If adaptive architecture is both, a techno-spatial environment and a set of environmental behaviors and practices, its design requires the collaboration of diverse disciplines. During the process of collaboratively developing an adaptive high-rise, models turn out to be the central medium in the multidisciplinary teamwork. They contribute to disciplinary questions of development and realization; they also generate and transfer knowledge and act as translators by facilitating exchange and cooperation between disciplines. The present study examines tasks and relations from the first design model to different functional models for the adaptive high-rise. It shows the initial architectural model as an overall role model and vision. While functional models perform isolated dynamic tasks, analytical models are used for review and discussion.