Theory Lecture

8/4/2019 Theory Lecture

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THEORY OF DESIGN RESEARCH OF ARCHITECTURE

Research contributes to Design Theory

NATURE OF DESIGN THEORY

Design Theory states facts

-- Design Theory aids design

SCOPE OF ARCHITECTURE THEORY

-- Includes all that is presented in the handbooks of architects

-- Includes legislation, norms and standards, rules and methods

-- Includes miscellaneous and unscientific elements

WHY DESIGN THEORY?

To aid the work of the architect and improve its product

-- Proven theory helps designers do work better and more efficiently-- Skill without knowledge is nothing (architectJean Mignot, 1400 AD)

UNDERSTANDING DESIGN THEORY

Theory does NOT necessarily PRECEDE design

-- PARADIGM = every new or established theory applied

= STYLE


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THEMATIC THEORIES CLASSICAL

Marcus Vitruvius Pollio

MIDDLE AGES

Medieval (read: Dark Age) anonymous tradition of trade guilds

RENAISSANCE

-- Alberti, Vignola, Palladio, etc.

STRUCTURALIST (Construction Theory)

Galileo Galilei, Robert Hooke, etc.

ART NOUVEAU (Personal Styles)

Eugene Emmanuel Violett-le-Duc, Le Corbusier, etc.

FUNCTIONALISM Walter Gropius, Louis Sullivan, etc.

POSTMODERNISM

Robert Venturi

SYMBOLIC ARCHITECTURE ECOLOGICAL ARCHITECTURE


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CLASSICAL THEORIES MARCUS VITRUVIUS POLLIO

author of the oldest research on architecture

-- wrote an extensive summary of all the theory on construction

-- had a thorough knowledge of earlier Greek and Roman writings

TEN BOOKS ON ARCHITECTURE

De architectura libri decem

-- consists mostly of normative theory of design (based on practice)

-- a collection of thematic theories of design with

no method of combining them into a synthesis-- presents a classification of requirements set for buildings:

-- DURABILITY (firmitas)

-- PRACTICALITY or Convenience (utilitas)

-- PLEASANTNESS (venustas)

VITRUVIAN RULES OF AESTHETIC FORM

-- based on Greek traditions of architecture-- teachings of Pythagoras = applying proportions of numbers

-- observations of tuned strings of instruments

-- proportions of human body

-- PLEASANTNESS = in accordance of good taste

= parts follow proportions

= symmetry of measures


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THEORIES in the MIDDLE AGES

MONASTERY INSTITUTION

most documents retrieved from the Middle Ages

-- however, archives contain only few descriptions of buildings

-- described only as according to the traditional model

-- Theres no accounting for tastes was the rule of thumb

DEVELOPMENT OF BUILDING STYLE

with hardly or no literary research present

-- Villard de Honnecourts sketchbook in 1235

-- Roritzers Booklet on the right way of making pinnacles

-- only through guidance of old masters

-- tradition binding and precise in closed guilds of builders


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RENAISSANCE THEORIES 1418 a copy of Vitruve manuscripts found at St. Gallen monastery

LEON BATTISTA ALBERTI (1404-72) person in charge of constructions commanded by Pope

-- On Building = De re aedificatoria

-- one of the greatest works of the theory of architecture

-- completed in 1452, published in 1485

-- more emphasis on decoration of building exteriors

SEBASTIANO SERLIO

-- Regole generali di architectura

GIACOMO BAROZZI DA VIGNOLA

-- Regola delle cinque ordini

-- concise, fast and easily applicable rules of the five column systems

-- based his design instructions on four things:-- idea of Pythagoras (proportions of small numbers meant harmony

-- proportions and other instructions provided by Vitruvius

-- example set by earlier buildings

-- general good taste


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RENAISSANCE THEORIES

ANDREA PALLADIO (1508-80)

I quattro libri dellarchitectura-- the father of modern picture books of architecture

PHILIBERT DE LORME

one of French theorists who are critical of Italians

-- proved that Pantheons Corinthian columns had 3 different proportions

-- thus, rejected the doctrine of absolute beauty of measures WORKS PRINTED BY FRENCH THEORISTS

-- Francois Nicolas Blondel: Cours darchitecture (1675)

-- Claude Perrault: Ordonnance des cinq especes de colonnes (1683)

-- Jean Louis de Cordemoy: Nouveau traite de toute larchitecture (1706)

-- Marc-Antoine Laugier: Essai sur larchitecture (1753)

-- Jacques-Francois Blondel: Cours darchitecture (1770)-- J-N-L Durand: Precis des lecons (1802-5)

-- Julien Guadet: Elements et theories de larchitecture (1902)

No method for systematically inspecting the results


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CONSTRUCTION THEORYBuilding Material Architectural Form

Amorphic material:

soft stone; snow

Spherical vaulted construction

Sheets of skin or textile Cone-shaped tent construction

Logs of wood Box-shaped construction

BEFORE WRITTEN CONSTRUCTION THEORY

- Architecture created without the help of architects or theory

- Builders used a model instead of mathematical algorithms

now used in modern construction.

- Inverted catenary model

SEMI-CIRCULAR VAULT: THEORY BY VITRUVE

When there are arches the outermost piers must be made

broader than the others, so that they may have the strength to resist

when the wedges, under the pressure of the load of the walls, begin

to thrust out the abutments.


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CONSTRUCTION THEORY DURING MIDDLE AGES

- No written document survived about theories or models to describethe magnificent vaults of medieval cathedrals

- Shapes of gothic vaults resemble inverted catenaries

- Architects design not only the layout and decoration but also the

construction and stability of buildings

DURING RENAISSANCE

- From Alberti onwards, architects began specializing. Thus, the mechanics of

materials & construction started to become a field of study of

its own.

- Mathematical models by Francis Bacon and Galileo Galilei.

- 1675: Marquis de Vauban founded a building department in the French army

called Corps des ingenieurs

- 1747: Ecole des Ponts et Chaussees, special school founded in Paris where

new profession specializing in construction was organized

- Other figures who developed mathematical construction theory

Robert Hooke; Jakob Bernoulli; Leonard Euler

- From Euler onwards, theory of elasticity of structures developed


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PERSONAL STYLES COPYING FROM ANTIQUITY

-Architecture from antiquity came to a point of perfection- Eugene Viollet-le-Duc (1863): the 1st theorist who set out to create a totally newsystem of architectural forms independent of antiquity

What we call taste is but an involuntary process of reasoning whose steps

elude our observation. Authority has no value if its grounds are not

explained.

- The foundation of modern architecture.- Although Viollet-le-Duc did not create a timeless architectural style himself, he

showed others the philosophical foundation and method that

they could use to develop even radically new form languages.

- Owen Jones: used forms inspired from nature, especially plants.

ART NOUVEAU

- The 1st architectural style independent of the tradition of antiquity after the

Gothic style

- The example set by Art Nouveau encouraged some of the most skillful

architects of the 20th century to create their private form

languages.

- Le Corbusier: architecture psychology, as natural forms of plants,

buildings as giant sculptures


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PERSONAL STYLES THEORETICAL TREATISES

- Five Points of Architecture (1926, Le Corbusier)

1. pilotis

2. free plan

3. free faade

4. the long horizontal sliding window

5. the roof garden

-Architecture as Space (Bruno Zevi)

the crux of architecture is not the sculptural pattern, but instead the

building interiors. These can be seen as negative solids, as voids

which the artist divides, combines, repeats and emphasizes in the same way as the

sculptor treats his positive lumps of substance.

- The personal styles of architects are not necessarily based on laws of nature

or on logical reasoning. More important is that they exhibit a

coherent application of an idea which also must be clear that the

public can find it out. An advantage is also if the style includes

symbolical undertones.


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FUNCTIONALISM

PRECONDITIONS IN FUNCTIONAL ARCHITECTURE- Function is one of the cornerstones of Vitruvian theory

- Did not receive as much attention in Renaissance era

- Industrial Revolution

- Eugene Viollet-le-Duc

20th CENTURY ARCHITECTURE

- The Chicago School

- Louis Sullivan: Ornament in Architecture (1892)

- Form follows function

- Frank Lloyd Wright Form and function as one

- Otto Wagner: Moderne Arckitektur (1895)- Bauhaus and Walther Gropius

- Architecture supported by mother sciences

- Construction Economy matchbox architecture

- Ludwig Mies van der Rohe Less is more


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POSTMODERNISM

PRECONDITIONS IN FUNCTIONAL ARCHITECTURE- Function is one of the cornerstones of Vitruvian theory

- Did not receive as much attention in Renaissance era

- Industrial Revolution

- Eugene Viollet-le-Duc

20th CENTURY ARCHITECTURE

- Louis Sullivan: Ornament in Architecture (1892)

- Form follows function

- Frank Lloyd Wright Form and function as one

- Otto Wagner: Moderne Arckitektur (1895)

- Bauhaus and Walther Gropius- Architecture supported by mother sciences

- Construction Economy matchbox architecture

- Ludwig Mies van der Rohe Less is more


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SYMBOLIC ARCHITECTURE MATHEMATICAL ANALOGY

Pure forms

-- Golden Section

BIOLOGICAL ANALOGY

ORGANIC: relationship between parts of building or

between the building and its settings

-- BIOMORPHIC: focuses on growth processes and movement

capabilities associated with organisms

ROMANTIC ANALOGY

-- BY ASSOCIATION: making references

-- BY EXAGGERATION: use of contrast, excessive stimulation,

unfamiliar scale, and unfamiliar forms

LINGUISTIC ANALOGY

GRAMMATICAL MODEL: elements (words) & rules (grammar)

-- EXPRESSIONIST MODEL: buildings as vehicles for

expressing an attitude towards a project

-- SEMIOTIC MODEL: using symbols literally


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SYMBOLIC ARCHITECTURE

MECHANICAL ANALOGY

A machine is a house for living-- Beauty assumes the promise of function

PROBLEM-SOLVING ANALOGY

RATIONALIST: analysis, synthesis, evaluation

-- Logical, Systematic, or Parametric in Approach

ADHOCIST ANALOGY

-- Responding to the immediate need using materials

immediately available

PATTERN LANGUAGE ANALOGY

Observing patterns of environment-behavior relationships DRAMATURGICAL ANALOGY

All the world is a stage

-- The architect as director


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ECOLOGICAL ARCHITECTURE

Theory Lecture

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