What Should Be Detailed - Categories

(Voiceover) One of the things that always happens when you get deep into a cd set is this idea that you've sort of been working through a design. You've been thinking about it in that scematic way and sort of early on think about the programming and all of that. Then eventually you're sort of getting into more detail, really understanding what the materiality is through design development. And then you're getting into all the other levels of information like how does the egress system work how does the roofing system work and what are these sort of big system ideas and how are they going to relate to everything and how are they going to work together?

And then you sort of find yourself in this moment that everybody gets to which is, alright now I know a great deal about the building. I understand a lot about what we're trying to propose here. How do I communicate some of the level of detail that we've understood back out to somebody who would need to know. So to bidders and code officials and people like that. But really mostly to the bidders, because you really want to make sure that your design intent, i e the drawings and the project manual and all that.

That sort of the base ideas behind what you're thinking about will find it's way through the process and actually get built. And that can really only happen if they understand the drawings well enough that the design intent becomes clear. So the design intent sounds like sort of wishy-washy kind of like big ideas kind of thing. But actually it really often plays itself out through the details. Is there a base board?

Or does the drywall come down and have a little reveal before the floor tucks in underneath that reveal? That's a really important design decision. That sort of relationships over what this thing is gonna look like. The feel of the space. Is about that sharp line or is it about there being sort of a little element there that kind of defines the edge? Kind of gives you a certain relationship to historical work.

That kind of decision is really what the design intent is all about. And the place that I'm gonna see that is in a detailed drawing. So does the drywall come down and look something like that?

Where I have this little reveal here? I have a finished floor. Or does it come down like that?

Clearly these are very different buildings. This is a very different aesthetic. And the way that it's gonna show up I mean it'll show up a little bit on building sections and some of those other drawings. But the place I really understand that intent is this trying to be mesion is it trying to sort of fit into a certain kind of tradition?

Is it trying to look like a standard building or a historic building? That's a very different tradition. Well when I'm trying to get across that design intent it really is in this level of detail. So this is one of those moments where you realize that big picture idea is actually showing itself through the details. So which details do you draw? And there's sort of an easy answer to that.

And then there's a lot of complicated answers to that. But the easy answer is there's two basic ideas about which details I'm gonna draw, typically on a set of drawings. So the two basic answers are one, is it emblematic? So something like what we just drew here. If I drew that detail so that you talk about this little reveal. That little, maybe that's a half inch reveal 3/4 inch reveal something like that down at the bottom of that wall system.

If I draw that in such a way that people could infer quite a number other sets of relationships, well then that's an emblematic one. It would be a spot where we're just choosing an idea here. We're not saying this is something that's happening in this particular place. We're saying this is happening in a bunch of different places. And probably in some places it's a little different because that's where there's running into a door. And probably in some places it's a little different because it has a different floor finish.

It might be slightly different. Maybe another place it meets up with a control joint and has a little bit of a difference. But all of those differences would be inferable from this emblematic idea. That you kind of get across what the point is of the set of relationships. That you're not trying to show every single possible variation. You're just trying to show enough information that somebody could infer a bunch of other details from what this one looks like.

And then the other example would be something that's very specific. So you can imagine a situation where I'm sort of thinking about it. I'm trying to show a bunch of information. I've thought throw a bunch of ideas about how something's going to work. And then you realize you know there is no place where this is really described. This is not something, and maybe it shows up on a section or on a floor plan or something. But it just has a simple note pointing to it doesn't really explain what's going on.

Well then that's a detail that needs to be drawn. If you can't infer it from other information from the plans, from the sections, from some other detail, well then you really need to draw that detail. You have to be able to give enough information enough tools for the people that need to be able to read the drawings to be able to go through them and make logical sets of choices about what it is you're trying to get across. So if it doesn't show up anywhere else and if it's not easily understood from other details, well then you probably do need to draw that detail.

So those are the two basic types of decisions that you're making when you're drawing details on a cd set. One, is it emblematic? Does it tells us about a whole range of different sets of relationships? Because we could look and it and just understand what it is we mean. And therefore we can imagine similar situations at the ceiling, at the wall edge, at all kinds of other kinds of examples.

Or is it something that's super specific? And that it really doesn't show up anywhere else? And therefore you need to draw it because this is the only way that that information is going to get across. So those are the two basic reasons why you chose which details to do. It would be nice to be able to do all the details. It would be nice to get detailed everywhere. And that's one of the advantages of really getting into the 3-D modeling. Is that you start to get into that level of thinking, of that you really are showing all the detail everywhere.

But you're not really getting into it. You're not getting so deep into it that you have the notes and the clarity. And you've really thought through exactly what's gonna happen. If something goes around a corner, or something like that. So the details are really where you're not just showing the information but you're actually describing it. You're taking it that next layer of sort of thoroughness and showing the dimensions of things and showing the sizes and calling out the materials and calling out the flashing and the insulation and all of those things.

You're not just showing a set of relationships but you're actually giving the whole narrative to how those pieces go together. And essentially saying why they are going together in that way. You don't usually actually say why but you're choosing details that explain why the things are. So that somebody can make reasonable decisions from those.

So it'd be great to do every detail on a whole building but it's just not viable. It's just not reasonable to assume that you'd be able to spend that much time and energy figuring out every one of those little details. So you're looking for those two key ideas. The ones that just wouldn't show up in any other way and it's the only way you can really get across that set of information. And then the other ones which are emblematic. And those are showing the big picture idea of what a set of relationships are like.

And you could understand what 100 different details are from just seeing that particular one. Now one of the things that we've said many times along the way, is you're always trying to only draw things once. But in actuality, in reality on a set of drawings, you're going to show things multiple times. It just has to be. You can not not show it more than once. But you're intent is to show it only once. So you want to be a little careful.

If you can show the information that you're talking about in a building section well maybe you should show it there. Or if you can label it easily and that's enough on a floor plan. Well, maybe that's all you need. You don't necessarily need to have everything be drawn as a detail. So this is one of those important things to start analyzing which is what items really need to be detailed and which ones are really just descriptions? Or which ones are seen in some other part of the drawing set?

So you don't really need to have a whole set aside set of drawings. And there's two reasons for that. One reason that we want to be concerned about that is we don't want to waste our time if we don't need to draw the details. If we don't need to get into that level of fine tuning. If we can see it easily in some other way or if we can describe it easily in some other way that's faster, we might as well. Everybody saves a little bit of money and it's all a positive. But the other reason is you don't want to get into having the same information in lots and lots of different places.

Because then, as we've said before, when something goes wrong or something gets changed or the client says, "Oh it turns out I decided I don't like the wood paneling. "I wanna go with putting shag carpet on the walls." So they've made some decision and now you have to go through and find all the places where you had the wood paneling and replace it with shag carpeting. Well that's gonna be a problem because maybe you forget one or maybe one gets left behind somewhere. Or it still shows up on a building section but you changed it in the detail.

So now I have things that don't match to each other. So you're looking to make sure you have enough information that these big important ideas, which are often shown only through something like a detail, that's the best place to show them, that have these big important details that are going sort of going across and the their going to explain our design intent. But if I'm trying to show too many different things, I can actually make it worse for myself because I create a situation where partly the big idea starts getting a little diluted and gets lost because you start not realizing which of the 30 details that we drew are actually the important ones.

But also just that opportunity to make a mistake becomes more and more present every time I have an extra drawing in the set. So you're trying to keep the details to a sort of reasonable number because you want there to be enough information that people can understand what your design intent is really all about.

But not so much that you're potentially creating trip hazards for yourself down the road when something starts to change. And inevitably things will start to change. So two basic ways of thinking about detailing. The emblematic ones and then the super specific ones.

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