History of 20th Century
Study of different western architects
There are many influential architects from the West during the 20th Century. These architects all had a specific method that was pioneering and by learning what they have designed and how they approached it, we can still learn much from them. 20th Century was dynamic era for field of architecture, from modernism into post-modernism, regionalism and globalisation. The following are weekly posters of my interpretation of different topics of the class. From the lecture series, I developed deep interest in American Architects Frank Lloyd Wright and Louis I Kahn, and wrote an essay comparing the two with how they treated landscape in their design theory. Also the Italian retreat from Modernism and how Aldo Rossi found his way of design also intrigued myself and decided to write about how the ‘Urban Artefact’ applied to the city of Melbourne.
CHICAGO FIRE THAT RESHAPED ARCHITECTURAL BUILDINGS, ADLER AND SULLIVAN
The Great Chicago Fire has devastated the rapidly growing city of the world in 1871, killing hundreds of people and damaging 9km2 of city’s centre. Most of the buildings before the fire were made of timber, the outside façade maybe fireproof but the core were made from timber, and this was because of the cheap cost of timber at that era and ease of transportation via Lake Michigan and Chicago River. This fire was a disaster to Chicago but consequently gave opportunity to new buildings to rise from the ashes. Architects such as Louis Sullivan, Danker Adler, William Le Baron Jenny, Daniel H. Burnham, William Holabird and John Wellborn Root also known as the ‘Chicago School’ experimented with steel framed buildings, known as sky scraper.
The Wainwright Building wasn’t the first to any new building technology. Instead it was the first to embrace the full potential of a skyscraper.
The concept behind Wainwright Building is to replicate classical column, as it too was the tallest sky scraping construct during classical era. The building can be divided into 3 sections, strong base, soaring vertical shaft and a bold capital, ‘tripartite design’.
Some of the qualities of the Wainwright Building contains, tall vertical piers enhancing vertical height to the building, terracotta ornaments giving humanising warmth to the city as well as organic details, and mass windows allowing great amount of sunlight to enter the building.
Louis Sullivan and the Chicago School started the skyscraper race, resulting Burj Khalifa to Empire state Building, skyscrapers rule the skyline of a modern day city.
THE GAMBLE HOUSE, CALIFORNIAN BUNGALOW BY GREENE & GREENE
The Gamble House by Greene brothers marks the height of Californian Bungalow design driving the Arts and Crafts movement forward,
'an architect is a builder employing the process of art' this quote can be observed in The Gamble House as it brings three distinct cultures together.
European settlers brought their architecture with them. however, the connection with Asian brought different design elements to the design. Lastly the West Coast environment has driven the Californian design that fits into the lifestyle.
The Greene Brothers carefully incorporated the best from these culture into architecture, which is called the Ultimate Bungalow
EXPRESSIONISM BUILDINGS IN BERLIN, GERMANY
Constructed reinforced concrete and brick distorted the vertical element, thrusting violently to the sky, expressing the might of architecture. At the same time, the building resembles a ship by manipulating the windows and to the eastern side the bow of a tall ship, which fits into the context of Hamburg being a port city. Comparing the two types of architecture depicts a good idea of what Expressionism Architecture did. Each design expresses different aspect and using the materials differently, but neither of the buildings take a standard box like architecture. Instead express unique statement by their creators.
Building is made of brick covered with cement due to construction constraints. Expressing the feeling of emerging from ground by using curves and edges and undulating forms. These are done to reflect then recent discovery of Einstein’s Theory of Relativity. Lastly, the building includes a pun from architect, Einstein meaning one stone in German language.
ALVAR ALTO AND PAIMIO SANITORIUM
Alvar’s sanatorium was revolutionary in hospital design. Traditionally hospitals were to house patients and doctors, providing environment to perform operation. However, Alvar’s design focuses on patient’s everyday life, and how architecture can assist in helping the lives of the individuals. Each part of the sanatorium are positioned differently, exposing different atmosphere, providing natural sunlight and fresh air into every room, furniture designed to provide relaxing comfort, water basins are designed to make less noise. Despite the fact that TB can only be cured by anti-biotic, Alvar’s design made the life of patients more hospitable being more connected to nature instead of locked up in jail.
MONUMENT TO THE THIRD INTERNATIONAL, VLADMIR TATLIN
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LOUIS KAHN AND FRANK LLOYD WRIGHT
Louis Kahn’s strong geometric shape can be observed externally as well as internally. Kahn used concept of ‘Contrast’ is heavy including figure-ground technique and Boolean difference. Internal space is completely opposite to the exterior portraying a world within the building. His use of Material is subtle yet helps to enhance his contrasting idea. Bricks on the outside blends while exposed concrete augments.
This Museum was Wright’s last design, which finished after his death. The constant flow of movement is emphasised in this project. No one is to stop suddenly disrupting others, this was achieved by making every design aspect of the building as organic and curvy as possible. The main spiralling ramp is to be used for exhibition as well as the rooms. This is later used by Zaha Hadid in DDP in Seoul, South Korea.
EERO SAARINEN AND THE INGALLS RINK AKA YALE WHALE
The Ice Rink home to Yale University, where Eero Saarinen studied, has the iconic curved arch made of pure reinforced concrete. The curvature resembles a bow of a ship or underside of a whale, thus the nickname. From this central support, timber cladding is hung on series of cables which strengthen the support and stability. The beauty of this design comes from simplicity, other sporting complex at time were designed just to support the recreation held inside, yet Yale Whale allows the building itself to come alive with its exposed concrete.
SAN CATALDO CEMETRY BY ALDO ROSSI
‘Architecture of the City’. Rossi unified the openings whether window or door the all same format. Discomforting space is formed to honour the dead. The cemetery is unbound by the constraints of time. The ossuary building aka ‘House of the Dead’ is running parallel representing Bone structure of humans. The ossuary has no Floor/Roof/Window or Door marking the absence of inhabitants.
ARCHIGRAM VOLUME 06
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URBAN ANALYSIS OF DETROIT, MICHIGAN USA
Detroit flourished during the early 20th century due to Ford Motor Company’s moving assembly lines allowing Detroit to dominate global motor vehicle industry. However, due to defeat of American automobile industry to globalisation, Detroit has lost its primary revenue and racial riots fuelled the decline. All these can be observed by overlaying the map of Detroit over the years. We can see the city built up to its peak in the 1960s then sudden disappearance of buildings from 1994 onwards. These sudden appearance of voids and series of inhabitable buildings allowed crime rate to skyrocket and ultimately made the mayor to ‘Bulldoze’ ¼ of the city. Now Detroit has started to rebuild itself from the scratch and map of 2005 is showing similar trend as 1916’s map.
DUCKS AND DECORATED SHEDS: KYO-BO BUILDINGS IN SOUTH KOREA
Robert Venturi’s analogy of the ‘Ducks and Decorated Sheds ‘in essence are, ‘Ducks’ are buildings represent the functions quiet literally through the form and ‘Decorated Sheds’ are generic structures that can be alternated depending on the function. This can also be described as symbol vs sign. The Kyo Bo industry buildings, in Korea, started out as ‘Decorated Sheds’ that became ‘Ducks’. The design of this book store was inspired by bookshelf and is a redbrick skyscraper. When the company expanded, they decided to build headquarters in every major city in Korea. The design of these buildings is very similar, allowing the exterior building it selves to advertise the company, like the iconic ‘M’ sign from McDonalds.
CITY OF CULTURE BY PETER EISENMAN
The City of Culture is a new cultural centre for the Province of Galicia in north-western Spain. Its design evolves from the superposition of three sets of information. First, the street plan of the medieval centre of Santiago is overlaid on a topographic map of the hillside site, which overlooks the city. Second, a modern Cartesian grid is laid over these medieval routes. Third, through computer modelling software, the topography of the hillside is allowed to distort the two flat geometries, thus generating a topological surface that repositions old and new in a simultaneous matrix never before seen. Peter Eisenman was one of the first big architects to advocate Computer Aided Design and implemented it into his design. Through using this program, the Superposioning can be negotiated. Distorting geometry would be mere impossible if tried to be done by drawing, by using parametric design program the unique form of City of Culture could be born.