alt Hacker NewsI always assumed that part of what made "the great architects" great was their skill in combining lofty visions with practical engineering, making houses that were at once artistic statements and durable, comfortable living spaces... utilizing the strengths of different materials, built on sound engineering principles and so on.
But these architects seem to be more interested in the experience you get when _visiting_ the house in its environment, rather than the experience of actually living in it, and these houses are famously often impractical, hard to maintain, and in need of constant repair. That makes them less interesting to me.
That's just architects in a nutshell, and stems from the division of labor. They're primarily tasked with designing a grand vision, and because of that, aesthetics and features naturally end up being primary concerns they deal with (ie the "what" and "why"). Whereas engineers are tasked more about figuring out the details, the how, and ensuring that vision can actually be built, so naturally... practicality ends up being a primary concern of theirs, since they tend to have to deal with it more.
That's not to say that architects don't or can't make practicality their primary concern, just that things naturally slant this way since this is typically how labor is divided.