Architecture that allows a developer to create an application quicker by providing an engine that automatically creates pieces of an application user interface (UI). The engine can take as input an instance of an entity or any entity type, and create as an output a user interface (UI) that allows the application users to view and modify the entity. The architecture also facilitates the association of metadata with the source entity to guide the engine decisions; decisions such as which UI controls the engine chooses to represent the entity properties, how much “real estate” (UI space) the entity is provided, and how the entity properties are to be laid out. Additionally, applications allow the user to interact with known entity types, but also with types that were unknown at the time of the application conception. In other words, applications (e.g., line-of-business) are able to handle random entities that are dynamically generated.