CASE STUDY - SOFTWARE STUNNER
ARCHITECT
BOOSTS
INNOVATION AND
COLLABORATION
WITH ARCHICAD
ARCHICAD HELPS AWARD-WINNING, AUCKLAND-BASED ARCHITECTS COPELAND
ASSOCIATES TAKE COLLABORATION TO THE NEXT LEVEL.
Copeland Associates
Architects is an
award-winning, New
Zealand-based architectural
practice with
a passion for innovative economic
solutions.
Copeland Associates was founded
by Barry Copeland in 1997 after
successful roles in leading practices
in Manchester, London and
Auckland.
Projects are diverse: from education,
to residential - but with a particular
expertise in large sporting facilities.
The most recent award – a
prestigious A’ Design Award in 2017
- was for the Three Kings United
Football Clubhouse in Auckland.
The practice has a strong belief in
the power of teamwork and collaboration.
Marco Duthie, associate,
says: “There is constant dialogue
with the client, and other contributors.
Right from a project’s inception
through to completion, we work
collaboratively with engineers, constructors
and other specialists.”
That creates a number of
challenges. The need to create,
export and share complex files
across various platforms. Being able
to adopt and handle a fast rate of
change. How to document such a
dynamic process. After researching
the local market, Copeland chose
ArchiCAD.
“It was clear that in New Zealand,
ArchiCAD was far superior in
terms of tailored tools to the NZ
building industry,” Mr Duthie says.
The practice was also impressed
with the customer support system
established by Central Innovation.
Importantly, the user experience and
interface of ArchiCAD was preferred.
“It’s wonderful to use, and easy on
the eyes.”
Central Innovation was founded
in 1990 on a passionate belief
in providing world-class design
solutions for the architectural,
engineering, construction and
manufacturing industries.
Today, the company has more
than 130 staff in seven locations
across Australia and New Zealand.
Thousands of customers, large
and small, rely on us to provide
award-winning technical support,
outstanding training and innovative
products.
RESULTS AT A GLANCE
Copeland Associates began using
ArchiCAD in mid-2017, along with
other tools to enhance the process.
“We complemented ArchiCAD with
Rhino, using Grasshopper. We are
also using Unity - exporting our
models out of ArchiCAD into Unity
for VR purposes. And, of course,
using the BIMX feature for client
explanation,” Mr Duthie says.
The results were almost immediate.
“ArchiCAD is now central to our
business and company success, as
it is our main tool. We can handle
more projects without expanding
our company and stretching our
resources, and have the ability to
do everything under the architecture
umbrella in house - things like
animations and visuals.”
An early project to benefit was their
award-winning Three Kings United
project. “Through ArchiCAD, we
were able to manage the complexity
and various file types needing to be
incorporated such as Grasshopper
(Rhino).”
ABOUT CENTRAL
INNOVATION
26 February 2019