Charette Design

The French word "charette" means "cart".  The etymology of the word dates back to artists in Paris who were competing for the coveted "Grand Prix de Rome".  As the deadline for the competition neared, a cart was sent around to collect the final artwork from each of the potential scholarship winners.  Participants were known to jump into the cart with their incomplete designs or artwork and attempt to complete them on the way to the final submission.  The term has rightly been attributed to an intense period of collarboration and design - particularly as it relates to architecture.

 Our firm has been involved in several of these intensive design "marathons".  Jonathan spends time researching prior to the charette so that he is adequately prepared to maximize his creative resources.  He will then meet with developers, designers and sometimes other architects for several days of collaboration and design.  The result produces some an impressive amount of work that usually would take weeks to complete.  The ultimate benefit goes to the client as they are able to give immediate feedback and thus steer the design process effectively. 

The Design Charette  can be an invaluable process which will give your project or development a serious "head start" in the right direction.  By bringing together key project leaders and developers into a very focused setting, the architect is able to receive real-time feedback which will save time and resources in bringing you the very best design.