Transition to Advanced BIM Software: A Case Study of BIG Architectural Firm

BIG – Bjarke Ingels Group is a renowned, international, conceptual architectural firm with offices in Copenhagen and New York. The firm has gained global recognition for several architectural accomplishments, including the award-winning “8 House” in Copenhagen, the Danish Pavilion at the Shanghai World Expo, and the “West 57” tower project near the Hudson River in Manhattan. BIG is known for its unique approach to architecture, combining Danish qualities with American grandeur. The firm is highly dependent on the freedom to design without restrictions and the ability to produce new proposals and visualizations quickly. BIG's work is characterized by its innovative and conceptual designs, which have earned it star status in architectural circles.

BIG – Bjarke Ingels Group, a large, international, conceptual architectural firm based in Copenhagen and New York, was facing challenges with their existing Building Information Modeling (BIM) software. The firm, known for its innovative and conceptual architectural designs, was struggling with the limitations of their chosen BIM software, Revit. The architects found Revit to be too restrictive and incompatible with their sketching process. They also encountered difficulties in establishing a smooth workflow between Rhino, a 3D modeling software, and Revit. The firm was seeking a solution that would allow them to leverage the benefits of BIM without compromising their creative freedom and ability to produce new proposals and visualizations quickly.

To overcome the challenges, BIG decided to replace Revit with Archicad for their new projects in the Copenhagen office. Archicad, a more flexible BIM tool, was developed by architects for architects. It focuses on graphic presentation and offers a built-in library of general building components, making it faster for BIG to use it as a documentation tool. BIG also changed their perspective on BIM tools, realizing that using several specialized tools, each aimed at a sub-task, was a more effective approach. To ensure a successful transition to Archicad, BIG collaborated with BIM Equity to create a strategy for implementing BIM through a series of specific, ‘dedicated’ pilot projects. BIM Equity trained the documentation team for each project just before starting the documentation phase, providing ample staff support and free software licenses during the pilot period.

• The transition to Archicad has been beneficial for BIG. The first pilot project with Archicad, a residential building project at the DONG site in Copenhagen, demonstrated the advantages of the new BIM tool. The project, which involved a complex design of residential boxes stacked one on top of another, required close cooperation between architects and engineers. The flexibility and features of Archicad facilitated this collaboration and made it easier to manage the complexity of the construction. BIG's BIM Manager, Jakob Andreassen, noted that architects were adapting to Archicad more easily than Revit, making working with BIM easier. The firm sees BIM software as a promising means of collating all project information and making it easier to concentrate on the architecture in future BIG projects.