BY ALLISON POTTERMAN
Chris Wiesen has always known he wanted to start his own business. From his first entrepreneurial experiments in men’s grooming supplies at the age of 21, to a drafting company with his current business partner, and even a snowboard apparel brand, he has always been driven by a mix of curiosity and determination. That entrepreneurial spirit eventually converged with his passion for technology and construction, leading him to found BLT SMRT in 2018.
Before launching BLT SMRT, Chris cut his teeth in the architecture world, working at firms in Las Vegas before joining UNIFI, an AEC SaaS company built to help architects and engineers manage their Revit content and standardize their libraries. UNIFI would later be acquired by Autodesk, a milestone that highlighted the growing demand for digital solutions in the design and construction industry. This experience shaped Chris’s perspective on how technology could transform the way buildings and spaces are designed.
BLT SMRT was born out of that conviction. Today, the company is focused on creating software tools that solve everyday problems for architects and engineers. Its portfolio includes Foundry for Revit, which simplifies content management, and Maestro, its flagship platform designed to empower teams to create, share, and scale custom tools inside their existing workflows. For Chris, the mission is clear: to break firms out of their innovation silos and give them the ability to harness automation across platforms.
Maestro’s development began during the first wave of LLM-driven solutions hitting the market. At first, the tool was envisioned as a way to add bookmarks and shortcuts within Revit, the widely used but sometimes rigid design software. But through conversations with clients, Chris and his team discovered that the real pain point was not just creating tools, it was sharing them. Teams often struggled to distribute the custom solutions they had already built, leaving valuable internal innovations stuck in isolation. Maestro addressed that challenge directly by making tool sharing seamless.
The first time Chris saw Maestro solve this challenge in the field was deeply rewarding. After more than a year of development and testing, the team finally saw data showing that clients were successfully sending tools across their teams. These were not flashy features, but they solved an enormous problem. In Chris’s words, it made all of the effort worth it, showing how technology could bring immediate, practical value to firms.
Through this process, Chris has uncovered some unexpected insights about the industry. The construction world is often painted as slow to adopt technology, yet he sees momentum accelerating. The infusion of investment and the rapid spread of AI into nearly every platform suggest that architects and engineers are eager for innovation, provided it delivers real value. Flashy features alone are not enough; solutions need to directly address pain points that slow down projects and limit collaboration.
Looking forward, Chris envisions Maestro becoming the home for automation in the AEC industry. He sees a future where every firm has automation specialists embedded in their teams, using Maestro to surface opportunities, streamline workflows, and guide decisions with data. In that future, project delivery is faster, collaboration is smoother, and innovation is no longer siloed by software. As technology evolves, Maestro will continue evolving with it, helping firms stay at the forefront of change.
At the core of all this is Chris’s belief in the power of technology to help the industry create better buildings and spaces. For him, steering BLT SMRT is not just about writing code or releasing tools, it is about shaping the future of how people design and build. And with Maestro gaining traction, that future looks brighter, smarter, and more connected than ever.
Below is our interview with Christopher Wiesen.
Chris Wiesen is the President and founder of BLT SMRT. He began his career at architecture firms in Las Vegas before joining UNIFI, an AEC SaaS company that helps architects and engineers manage Revit content and standardize their libraries, which was later acquired by Autodesk. In 2018, he founded BLT SMRT to create innovative software solutions for architects and engineers. As a design technologist, Chris believes in the power of technology to help the industry create better buildings and spaces.
Share a bit of history about Christopher Wiesen. Why did your choose to start a business?
I’ve always known I wanted to start my own business. Before BLT SMRT, I experimented with a few side hustles while learning the ins and outs of running a company and the effort it takes to make one successful. I launched my first business at 21, focused on men’s grooming supplies, before starting a drafting business with my current business partner. I also helped start an outdoor apparel company called Alpine Bandit, where we created snowboard gear and apparel.
After my time at UNIFI, I entered a period of exploring how I could work for myself full time. I wanted to build a business that would give me the freedom to travel and the opportunity to build lasting relationships. I’ve always loved both technology and construction, and bringing those two passions together led to the creation of BLT SMRT. Being able to steer the ship has been the most rewarding part of this journey.
What challenges did you overcome when merging technology and construction in Maestro?
When we first started developing Maestro, the biggest challenge was bridging the gap between modern AI capabilities and the rigidity of construction software like Revit. Revit has been a staple in architecture and engineering for over a decade, but because it was originally developed in the late 1990s, it often feels dated and inflexible.
Our initial solution was to build a tool that allowed users to add bookmarks and shortcuts to Revit. We then merged this feature with AI so that new tools could be created and added to the Revit ribbon instantly. However, through conversations with our clients, we uncovered a deeper challenge: teams were not only struggling to build tools, they were also struggling to share the ones they had already created.
This realization shifted Maestro’s direction. Instead of only focusing on tool creation, we made sharing and collaboration central to the platform. The outcome is that Maestro now allows architects and engineers to both create new tools and seamlessly share them across their teams, making internal development more scalable and efficient.
What emotions did you experience when seeing Maestro solve the sharing problem for the first time?
The road to first use was long and arduous. We spent more than a year testing and developing the framework to support the instantaneous delivery of tools before we could get Maestro into the hands of early users. Seeing the data that showed clients were successfully sending tools to their teams made all the effort worth it. These kinds of problems may not seem flashy, but they are huge pain points in the industry. Experiencing how smoothly Maestro solved that challenge was incredibly rewarding.
What unexpected insights about the industry have you gained from this endeavor?
Throughout the development of Maestro, we realized that even with so many cutting-edge tools on the market, the real priority is delivering tangible value to clients. While we continue improving our Maestro AI chatbot to handle more complex problems with greater accuracy, we discovered that the deeper pain point was helping firms scale their technology efforts more easily.
The construction industry has a reputation for being slow to adopt new technology, but that is changing rapidly. With new investments flowing in and AI being integrated into nearly every platform, it is clear that designers and builders are eager for new ways to work, as long as those solutions provide real, lasting value.
What long-term impact do you envision Maestro having on the construction industry?
My vision for Maestro is to become the home for automation in the construction industry, no matter what tools are being used. As automation becomes more pervasive, we want to give firms the power to break out of the silos created by traditional software. Maestro enables teams to apply automation across platforms, making their technology stack work together instead of in isolation.
Looking ahead, I see a future where every construction firm has automation specialists embedded in their teams, using Maestro to surface opportunities, streamline workflows, and guide decisions with data. In this future, project delivery is faster, more efficient, and more collaborative because automation is not an afterthought but a core part of how the industry operates. As technology continues to evolve, Maestro will grow alongside it, ensuring firms stay at the forefront of innovation.
How can readers connect with you or learn more?
If you are an architect or engineer interested in creating tools that make your work easier while empowering your team to do the same, you can learn more and apply at https://maestroaec.com.
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