Preservation pet peeve #3: An increase of book learned individuals in the
field results in a higher level of absurdity occurring at the building.
At present the graduate programs in preservation are producing a flood of
highly trained technicians without assuring a reciprocal balance of training
in the hands-on crafts. As well, a great deal of technical information is
being produced, but it is not being effectively filtered to the trades.
Knowledge workers that are inexperienced in construction management, often
inexperienced in life or work, are being let loose into the construction
environment. These individuals are too early being placed in positions where
they are asked to make judgements and issue directives. The problem is that
without life experience the judgements being made are often narrow in focus
and do not make consideration of a complexity of factors that any construction
project will encounter.
On the craft side the problem is that the workforce has not been prepared to
interface with the new design professionals. Often an individual with years of
construction experience is not able, either from a self-imposed feeling of
intimidation or anxiety over literate inadequacy, to add the perspective of
their field of knowledge. Young craft workers have a reciprocal lack of
experience and are often not prepared to deal with the management situations
that they encounter. Training in the construction environment has not by
tradition been through academic means, but through trial and error and
survival by natural selection of the market. For the most part training in
construction management occurs in the field in real time. There are obvious
problems with this method of education.
When you bring the highly prepared technician to the field and they encounter
the craft worker you often end up with absurdity.
Cleaning brick with toothbrushes. Field directives at 10 AM changed at 2 PM,
but neither directive issued to the same individual. Craft workers standing
idle while design issues are resolved then later being called morons by the
building owner for standing idle. Consolidation of limestone with lime washes
in weird places. Inappropriate masonry cleaning methods. Directives to custom
mix in the field materials that were never intended to be custom mixed.
Unclear specifications that mean one thing to the design professional but
another to the craftsman. Specifications for slaked lime mortar, when there is
nobody available to slake lime. Very odd and impractical methods for removing
mortar from brick joints.
I do not see these issues being adequately addressed and I believe it is to
the detriment of the preservation industry, and ultimately to the detriment of
the structures we all mutually care about working on.
Design professionals should be trained in interview techniques in order to
interface with, and learn from, older and experienced craftsmen. None of my
craft mentors would have put up with the absurdity that has been going on in
the field, they would have simply shut down, closed off the nuisance, and gone
elsewhere. This results in a loss of the knowledge of process. It also results
in capable craftsmen opting out of historic preservation work when they find
amusement parks, parking garge decks, and resorts easier.
Older design professionals should work to maintain a healthy and positive
communication process between their employees and the craft workers. I have
had mechanics complain that they do not want to share with the design
professionals because the next time they meet the information is used against
them. Craftsmen are not trained in verbal combat and often do not know how to
defend themselves from people that have only half the story but all the
belief. You take an individual who has no other desire than to put the
patching material in the terra cotta and make it invisible to the eye, and
they can do this extremely well, then suddenly you want to have a
philosophical argument about what they are doing. This does not work very well
to develop trust relationships.
Opportunities for training of craft workers need to be increased in order to
balance against the training of design professionals. Graduate programs should
consider initiating outreach programs for shared training, between students
and craft workers, in their own communities. This training needs to reach
beyond the gap of literacy and the social tensions between blue collar and
white collar workers. The fact that on the internet there can be informed
discussion as to lime mortars does not mean that the next craftsman you meet
in the field will have any idea what you are talking about. Do you teach, do
you learn from each other, or do you maintain a climate of ignorance in the
preservation environment?
Knowledge of traditional building process is a resource that the preservation
industry needs to maintain. If a balance is not maintained then the employment
opportunities for preservation graduates to work in the field will diminish,
as there will not be a skilled workforce available to do the work that the
young professionals are entrusted to specify.
If you want the work to be done properly then you have to support your local
craftsman.
I have to thank Mike McLeod of MJM Studios for having first focused my
attention on the problem of the information imbalance in historic
preservation. MJM Studios at one time was in the business of fabrication of
masonry ornamentation units for historic buildings. They fabricated the roof
balustrade for Carnegie Hall in the late 80's. I remember Mike giving some
inspiring talks on the subject of terra cotta fabrication. MJM studios has
decreased their involvement in HP and currently markets GFRC fabrications to
the resort industry.
][<en Follett
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