterations, the design is produced through a radically different process of thought and response.
Yanni Loukissas reveals generational disparities between the ability of master and apprentice to handle changing architectural technology in Keepers of the Geometry. In one studied firm, Paul Morris Associates, the principal rarely works with technology directly, and relies on apprentice Drew Thorndike to negotiate designs with the digital interface. Once designs are within the digital, Thorndike must then print them out for Morris to make revisions via trace paper. I see this process as typical of the transitional strategies older firms employ to keep themselves relevant; however, by not committing fully to using the medium by which his designs are developed, Morris is missing the mark. The lowest common denominator determines the agility and performance of the design, which in this case might be the manual recitation by trace and by Morris' intentional distance from the digital realm. This distance does not lessen over time, but Morris does begin to give more authority to the capabilities of the program, thereby losing "some of the physical intimacy he has with pencil drawings." The evolved method of working involves Morris standing behind Thorndike as the apprentice drives the computer program—perhaps a more direct feedback loop, but nonetheless still one which is not fully invested in the logic and capabilities of the software.
My experience has been largely shaped by workflows similar to the one described above, and has indicated to me two things. One, not all firms require or desire a fully intimate relationship with the software they use, and perhaps are more efficient in their design process when the software is tapped in a very limited way. Two, those firms that wish to fully capitalize on the emerging capabilities of digital design tools must not take a transitional stance, and must have design leaders who understand the inner workings of the software itself.