Archispeak

Some weeks the conversation just goes where it goes. Evan and Cormac spend this one reading Wikipedia and AI overviews at each other in real time — the AIA convention ping-ponging from Philadelphia to Los Angeles, SoFi Stadium sunk 100 feet into the ground for the LAX flight path, its cable-net roof that expands and contracts like a tennis racket until Cormac christens it a "thermal reactive umbrella." Along the way: stadiums built as war memorials, U2 tours, and Public Enemy's opening statement in Birmingham.
Underneath the tangents is a real question for the profession. The Architecture Billings Index (ABI) has sat below 50 for a year, job confidence is low, and the flagship AIA convention costs each attendee around $1,500 before tours and CEUs. This episode is especially relevant for architects deciding whether that show is still worth attending when the economy is soft — and anyone who's quietly started reading the convention as an expense instead of an investment. It's a loose, funny episode that lands somewhere honest.
Episode Links:
AIA Conference on Architecture & Design 2027 — Philadelphia, May 19–22
AIA/Deltek Architecture Billings Index
ABI market research partnership — AIA
Architecture billings downward trajectory continues — AIA press
SoFi Stadium — HKS
SoFi Stadium / HKS — ArchDaily
SoFi Stadium — Architect Magazine
Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum — Wikipedia
Barnes Foundation — Philadelphia
Salk Institute — La Jolla
youtubetours.com — concert tour archive
Bankrate — mortgage & loan rates

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What do you do when you finish six years of architecture school, land in the profession, and realize none of it speaks to you? Evan and Cormac start with a former student on a Detroit construction tour who says the buildings around her are falling on deaf ears, and they take the question seriously instead of waving it off. They dig into the difference between dreading the work and feeling nothing for it, why the degree opens far more doors than the traditional path, and how meaning has to be found before happiness can follow it.
From there the conversation widens into attitude and its contagious effect on a team, the collapse of the mentorship that used to teach young architects why a single line matters, and a misplaced fire department connection that reveals how coordination breaks down when nobody asks the question. This episode is especially relevant for emerging professionals second-guessing the path they chose, and for the people managing them. You'll leave with a harder, more honest frame: the situation is yours to change, and no one else is going to do it for you.
Episode Links:
Out of Architecture — the community and book Cormac points the disillusioned grad toward, for architects finding a life in, around, and outside the profession
TRXL Podcast — Evan's AEC tech podcast, recommended alongside Out of Architecture

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Thank you for listening to Archispeak. For more episodes please visit https://archispeakpodcast.com.
Support Archispeak by making a donation.

Evan and Cormac dig into why architects deliberately stop detailing at "design intent" instead of shop-drawing level, and how that decision has handed constructability over to contractors and manufacturers. They explore the level of detail (LOD) gap between US and overseas practice, a real design-assist story about pushing a terracotta fin cantilever further with a manufacturer, and why competitive bidding punishes architects who over-detail their own work.
That leads into a wider conversation about why so much new construction feels generic and developer-driven, and why "breaking the mass" isn't the daring move it's marketed as. Using Frank Lloyd Wright's Usonian houses and Sam Mockbee's Rural Studio as examples, they make the case that affordability is a design tool, not a constraint that kills architecture.
This episode is especially relevant for project architects and BIM managers navigating construction documentation expectations, and for anyone frustrated by how mundane the built environment has become. It's a push to treat understanding construction and materials as the real path to bold, affordable design.
Episode Links:
Rural Studio — official site
Rural Studio — Our Story
Citizen Architect: Samuel Mockbee and the Spirit of the Rural Studio — official film site
Thorncrown Chapel — official site, E. Fay Jones
Schindler House / MAK Center for Art and Architecture — Rudolf Schindler's Kings Road House
Glenn Murcutt — 2002 Pritzker Architecture Prize
Citizen Architects — "Creating Hip Spaces on Solid Foundations"

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Thank you for listening to Archispeak. For more episodes please visit https://archispeakpodcast.com.
Support Archispeak by making a donation.

Evan and Cormac catch up on Cormac's 6,800-mile road trip from Detroit to the AIA National Convention in San Diego with his daughter, built around a bucket list of architectural pilgrimage stops. They explore what happens when a non-architect finally sees a building that lands emotionally (Thorncrown Chapel), what happens when a canonical masterpiece doesn't (the Salk Institute reads as "a parking garage"), and what the 2026 AIA National Convention got right and wrong.
This episode is especially relevant for architects who've ever tried to get a non-architect family member excited about a building they love, and for anyone curious what 18 states and 10 national parks look like when the itinerary is built around Route 66 gas stations, Louis Sullivan bank buildings, and a soda shop with a 66-foot bottle out front. Expect a reminder that the buildings people love most aren't always the ones architects were taught to revere.
Buildings & Projects Mentioned
Thorncrown Chapel — E. Fay Jones
The E. Fay Jones Conservancy
POPS (Pop 66) — Rand Elliott Architects
Salk Institute for Biological Studies — Louis Kahn
Geisel Library — William Pereira, UC San Diego
Wainwright Building — Adler & Sullivan, St. Louis
Jack C. Taylor Visitor Center — Missouri Botanical Garden
John Deere World Headquarters — Eero Saarinen, Moline

Context: AIA National Convention
AIA National Convention (A'26), San Diego

Related Work
Rand Elliott Architects

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Thank you for listening to Archispeak. For more episodes please visit https://archispeakpodcast.com.
Support Archispeak by making a donation.

David Prutting joins Evan and Cormac to talk about what 50 years of building high-end contemporary homes has taught him about the relationship between architects, owners, and builders. They explore the trust triangle that makes or breaks a custom project, why David actively steers clients away from design-build, and the floor plan theory he's developed over decades: the stranger the plan, the better the architect was listening.
This episode is especially relevant for architects at any career stage who want to understand how their work lands with the people who actually build it. David's perspective is rare — a builder who has spent five decades alongside Steven Holl, Toshiko Mori, Olson Kundig, and KieranTimberlake, who hires architects into his own construction firm, and who has been on both sides of the client chair. His book, A Builder's Life Done Well, is available on Amazon (link below).
Episode Links:
Get the book: A Builder's Life Done Well
Prutting + Company — prutting.com
David Prutting on LinkedIn
Prutting + Company on LinkedIn
Prutting + Company on Instagram
Profile — Residential Design Magazine
Steven Holl Architects
Toshiko Mori Architect
Joeb Moore & Partners
Olson Kundig
KieranTimberlake
New Canaan Modern — Prutting + Company
Philip Johnson Glass House
Annunciation Greek Orthodox Church (FLW) — Frank Lloyd Wright Building Conservancy

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Thank you for listening to Archispeak. For more episodes please visit https://archispeakpodcast.com.
Support Archispeak by making a donation.