ARCHITECTURE & AI
Architecture after automation
Phillippe Fouché and Oliver Hall
SAOTA
When speaking about automation and artificial intelligence in architecture, we are not talking about architecture being replaced. We are talking about it being repositioned. So argue our writers from leading architecture firm SAOTA( www. saota. com), while explaining their design DNA and the human role in the process.
Automation and artificial intelligence have already changed the mechanics of how we work significantly. At SAOTA, our journey with AI began pragmatically, using it to assist with rendering, and translate early models into usable imagery.
This helped us to communicate ideas more efficiently. What mattered was what that time allowed us to focus on instead. We could interrogate the design sooner, which ultimately allowed us to push our ideas further.
Today, AI enables us to rapidly test multiple visualisations of our projects: times of day, weather conditions, and atmospheres. Snow, dusk, moving foliage – things that once required enormous effort can now be explored fluidly and early. But these tools do not design for us. They allow us to interrogate our ideas before they are fixed. That distinction is critical.
36 winter 2026 | www. tobuild. co. za