The Architecture of Twists and Turns: Space, Time and Narrative in the work of John Soane and Carlo Scarpa

Architecture has both interactive and analogical relationships with language. A designed building originates in a linguistic document, the design brief providing a list of functional categories and quantities. In the case of building programmes, such as libraries, museums and art galleries, the word-like function of the classifications of contents in space are preceded by classifications recorded in texts and reflecting the history of thought. The analogical relationship between architecture and language goes back to the 19th century and the idea that works of architecture should be read like books, narratives or texts (Forty, 2004). Quatremère de Quincy for example, likened historical monuments to libraries - public inscriptions or records of the people. This idea came under strong criticism in the 20th century after modernism asserted that buildings were to be read as autonomous works. Writing on the occasion of the Museum of Modern Art’s fifth anniversary in 1934 Alfred Barr, Jr., MoMA’s founding director, set up a dichotomy between an intellectual understanding of art mediated by words and a direct experience of art that comes from the unmediated encounter between the viewer and the object. ‘Words about art may help to explain techniques, remove prejudices, clarify relationships, suggest sequences, and attack habitual resentments through the back door of intelligence. But the front door of understanding is through experience of the work of art itself’ (Barr, 1934). Similarly to art, architecture has been affected by a longstanding assumption that ‘experiences mediated through the senses are fundamentally incompatible with those mediated through language’ (Forty 2004, 12). Yet, as Adrian Forty explains, even if architecture is not a language this does not lessen the value of language for understanding architecture. Bill Hillier for example, has made a productive analogy between the syntax of space and the syntactic and semantic structure of language. The characteristic spatial relationships that define the cultural inhabitation of space are similar to linguistic rules we use in speaking and writing, or the unconscious mechanisms we ‘think with’ (Hillier 1996). If ordinary language offers a paradigm for understanding the unconscious apparatus of meaning-making in architecture, what about the literary function of language? This question concerns works of architecture as intentional aesthetic systems rather than as unconscious structures shared within a society like language. It also allows literary narrative to function as a critical tool and a design tool as opposed to explanatory paradigm. If the principles of spatial structure function similarly to those of ordinary language, what can we say about narrative devices or rules used in literary texts? Or what about buildings as social objects, understood in a historical context and the ordering mechanisms of language to organize cultural messages and relations of power? In this essay I address these questions first, by focusing on how devices ordering our perception of space and time in literature can illuminate spatial practices as aesthetic systems; second, by exploring our perception of space-time in buildings housing collections, such as museums, galleries and exhibitions. Buildings devoted to displays share the assumption that the spatial arrangement of objects, supported by object-based interpretation, offer a narrative to be understood through the physical experience of reading, looking, and walking. This experience is staged by the linguistic strategies of classification, taxonomy and lists, and the architectural strategies of viewing sequences, mediating the encounter between the architect, the curator, the objects and the viewer. Museums, galleries and private collections therefore, are ideal candidates for addressing the analogic and interactive encounter of architecture with linguistic strategies and narrative form. The choice of these narrative strategies is critical when the container is itself a historical monument or is embedded in a historical context, as the meanings that are attached to the building and the displays can be motivated and invested with potential significance. Although separated by a century and a half, John Soane and Carlo Scarpa had a strong relationship with history and context as artistic practices and inspirational resources. Soane’s house-museum and Scarpa’s projects such as the Castelvecchio, the Olivetti Showroom and the Canova’s extension, seem to present a common paradigm: all housing collections, albeit Soane’s house-museum accommodates his own private collection; all fusing the architects’ own interventions within the existing fabric; all collaging contemporary architecture over the substrate of previous historical episodes; all eschewing the idea of a single unified form as the central governing composition by which the building could be read; all forcing the visitor into sinuous routes and around art works to see the building and the objects. For Nicholas Olsbeg, Scarpa opened the possibility for an architecture in union with poetry, sculpture, painting and craft around the themes of memory, allegory and metaphor (Olsberg, 1999). Soane also conceived his house-museum as a union of architecture with the arts, engaging in spatial optical mechanisms and an eccentric taste in narrative expression (Soane 1830, 1832, 1835-36). Deriving from these common tendencies for itineraries and multiple associations, works of the two architects present suitable examples to examine the perception of space, time and meaning, drawing parallels between motifs in architecture and narrative

A comparative study of graph structures, traversability movement and exhibition strategy in museums during Covid-19

The global pandemic of COVID-19 has posed challenges in relation to how buildings re-open to use, particularly buildings attracting large numbers of visitors, such as museums and galleries. As these institutions started to reopen across the UK and internationally, a number of social distance measures were adopted in order to safely bring people into their premises and access their collections. Building on Bill Hillier’s theorical model of spatial types and spatial structures (2019), we explore the spatial-curatorial changes implicated in the re-opening of five British museums (The National Gallery, The Tate Britain, Tate Modern, British Museum and The Wallace Collection in London) and one American museum (The MoMA, New York). Our purpose is not to provide practical solutions, but to set the search for spatial approaches to the reopening of museums within a theory of spatial structure in space syntax and inform the design future of public buildings. We present a model of a three-layered spatial system, interfacing the global and local structure of these buildings. We argue that the presence of intersecting cycles of movement in spatial layouts determines their capability for adapting to the one-way routes imposed by the pandemic. The spatial organisation of the display is a second factor influencing the reopening strategies, either limiting or optimising available spatial sequences to meet curatorial criteria

The Embodied Competence of Institutions

This paper explores the connection between the spatial configuration of the UK Houses of Parliament, how the building is perceived by parliament Members, and political culture. It conceptualizes spatial competence as the knowledge that enables and limits users in employing the possibilities space offers for socio-political interaction; and spatial performance as the realization of these possibilities for the exercise of power and negotiation through rules of behaviour and spatial practice. A qualitative approach based on interviews with parliamentarians and a quantitative study of spatial morphology are combined, demonstrating the agency of space in generating a spatial culture of informal interactions akin to the political practices of negotiation and adaptation that define British politics and the institutions of its larger constitutional order. Describing and visualizing the spatial characteristics supporting these institutions is critical for understanding how the upcoming Restoration and Renewal Programme (R&R) of the UK Houses of Parliament can be about restoration as well as renewal

Geometrical Walks in Architectural Space - The Synchronous Order of Geometry and the Sequential Experience of Space

Architecture creates spaces to accommodate social relations. It also creates spaces to look at and experience through movement and through observation. In addition to social purposes some buildings carry an extra level of content. This refers to the ways they become visually appreciated as spatial systems o f a specific appearance. These buildings are often thought of as works of architecture. It is on this additional dimension that this thesis focuses - How works o f architecture are seen experienced and interpreted as systems o f cognition. Cognition depends on grasping a mechanism of construction; architectural composition is based on laws o f construction. Cognition and architectural com position becom e, thus, intrinsically interrelated generating the need to look at composition as the source of architectural experience. Architecture is subject to laws and these laws are expressed through two levels of systems. Architects combine geometrical shapes and forms to give buildings a specific appearance. They also combine spaces to give buildings a specific experience. The ways in which geometry and space interact in the course o f cueing and channelling the viewer’s cognition o f a building is the question addressed in this research. This is examined in the context o f the architecture o f Le Corbusier and Mario Botta. This thesis attem pts to develop a common theoretical and analytical fram ew ork that studies the relationship between geometrical and spatial patterns. It argues that form al and spatial description is a description o f composition seen as a transformation process. This process progresses in stages from abstract-simple order principles to specific-complex ones. It also proposes that form al and spatial patterns interact through geometrical properties that stay invariant as an observer moves in space. The more properties stay invariant the more these patterns coincide. (Botta). The less they remain invariant the more a tension is created between these patterns, (Le Corbusier). The form er display a structural unity guiding and easing intelligibility towards a single reading. The latter present a structural complexity accommodating a multiplicity of readings. The analysis of the two architects reveals also that there are two compositional directions. In the first one com position is dominated by an explicit syntax established at the first stages of the transformation process, (Botta). In the second one composition is dominated by a release o f combinatorial possibility emerging during this process, (Le Corbusier). The former generates buildings that are grasped at once subjecting spatial narrative to formal pattern. The latter results in buildings that demand intense attention and extensive exploration making spatial procession the main protagonist of spatial experience. The overall research concludes that architecture is based on a recognition of a composing strategy articulating the relationship between the synchronous geometrical order and the sequential experience of space

Evaluating and Expanding Hillier's Mean Local Choice: The Need for a New Measure of Quantitative Spatial Description

This paper critically evaluates the ‘mean local choice’, a newly introduced spatial measurement by Hillier in his keynote speech presented in Beijing (2019). Different from the well-discussed mathematical ‘betweenness centrality’ in syntactic studies, Hillier’s proposed measure looks at the step-by-step alternatives (choices) regarding the all-to-all visit from each space in a spatial environment to all others by the simplest route. He argues that different levels of mean local choice values entail ‘consequent functional effects on spatial layout’ (Hillier, 2019, p.14). This paper identifies methodological deficits in Hillier’s explanations, arguing that the calculations of mean local choice in different structure types are not mathematically consistent. Moreover, the social significance stemming from differential functional effects varied by mean local choice in spatial layouts remains undefined, limiting the theoretical and practical applicability of this new measure. Building on this observation, this paper provides two possible evaluations of the theoretical definition of mean local choice, deriving from Hillier’s original work. Comparing this measure with the measures of ‘betweenness centrality’ and syntactic choice, it raises the following questions: How does mean local choice differ from existing spatial measures? How do varying levels of mean local choice correspond to diverse functional effects in spatial layouts? We argue that mean local choice, as an independent spatial variable, provides a new perspective on the relationship between spatial attributes and human behavioural patterns. Furthermore, this paper introduces a third approach to defining and calculating mean local choice, diverging from Hillier's original methods. We suggest that this approach more accurately captures the theoretical essence of the new measure. Consequently, we provide comprehensive evaluations of mean local choice for theoretical models with different node counts and present a Python-based program designed for analysing real-world configurations, which enables the practical application of mean local choice, enhancing its utility in spatial analysis

Traversability in Spatial Configuration: Some Theoretical and Practical Aspects

Traversability, a relatively new concept in the field of space syntax study, was introduced by Hillier (2019) in his last paper, measuring the ease with which a layout can be traversed as a whole without crossing the same space twice. In his preliminary comparison of the traversability value of four structure types (a-. b-. c- and d-structures), Hillier argued that the understanding of traversability in graph structures, regarding its functional effects and social meanings, will contribute to the enrichment of space syntax theory. Taking Hillier’s work as a starting point, this paper provides a more in-depth exploration of traversability in four dimensions. a. providing mathematical evaluations of the traversability value in a-, b-, c- and d-structure with the number of nodes ranging from four (the minimum number of nodes to form a d-structure) to n; b. conducting experiments with how changes in local spatial relationships may affect the global value of traversability in a configuration, thereby illustrating the architectural implications of the measure; c. classifying distinctions in social meanings between spatial configurations with high and low traversability values. This analytic is based on comparing traversability values with established classifications of layouts in space syntax research using the conceptual/analytical pairs of high/low integration and strong/weak programmes (Hillier 1996); d. measuring and comparing traversability values of real-world layouts using a python programme developed for this study. We argue that these four dimensions of analysis highlight the significance of this new measure; we also explain what they add to existing applications of space syntax analysis. The paper concludes with directions for the future exploration of this new measure and possible applications in practical fields

Just around the corner from where you are: probabilistic isovist fields, inference and embodied projection

This paper concerns the development of a new computational stochastic analysis in order to gain insight into situated vision in spatial environments. It is structured in three parts. The first two parts present the theoretical framework for the new model, based on the following propositions: firstly, that isovists are bound configurations containing one or more areas of spatial points that are intervisible; secondly, that observers are capable of embodied projection in space, anticipating how relations seen from a position can be seen from other regions that are one step away from the current position, and building expectations about other spaces visible from these regions; and thirdly, that we need a method that describes isovists not as static units but as dynamic seeds for a global framework of knowledge. The final part of the paper presents the new method with the following functionalities: a. continuous-time stochastic discretisation of space for isovist root selection and isovist generation; b. quantification of geometric isovists properties based on successive isovist intersection; c. high resolution of isovist analysis; d. four quantitative isovist measures. These measures are discussed in hypothetical layouts and in the context of Mies van der Rohe’s Farnsworth House. The paper contributes a dynamic modelling technique to the discussion of diagrams and their capacity to represent embodied vision as actualised and virtually embedded possibilities, rather than as static structures

Urban opportunities and conflicts around street musicians: the relationship between the configuration of public space and outdoor acoustics in Ciutat Vella, Barcelona

The practice of busking and street music performance is becoming key to the identity of cities. However, although the spatial configuration and acoustics of historic city centres are interrelated, few rigorous studies have been undertaken on this area. The paper presents the results of a quantitative and comparative analysis of the space syntax configuration and on-site sound recordings in four main open environments within the inner core of Barcelona. The aim of this work is to highlight the conflict points between outdoor acoustics and movement flows in order to inform future designs and management of those public spaces.Postprint (published version