Architectural Revolution: AI's Impact from Design to Construction and the Role of Architects

0:00Today on the podcast, I want to talk about some new software and ways that AI is revolutionizing construction and specifically architecture. And the question is, will AI completely replace architects and, you know, take their job? So today on the podcast, we'll be diving into it. So a lot of this comes from a recent report by The Guardian where they were covering a company called Xcool. And Xcool is a company based out of China, based out of Shenzhen, that they've essentially created this this virtual AI that can help do a lot of things architects can do. So Wei Yang He, who's an architect who is an architect from Shenzhen and is kind of, you know, some would attribute as the visionary behind Xcool, demonstrated how AI can dynamically adjust hotel room layouts in real time with just a few clicks.

0:52She also revealed how the intricate network of wiring, lighting placements and even cost breakdowns can all be done by ai all of this was ready for immediate execution and surprisingly a hotel complex conceptualized in minutes via this tool took just four and a half months to be physically realized this is absolutely incredible the fact that you know you could say i would like to build a hotel and then in just a couple minutes this technology would essentially you know give an entire layout build the whole thing out show the the network of wiring lighting like it goes into such great detail it's absolutely insane all of this being done with ai to opt to make this thing absolutely optimal um and this and then these hotels can actually be built this could be houses this could be skyscrapers this could be anything um these ai this ai software is able to do some really incredible things in architecture so i I think recent developments in AI tools like Dolly, Midjourney, and Stable Diffusion are really what is currently allowing designers to bring their visions to life.

1:59And they're able to do this in really high res, essentially images that are inspired by Frank Lloyd Wright or, you know, eccentric designs that are blending sci-fi and art. So I think these tools make visualization a breeze, right? So if you have an idea for what you would like your home to look like, you could go to Mid Journey, you could give a bunch of prompts and say modern home, this many square feet, this size, this location, these color schemes, and it could generate you the outside. But I've also seen from interior designers some really incredible interior designs. They were like, I would like a kitchen that looks like X, Y, and Z, blah, blah, blah, modern, these styles.

2:36Gets all of these different design inspiration ideas of the interior design. So it does interior, exterior, and now with a tool like Xtool, it's able to take this one step further and actually start doing the layouts and a lot of the architects' work on these buildings, which would be really incredible to go, let's say, generate some really phenomenal-looking buildings on MidJourney and then having something like Xcool go and actually give you the architects' layout and blueprints for something like that. So I think AI's impact is incredibly profound right now in this day and age. And we're seeing this from a perspective that a lot of architects, I think, will be using these tools to augment their capabilities 100%.

3:22And then the question remains, will this eventually replace architects? So I think according to Neil Leach, who's the author of Architecture in the Age of Artificial Intelligence, he says that AI's power lies in automating the entire design process from initial ideation to construction. He really believes that AI is going to take over the entire process here. Xcool is definitely at the forefront of this kind of AI-driven architectural revolution. It was established back in 2016, and the company already has over 50 ,000 users in China. The English iteration of its AI tool is called LookX, and it has also launched.

4:01So the team behind X Cool, formerly associated with the architect REM Coolhouse OMA, really envisioned a future where architecture harnesses the power of AI. And it was inspired by AlphaGo's historic win over a human at the game of Go back in 2016. and when they saw that they you know I think they really kind of decided that if AI could beat humans in a game of Go they could beat them in many things including architecture and that's I think when you know the inspiration for this platform really came to the forefront so Xcool has an integrated platform which essentially is assisting architects from high level with high level master plan layouts down to intricate interior details so while its early designs may seem somewhat mechanical um you know like the robot-esque shenzhen hotel i think the technology's promise is really really incredible this is what i say with a lot of ai advancements when people are quick to dismiss it like oh you know it just designed a hotel but the hotel doesn't look as creative as like a human could make it's like yes but it is able to do a basic hotel therefore it's able to do a very creative very elaborate hotel in the future as these things improve um especially when like from the creative side platforms like mid journey i've seen the most creative looking buildings in the world on there i've seen people create all sorts of you know castles from fantasy books and lands and all sorts of weird shaped hotels and crazy things on mid journey so we know that ai obviously is capable of doing these really creative tasks um and then all it comes down to is being able to integrate it with a platform like x cool that can do a lot more of the actual integrate or a lot more of the, you know, how this thing is, the nitty gritty of how this thing is actually pulled off.

5:44And I think pairing those two technologies is going to be the solution that essentially can create and design the most elaborate, most complex, most beautiful and creative buildings, and then actually make it so that these things are possible, architecturally sound and able to actually be pulled off. So I think not everyone's sold on this vision though. There's a lot of concerns about data misuse, um martha tsekari of foster and partners in london emphasizes the importance of data quality and its implications for data privacy and intellectual property ai's accuracy and reliability kind of hinge on the quality of the data that are fed into it so some people are concerned um that you know in architecture there may be issues there so i think for the last half decade tsekari's team has been leveraging ai to optimize materials and building designs and their experiments include developing facades with thermally responsive laminate materials that change shape with temperature variations.

6:44So I think additionally, you know, something else that AI is really great at doing is essentially providing really complex simulations that traditionally would have been very labor intensive, which essentially could allow architects to instantly visualize the implications of design adjustments, which I think is really, really cool. And so I think the question then becomes, you know, how is the broader architectural community embracing these changes? We're obviously seeing AI is able to do a lot of impressive things. So how are people actually, you know, embracing this? I think some architects use ChatGPT to, you know, really quickly create and analyze local planning policies.

7:21I've personally spoken to a number of, you know, architectural firms and engineering firms that are really interested in this technology. they're also using it to kind of evaluate material properties while while some others are also leveraging mid journey for ideation during the conceptual phase right like i mentioned i think that's absolutely an amazing amazing way to go zha is a firm established by the late zaha zaha hadid and zha actually uses mid journey to quickly turn out numerous design alternatives when they're trying to come up with their initial designs for something. So beyond visualization, I think AI's potential in the planning phase of development is absolutely massive.

8:05Yuan Mills is a co-founder of BlockType, and he envisions AI simplifying the planning process and potentially curbing land speculation. His tool that he has aims to assist developers in grasping the spatial potential of sites and provide local authorities with a cleaner framework for development permission. So while some of the industry may perceive architecture as exclusively, isn't really something that's going to get mixed with code, I think the reality is a lot more nuanced. And so I think the tech-driven trajectory is absolutely undeniable that we're seeing here. AI is getting integrated into everything, and that will 100 % include architecture.

8:45We're seeing some amazing use cases and tools. and I think that if I was to make a prediction on where this goes in the future this is going to be incredibly this is going to be way more adopted. Architects are definitely going to have to learn to originally use these tools and I think at the end of the day these tools will be able to do a lot of what architects do. Does it replace architects? No I don't think this replaces really anyone necessarily because there's always going to be creative architects that know all of the right architectural phrases and things to ask an AI and so they're going to be able to essentially the same way you get a better response when you ask a better prompt on chat tpt there's going to be experts that are able to do that but i think that a lot of the perhaps very specialized skill sets will be able to be learned by anyone through a youtube video or online course that would have taken architects much longer because a lot of the heavy lifting and nitty-gritty will be able to be done by ai and then of course you'll probably still have to send off whatever your designs are to an actual architect or engineer to do the final stamp of approval similar to when you buy templates online you still got to do the same thing to get your permits a lot of the time so i think there there's still gonna be that aspect of it but very very interesting to see how this is really shaping an industry that you know previously people were not associating with ai very heavily and so i think architecture may just be the next frontier to see some massive disruption from ai