I caught Charlie Lazor, talking about building furniture and houses at the University of Minnesota this evening.
I found this quote on prototyping invaluable:
“We spent so much time arguing whether or not it work, and when we prototyped it, it worked remarkably well. We could have saved so much time, if we had just built it sooner.”
My full write-up on his talk can be found at: Your House as Furniture.