Resonances of the Unknown

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to discuss the relevance of second-order cybernetics for a theory of architectural design and related discourse. Design/methodology/approach – First, the relation of architectural design to the concept of “poiesis” is clarified. Subsequently, selected findings of Gotthard Günther are revisited and related to an architectural poetics. The last part of the paper consists of revisiting ideas mentioned previously, however, on the level of a discourse that has incorporated the ideas and offers a poetic way of understanding them

The Facets of Place

This chapter will outline one theory aimed at integrating aspects of environmental psychology with issues in architectural design. The theory to be reviewed is broad in those characteristics of theory that Moore (1987) called their 'form and scope'. This broad brush, top down approach is intended as a contrast with bottom up attempts to specify the behavioural effects of specific aspects of design, such as lighting levels or size of spaces. It also contrasts with models that seek to answer immediate design problems. However, in Moore's (1987) vocabulary, the theory to be outlined is more than an 'orientation', or 'framework'. It is an 'explanatory theory' that has been found to have considerable scope, open to direct empirical test

Awakening the architectural experience: how to teach the dialogical knowledge of architects

Learning processes in architecture have always been a complex and difficult research field; the specific qualities of architectural education from childhood to adulthood are far from to be really known. We will present some studies, some coming from works with children in primary school and some from the university level in the school of architecture in Barcelona. We will analyze with some examples how the dialogical dimensions of the knowledge of architects can be developed, underdeveloped and even destroyed in education. Some conclusions will intend to uncover how to bridge the gap between practice and theory in architectural education, and then we can immediately understand that this gap has been produced by the wrong assumption that learning and design architectural processes can develop out of their social and cultural-geographic circumstances, in an abstract and apolitical place, where the relationships between experience and reflection can never exist

Landscape Architectural Design as Scientific Inquiry?

This presentation discusses ‘landscape architectural design as scientific inquiry’ and exemplifies this with the description of a design process within climate-responsive design leading to new design knowledge. ‘Research and design’ are issues that need increasing attention within landscape architecture academia. Substantial contributions on ‘research’ and ‘design’ exist within architectural theory [1,2,3,4]. However, within landscape architecture, there are only few publications on this topic. In those publications, either the definition of ‘research’ was not clearly stated [5] or from the onset, design was not considered to be research “by definition” [6]. This is in contrast to several assertions within architectural theory where design is considered as scientific research. So the question remains: can landscape architectural design also be scientific research? Here, it is stated that design can be scientific research when the design method is similar to a ‘scientific’ method and the aim of the design process is the generation of new knowledge. This requires that research questions are clearly formulated and a systematic, transparent and reliable method of looking for answers is guaranteed. Since there are various ways of conducting scientific research, consequently some ways of ‘design as scientific research’ can be thought of. For instance, ‘design as scientific inquiry’ can mean that design is done similar to action research- as a communicative process from which new knowledge can be gained [7]. But it can also mean that design processes are conducted similar to the methods in the classical empirical sciences. In this presentation, the focus will be on this latter method. In the empirical sciences, normally the research process consists of formulating hypotheses, testing these hypotheses in experiments and generating new knowledge from that. To guarantee reliability, the results are controlled through peer- review. When design is considered an inquiry similar to empirical sciences, possible design solutions are treated as hypotheses and then tested. Zeisel and other authors [8,9,10] proposed this earlier, but they were not clear about the ways design can be tested. Yet, the reliability of testing design is crucial for ‘design as scientific inquiry’. Actually, nowadays modern computer simulation methods offer new avenues for testing designs. With such simulations, the expected effect of design can be tested for many different issues and they can be used within a ‘design as scientific inquiry’ to generate new knowledge. Design processes to generate new knowledge that use these techniques are also widely found within engineering research and development. In this presentation, a similar ‘design as scientific inquiry’ process will be illustrated by an example- a process of climate responsive design to generate new design guidelines for microclimate responsive design of urban squares. This process consisted of generating various design alternatives- or hypotheses- that were expected to be a potential design guideline. These design alternatives were fit for mid-sized urban squares within a Northwest-European maritime climate context. They were all assumed to improve microclimate in the problematic situations: too windy spring and autumn and very hot summer circumstances. The design alternatives were composed of different configurations of vegetation and other elements like pergolas or wind screens that were expected to bring about microclimate improvement. These alternatives are tested with microclimate simulations and the alternative that shows the best effects can be considered as new design knowledge. This design process which had great similarity with scientific research processes can be considered an example for ‘landscape architectural design as scientific research’. [1] Lang. J. 1987. Creating architectural theory, Van Nostrand Reinhold Company, New York [2] Cross, N. 2007. Designerly ways of knowing, Springer, London [3] Laurel, Brenda, ed., 2003, Design Research: Methods and Perspectives. Cambridge: MIT Press [4] de Jong, T.M. and Van der Voordt, D.J.M., 2002, Ways to study and research urban, architectural and technical design, Delft University Press, Delft [5] Milburn, L.S. Brown, Mulley, S.J., Hilts, Steward G., 2003, Assessing academic contributions in landscape architecture, Landscape and Urban Planning 64: 119-129 [6] Milburn, L.S. and Brown, R.D. 2003, The relationship between research and design in landscape architecture, Landscape and Urban Planning 64: 47-66 [7] De Jonge, J.M. (2009) Landscape Architecture between Politics and Science. PhD dissertation, Wageningen University. Blauwdruk, Wageningen [8 ] Zeisel, J. 2006, Inquiry by design (revised edition) W.W. Norton & Company, New York [9] Cross, N., Naughton, J., Walker, D. 1981. Design method and scientific method, Design Studies vol 2 no. 4 pp. 195-201 [10] de Jong, T.M and van der Voordt, D.J.M. 2002 Criteria for scientific study and design, in: de Jong, T.M. and Van der Voordt, D.J.M. (eds.), Ways to study and research urban, architectural and technical design, Delft University Press, Delft, p. 19-3

Leon Battista Alberti and the Concept of Lineament

A core idea in the architectural theory of Leon Battista Alberti, as expressed in the De re aedificatoria, is the distinction between “lineament,” the line in the mind of the architect, and “matter,” the material presence of the building. This distinction plays a key role in architectural design throughout the history of Western architecture. As Le Corbusier would say in the twentieth century, “architecture is a product of the mind.” The distinction between mind and matter can be found in Vitruvius, in the distinction between “that which signifies and that which is signified”; at the Accademia di San Luca in Rome, between disegno interno and disegno esterno; or in Peter Eisenman’s distinction between deep aspect and surface aspect in architecture, to name just three examples. There are passages in the De amore of Marsilio Ficino where it seems clear that he is referring to his mentor’s concept of lineament. Lines cannot be called bodies, for example, and beauty can only be a property of matter through arrangement, proportion, and aspect (shape and color), which are products of thought, in the Neoplatonic tradition, as in the idea of beauty described by Plotinus, which can be found in Alberti’s concept of beauty or concinnitas. Plotinus distinguished the shape of the matter of a statue from the shape of the statue in the mind of the artist. I would like to suggest that Alberti knew the Enneads of Plotinus, perhaps as a result of a meeting with Gemistos Plethon and Nicholas of Cusa at the Academy of Palestrina, and through the translation of the Enneads by Marius Victorinus. Alberti’s concept of lineament is a Neoplatonic concept, and it plays an important role in architectural theory. Neoplatonism can also be found in Alberti’s proportioning systems in his architecture, as Ficino called Alberti a “Platonic mathematician.” These propositions have never been advanced, that I know of, and they are fundamental to an understanding of architectural theory

Ethics After Theory

Today, architectural theory has atrophied. Despite a perceived need for different theoretical ways of clarifying, explaining and understanding the complex phenomena of contemporary architectural production prior to a designer's intervention, there are few existing theoretical frameworks. Without either the descriptive or projective enablement by theory, conscientious and critical practices in architecture will have few alternatives against the tide of neoliberal city-making. In this paper, I make a pun of Speaks's (2006) paper titled, ‘Intelligence after theory' by arguing that while (design) intelligence is necessary, it is however not sufficient. Ethics is also needed in architecture. Through a brief restatement of a canonical debate in the critical school of architectural theory, I argue why ethics is needed in architecture, and how ethics could be further developed through theory and theorization

Book Review: Unified architectural theory: Form, language, complexity, Nikos A. Salingaros

Unified Architectural Theory: Form, Language, Complexity is a compendium of scientific knowledge and practical insight into architectural theory and how it is taught to students. In this guide, Nikos Salingaros, Professor of Mathematics at the University of Texas, offers a succinct summary of his extensive course focusing on how to intelligently approach architectural design by aid of scientific evidence. Unified Architectural Theory seeks to establish a clear articulation of the perdurable framework behind “all of architecture” through centuries that is based on hard scientific facts rather than personal sentiments. The book contains 44 sections and is organised in two parts that respectively give an overview of the course lectures and assignments. The concise format of the sections as well as the apprehensible writing tailored to meet students’ needs make it a great companion for anyone who wants to learn

Wire mesh design

We present a computational approach for designing wire meshes, i.e., freeform surfaces composed of woven wires arranged in a regular grid. To facilitate shape exploration, we map material properties of wire meshes to the geometric model of Chebyshev nets. This abstraction is exploited to build an efficient optimization scheme. While the theory of Chebyshev nets suggests a highly constrained design space, we show that allowing controlled deviations from the underlying surface provides a rich shape space for design exploration. Our algorithm balances globally coupled material constraints with aesthetic and geometric design objectives that can be specified by the user in an interactive design session. In addition to sculptural art, wire meshes represent an innovative medium for industrial applications including composite materials and architectural façades. We demonstrate the effectiveness of our approach using a variety of digital and physical prototypes with a level of shape complexity unobtainable using previous methods