The snub hubbub.(letters: exercise your right to write.)(Letter to the editor)

I read with interest your editorial in the May 2005 issue ("Group Hug," page 19). My husband and I have long felt the snub [from other architects] for the small custom home practice.

We are tired of sitting in seminars [that] don't address the high (and growing) level of bureaucracy and how to deal with it, the growing number of seemingly random written and unwritten rules, designing within the context of existing neighborhoods, designing a home when the neighbors have more rights than the property owners do with respect to the design, and the better design that frequently results within the many constraints our city and county jurisdictions [dictate].

The AIA has talked about the need to build up the worth of good design in the eyes of the public, and yet it seems [the organization doesn't[ understand that reaching the public can most effectively begin in their homes. When individuals recognize a building with good design because they live in one, they can see the importance of it in public buildings, multifamily projects, and [so] on.

I keep wondering how the architectural gurus expect to reach the masses when their disdain for them is so pervasive in their thinking.