Difficulties of sequence caused by separating design from construction

The way that sensible adherence to a sequence of unfolding, is likely to impact real social processes, is nowhere more clear than in the relation between design and construction.
In conventional 20th-century process, most people made the assumption that design and construction can be separated successfully, and should be separated, that design comes first, ending with preparation of detailed construction drawings, and is then followed by a construction process which executes the design specified by the drawing.
If we pay attention to the sequence of unfolding as it actually needs to happen, and to the formation of living centers from the whole in a way which enhances the whole, we find ourselves repeatedly in the circumstances where we must jump back and forth between the two. […]
We find that a step in the design cannot be taken responsibly, without first taking a step in construction; or a step in construction cannot responsibly be taken, without taking a step in design.

Thus, in as living process, design steps and construction steps must be interleaved and entangled. The idea that they can be sharply separated as they were in much of the 20th century, does enormous violence to the needs of living structure.
On the other hand, careful attention to the natural sequence of events in a living process that is truly capable of creating a good building leads inevitably to a form of process (and social organization) in which these two are entwined.

#book/The Nature of Order/2 The process of creating life/19 Massive process difficulties#