Analytic hierarchy process based approach for evaluation and improvement of architectural design quality in building process implemented with case studies

The overall design and procurement process (building process) is complex. Each design is unique and has its content considering its program of requirements, stakeholders and site to be built due to constraints and potentials. Some of criteria of architectural design quality can be evaluated quantitatively while the rest can be defined by intangible notions based on experience or personal judgments. Evaluation of architectural design quality is also complex since its assessment can be made with tangible and intangible criteria defined diversely by stakeholders. Most of the quality assessment tools developed to cope with the complexity of all these problems may only be used for post occupancy process and has limited potentials for transforming assessment data to design knowledge.Considering the problems told above, this PhD thesis aims to bring out the approach to assess architectural design quality for all stages of building process including design process based on pair wise comparisons of criteria and sub criteria. It is also aimed to reveal potentials of the approach for transforming assessment data to design knowledge. One of the motivations of the PhD is to make contribution to this field which has limited studies on it; by using pair wise comparison techniques. Offered approach is based on a flexible structure which permits adaptation for case specific studies, since definition of the term ?quality? may differ depending on society, era, building typology and technology.The approach, based on Analytical Hierarchy Process, one of the methodologies of Multi Criteria Decision Making, aims to cover all building process including design and pre design processes. The implementation of the approach aiming to evaluate priorities of stakeholders related to design alternatives generates the main structure of the PhD thesis. Moreover the thesis aims to reveal strategies to transform the assessment data to design knowledge for design teams to be used for different stages of building process.