Gehry shares digital system for “paperless buildings”

BE SURE TO CHECK OUT THE “COMMENTS” THAT APPEAR BELOW THE ARTICLE; one reveals reality, the other two are just funny!

This article appeared in De Zeen Magazine on April 12, 2013

Frank Gehry has launched his studio's paperless system for sharing and collaborating on drawings as a scaled-up product for the architecture industry.

The GTeam software by Gehry's technology development and consulting company Gehry Technologies is now integrated with cloud-based storage service Box, enabling Box's customers in the fields of architecture, construction and engineering to easily access and manage blueprints, CAD files and contracts.

The paperless system was refined by Gehry's studio during the construction of New York by Gehry (pictured), the 265-metre-high apartment building completed in 2011, where sharing digital files enabled the architects and engineers working on the tower to significantly reduce the number of expensive alterations required during construction.

Box has now scaled up the software to bring it to the wider industry and allow others to benefit in the same way, according to company CEO Aaron Levie.

"I think when you can bring these tools to the masses, it really opens up innovation in an incredible way," he said.

The software was developed by Gehry's studio over the decades to eliminate the need for paper.

"My dream is to do buildings paperless. And it can be done," Gehry told technology magazine Wired. "I discovered that, using the computer, we had more information, which kept us in control and allowed us to protect the owner from a lot of waste in the process."

GTeam can incorporate files from other design software, such as Rhino and AutoCAD, and is already being used in the offices of Zaha Hadid and SOM, according to Gehry.

In a similar mood of collaboration, Dutch firm UNStudio this week announced it will relaunch in June as an "open-source architecture studio" inspired by technology start-ups, using an online platform to encourage the exchange of ideas between its own architects and those outside the company.

Gehry was recently asked to "tone down" his plans for Facebook's new Silicon Valley campus, while earlier this year a Utah congressman launched an attempt to scrap the architect's proposed Washington D.C. memorial for former president Dwight D. Eisenhower – see all architecture by Frank Gehry.

From the "Comments" section:

Gilles Normandin

Mr. Gehry ,

I am about your age, I've been in the same business as you for 50 years. I am one among other architects and designers on a two billion dollar project at McGill University Health Center (MUHC) in Montreal. It is done with a computer program call Autodesk Revit producing a 3D model. Said like that it seems fantastic, but it isn't. We are 300 hundred professionals, it is a pure utopia to think that this will solve it all. Let me tell you that I've never in my all career seen so many paper drawings!

Thanks Mr. Gehry for making us believe in utopia! It may happen one day.

TTT

Says the guy that claims "I can only use the computer to throw at somebody"

TT...

I wonder if Frank Gehry irons his clothes.