Understanding what is actually proposed in proposed development.

Paul Finch opines on Presenting architecture properly (he's speaking to architects, designers and other project proponents) and many of his sugestions are well-made. My own addition:

“Walk around the proposed building with your audience.”

Take one example. Though never discussed with any precision much less sophistication, urban design writ large is at the center of the Chelsea Barracks dispute between Prince Charles andLord Rogers, about which I have been posting in the past few days. But I bet not one in a hundred citizens of the London neighborhood where the project is to be built (and in itself a well-informed group) could describe with any accuracy what one sees/senses as one walks at street level around and through Rogers’ design. 

And that's true for any one of these development disputes in any nation at any scale. The project is usually presented and then discussed in terms of the 1000-yard view — what it looks like from a great distance. But in reality, people experience a building from close-up. 

So if you are presenting a building to anyone, take a pedestrian level view and “walk around the proposal,” stopping every 20-30 feet to describe what’s there and what one would be seeing.

I promise, you will be quite surprised at what your audience learns and in fact what you, as a project proponent/opponent/analyst, will learn.