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Schematic design in multifamily projects: when decisions–and mistakes–scale
Decisions made during schematic design last a building’s lifetime. Long before it’s time for construction documents, material selections, detailed engineering — the fundamental choices made here define massing, spatial organization, building orientation, unit layout, and core placement. They’re especially critical in multifamily projects because they don’t just affect one unit but scale across 50, 100, 200 or more units. To get these decisions right requires rigorous exploration during schematic design to ask questions, test ideas, check performance, and fine tune numbers. For this phase…
Industry & Insights
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Forma Board now available for Autodesk Forma Data Management users
Design reviews are one of the most important parts of any AECO project – and one of the easiest places for teams to lose momentum. Too often, feedback is spread across PDFs, screenshots, slide decks, email threads, and chat messages. Iterations become harder to track. Decisions lose connection to the BIM model. Teams spend valuable…
Product
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Start your pre-design site analysis with Forma Site Design’s sun hours analysis
When you’re doing a site analysis in architecture and urban planning for pre-design and conceptual design, understanding sun exposure and solar gain is a must – it’s a core principle of passive design. In the early phase of design, architects face the challenge of balancing density with environmental performance and living qualities. Forma Site Design…
Product
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How to: send your Forma Site Design proposal to Revit
Watch this video to learn how to easily move from early-stage design in Forma Site Design to more detailed modeling in Revit. Step 1: Install the Forma Add-in for Revit Step 2: Prepare and send the proposal from Forma Site Design Step 3: Load the proposal in Revit Step 4: Review informational dialogs Step 5:…
Learning
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How BDP upskills its team for positive impact
BDP is embedding sustainability into everyday design by empowering its global workforce to make sustainable decisions routine rather than exceptional. The firm began with a skills survey to understand where teams stood, then developed internal sustainability champions and a Climate Action and Social Impact Design Framework aligned with the UN Sustainable Development Goals. Implemented as…
Customer Stories
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My Top Five Favorite Features of Forma Site Design in 2025
In 2025, Forma Site Design introduced targeted improvements across modeling, analysis, interoperability, and collaboration. Development focused on strengthening and stabilizing existing workflows, with emphasis on reliability, user control, and continuity between early site studies and downstream design tools. The features below are the ones I consistently relied on this year because they directly reduced friction…
Product
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How to use Forma Board with Forma Data Management to capture design intent from the get-go
Tl;dr: Early-stage architectural design is rarely short on ideas, inspiration, requirements, regulations, references, or stakeholders. What often lacks is shared clarity. At the start of a project, information arrives from many directions: site constraints, early massing models, environmental metrics, reference imagery, screenshots, notes from meetings, and informal assumptions. By the end of the day your browser probably looks like mine: 5 windows,…
Learning
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How to: present your Forma Site Design findings in Forma Board
Create a new board for your site Add a new frame Add widgets from Site Design Edit widgets Sun hours analysis widget Add external images Share the board Annotate your board Present the board You now have a collaborative online whiteboard that brings together data, visuals, and insights in a clear, shareable design narrative.
Learning
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Inside Forma Building Design: How architects’ feedback shapes better products
As Principal Product Manager for Autodesk Forma Building Design, a big part of my work involves testing what we build with the people who will rely on it every day. Getting user feedback gives us clear input on the direction we should take in the development of the product. The whole team is involved, from the software engineers to UX designers, so they can engage with users directly and really see…
Product
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Looking ahead to 2026: Building on a strong AECO foundation
Carl Christensen is Vice President, Product at Autodesk As we kick off 2026, there’s a lot to be excited about—and it all builds on the progress we made last year in shaping the Forma Industry Cloud. 2025 was very much about connecting the pieces and laying the groundwork for AECO’s first end-to-end industry cloud. At…
Autodesk Forma