scaffold

Type: Hybrid (Personal / Software / collaborative) Status: Planning Deadline: TBD Created: 2026-06-08

What is this?

An exploration of agentic tooling for the AEC (architecture/engineering/construction) industry — but aimed at everything around the design rather than the design itself. Think “Git + MCP for building projects” rather than “Figma for buildings”. Whether this becomes a product, an internal tool, or a research note is still open.

Motivation

Most current AI-for-AEC startups focus on generative design. The interesting unexplored gap is the project lifecycle scaffolding around design: specs, RFIs, submittals, code compliance, coordination, contract admin — all the document-heavy, workflow-heavy work that agentic systems are particularly well-suited to. David has Claude Code fluency and willingness to vibecode; brother + sister-in-law (architects) bring domain expertise and can validate whether any of this is real pain.

What does success look like?

TBD — explicitly. The first phase is exploration. A reasonable checkpoint: after ~3-4 working sessions, decide whether to (a) commit to a concrete prototype, (b) reframe the angle, or (c) shelve.

Collaborators

  • David (build / agentic tooling)
  • Brother + sister-in-law (domain expertise, workflow validation, real-world test cases)

Workspace

  • Notion (shared / collaborative): https://app.notion.com/p/37a76df7a80281408430f076465524af (top-level Scaffold page in Enigma Studio workspace)
  • Local (personal working substrate): ~/topaz/projects/scaffold/
  • Split rationale: Notion = shared layer for architect collaborators (Home, AEC Lifecycle Map, Prototype Ideas, Open Questions, Conversations & Notes, Decisions). Local = David’s working notes, drafts before they’re ready for collaborator eyes. See decisions/001-notion-collaboration-substrate.md.

Technical (provisional)

  • Stack: TBD — likely Claude Code + MCP servers, Git-backed project state
  • Repo: not yet created
  • Deploy target: TBD
  • Intended users: small-to-mid architecture practices (initial hypothesis)

Open questions

  • What’s the unit of work? A “project” in AEC terms vs. a Git-style repo — how closely do those map?
  • Which workflows are document-heavy enough to benefit from agents but standardized enough to be tractable?
  • Is the value in replacing existing tools (Revit, BIM360, Procore) or bridging them?
  • Is this a tool for architects, or a tool for the GC / owner / consultants around them?