Building stories revisited: Unlocking the knowledge capital of architectural practice

Since architects deal with unique projects, their knowledge is largely experience-based, tacit and embedded within the design and construction process. Nevertheless, few consistent and systematic mechanisms exist that try to establish and maintain access to the profession's knowledge. Effectively capitalizing on this knowledge thus seems as pressing a problem as producing more knowledge. Building Stories, an experimental course at University of California—Berkeley, started with a carte blanche opportunity and generous support from leading architecture firms in the San Francisco Bay Area, to try to unlock the knowledge capital of architectural practice through storytelling. This paper is about creating a discussion forum for dialogue about the nature of knowledge in architecture, how it can be captured and disseminated. More importantly, the paper illustrates how designers and other participants in the design and making of architecture can share their experiences through the method of storytelling. The paper looks back on the outcomes of Building Stories over the past five years, and on how it has evolved into an inventive methodology for catalyzing knowledge sharing between projects, between individual architects and architecture firms and, finally, between practice and academia. After briefly recalling the underlying ideas of Building Stories and their implementation as an operational methodology, the paper reports on its recent in-depth evaluation involving former participants from various contexts—young and seasoned professionals in practice, students and researchers in academia. Besides valuable feedback on Building Stories as such, this assessment provides more general insights regarding current ideas and practices of knowledge production and sharing in architecture.