Client feedback is not user research. Your client tells you what they want. That's valuable. But it's not the same as understanding what users actually need. Clients have agendas. They have budgets. They have timelines. They have preferences. They're not always thinking about the end user. They're thinking about their own goals. Real user research means talking to the people who will actually use the space. The people who will maintain it. The people who will live with it every day. Not just the person paying for it. The best projects I've worked on had architects who pushed back on client feedback. Who asked "why?" Who did their own research. Who advocated for the user, even when the client disagreed. Client feedback is important. But it's not the only voice that matters. Sometimes the architect's job is to represent the users who aren't in the room.