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  1 Design conversations Some time ago, we started to explore design processes by trying to write computer programs that would conduct conversations that other designers would consider useful。
  5 This led us to understand the importance of narrative and memory in design thinking。 Coming from a linguistic background, Medway and Andrews have studied a real recorded conversation in an architect’s office between three partners of the practice who are obviously highly experienced designers。
  6 Med- way and Andrews note that the ‘base mode of the conversation is narrative’。 That is to say that although from time to time the conversational mode changes temporarily, it begins in and generally returns to a style similar to that of telling a story。
   This chimes with the Scho¨- nian view of design as a conversation in which characters are introduced, or ‘named’ and the story set up, or ‘framed’ around their characteristics。
   Secondly, this analysis shows that there is frequent reference to documents throughout the conversation。 This is hardly astonishing in itself but what is of particular interest to these researchers is the way in which the designers treat drawn and written documents and ‘regard them as equivalent’。
   This clearly surprises those steeped in linguistic research。 That architecture is such a textual business is not what we expected to emerge from our close analysis of the transcripts。
   This research above all else shows that design conversations are extra- ordinarily compact since they are full of references which in turn point to huge chunks of information。
   It also draws our attention to the importance of words as well as pictures if we wish to understand the way knowledge is handled in the design process。
   If we listen to conversations within experienced teams of designers it is quickly evident that they have many common expectations and use a shared language。
   I am going to use some data here from a study I did of the architect Richard MacCormac。7 This senior and distinguished British architect is widely regarded as an outstanding designer, he is recently knighted, an ex-president of the RIBA and his clients include the BBC, London Transport, Cable and Wireless and several UK Universities。
   In describing his own role in the practice, MacCormac described an interesting variation in process that is particularly revealing about our exploration of experience。
   I think that my role in the practice is to initiate the design processes in all the major jobs, not so much in building types like housing where I think we have established a kind of repertoire, a typological repertoire, which is to do with density and to do with the main problems like car parking and so on which are。
   。 。 it’s sort of vernacular if you like, we do quite a lot of it for housing associations and so on。 。 。 vernacular in the sense that its a language that’s the common language。
   Clearly, Richard is telling us here that he changes the process depending on the level of experience the practice has with the problem in hand。
   He is also telling us that this relates to the way the practice relies upon its known sub-solutions to the generic typological problem。
   In such cases, he feels then that the job architects can be left to work without his personal intervention at the early conceptual stage。
   This proves to be a significant point as the argument unfolds。 2 Schemata I spent some time in MacCormac’s design office and in the space of one day I heard three members of the practice use the word ‘belvedere’。
   Of course, this is a perfectly acceptable architectural term but hardly common parlance even in a contemporary practice。 This suggested that this word represented a complex set of ideas that were common ground within the practice。
   During an interview with Mac- Cormac himself, he described the process leading to his design for the chapel at Fitzwilliam College Cambridge。
   。 。 。 at some stage the thing (the worship space) became sort of round but I can’t remember how。。 。 。 early on we were playing with round shapes in square containers, you know the sort of thing。
   。 。 Here, Richard was obviously expecting that I would understand from this reference a whole series of architectural ideas, and that I would recognise the architectural game being played。
   I remember him looking at my eyes to see if this was the case。 He must have inferred that it was or I guess the conversation would have halted or proceeded differently。
   Listening to conversation in such practices reveals just how extraordinarily efficient communication becomes since enormously complex and sophisticated sets of ideas can be referred to using simple diagrams, catchphrases (for example, ‘round shapes in square containers’) or even single words (for example, ‘belvedere’)。
   Such a phenomenon is hardly new to us。 It is precisely that of concept formation or the development of schemata。 For experienced architects, the concept or schema of ‘round shapes in square containers’ includes not just the simple idea of that geometry but the whole game of contrasting the curved and straight lines, and all the examples and variations have been developed by other architects。
   For MacCormac’s practice members, the schema of ‘belvedere’ was not restricted to the commonly shared idea of a viewing tower。 For them, it was not a matter of a building typology at all but rather a whole series of devices for organising space vertically in order to afford dramatic views that helped building users to build mental maps of their surroundings。
   They collectively delight in these ideas and have studied them and exploited them in previous designs。
   But how do expert designers actually come to use these schemata in the process of designing? In particular how do they know when an individual schema may be useful or not? 。