Questionable detail

It’s amazing how some architects can keep on repeating obvious mistakes, something that you’ll hardly see in other industries. With the advent of computer aided design, improvements have become largely incremental and the products that come out are generally getting better over time, not the other way around. Is it because we live in the mountains and that local architects were neither born nor raised with their feet in the snow, rain and mud, that we keep on seeing recurring bad ideas? Perhaps the job should only be open to folks who sometime get out from their office and look up at the sky instead of staring down into their computer screens? Since there are plenty of retrograde ideas to shoot at, today’s blog will just explore the treatment of rafters by architects. In recent years, mountain home designers (from California, Colorado, Montana, Utah) find it cute to have their rafters stick from underneath the roof and get exposed to the weather. Anyone can see that these will get rain beating on them and snow capping them all winter long. So what’s the point? Just to look cute? If these creative minds had to repaint these exposed areas every year they'd quickly tuck them in, unless of course, there’s a compelling reason; if you know it, let me know!