Architecture

1. Architecture

2. THE PAST People banded together for protection from the elements, from other people. They banded together for collective hunting, for farming, for trading. First in caves, then in buildings. These people and their buildings became cities, and cities developed – along trade routes, at crossroads of those routes, at ports. Cities were pools of skill, centers of culture and administration, of protection, of religion, of commerce. They were concentrations of people huddled together in the safety of enclosing walls. Cities required water, food, supplies, and power sources. The growth of tightly-knit masses of peoples, of cities, was a major part of the civilizing influence. And Architecture, of course, played more than a key role.

3. THE FUTURE There was a time when the city and its buildings was a world; now the world has become a city. But a city in trouble. The future of our cities lies in the solving of the following global issues: 1. Population explosions – either natural of through immigration. 2. Change from an agricultural to an urban society. 3. Technology. 4. Expendable resources, depleting the environment. 5. Attempts to eliminate poverty. 6. Giant industrial, military, and governmental complexes. 7. Speed of transmission of ideas, and transportation of goods. 8. Nuclear threats / terrorism.

4. Architects today and in the future should be involved in not only design of single buildings, but land planning, civic design, possibly even politics. Master Plans for cities are being considered. Philadelphia created the first such Plan in the Post-World War II era, with a Master Plan in 1949. But then industries pulled out and the city almost went bankrupt…. Think of the plans for the new Kings Arena. Money, money, money. Paris, first under President Francois Mitterand, then Parisian Mayor and later President Jacques Chirac, formulated and developed the “Grands Projets,” which saved the view of the Eiffel Tower from being obliterated by surrounding skyscrapers. They brought a halt to indiscriminate skyscraper development, creating instead La Défense, which clustered high rises together in a planned environment. Why is this significant? In Colorado suburbs they have “blockage” clauses in contruction. Why?

5. An aspect of future planning is designing for flexibility in the event of total change of the function of a building. Architects now are assuming this responsibility especially as the costs of construction rise and land space decreases. The amount of care, of nurturing of the Architectural design, of thinking of future problems and providing for those problems with contingencies for special growth, for change, for adaptation – all of this care and concern for not just today, or opening day, but for future days and future populations, will determine the success or failure of the function. Think of your favorite city – what makes it that? The buildings, the public squares, plazas, piazzas? The intimate little nooks and crannies – the side-streets and cafes with their sense of human scale, making you comfortable? What, after all, are these, if not bits and pieces of architecture?

6. First, What Is Architecture? Louis Kahn (1901 -1974) said: "Architecture is the thoughtful making of space.“ Now space has to be created by some sort of form, and just what shape that form takes - well, throughout history there have been an almost infinite variety of forms, which we can call architecture.

7. Basic elements of Architecture: • Function (use) • 2. Structure (construction methods and materials) • 3. Aesthetics (beauty / artistic endeavor)

8. People needed to keep out of the rain, out of the snow, needed to be warm when it was cold, cool when it was hot. Throughout history people have been confronted with a need for shelter resulting from climatic conditions. In their search for shelter, there has often been an innate instinct to combine beauty with that shelter, which moved people towards an emotionally rich environment. Available building materials and technological capabilities of their time and place determined the results, which we call architecture.

9. Basic construction materials used throughout history have been wood and masonry; stone, brick, concrete, marble, iron, and more recently steel, followed. Wood structures are not very durable, and if durability was an objective, stone was substituted, when and where available. If there was clay in the ground, brick was used. If there was wood for creating fire, the brick was "baked." If there were insufficient supplies of wood, then the bricks were dried in the sun (not as durable as the oven-baked items). Concrete seemed to have originated in Roman times, a little more than 2000 years ago, although mortar was used earlier

10. This availability of raw materials, combined with a technological process for producing those materials, have been factors in determining architectural ways of designing. In many instances functional needs and requirements resulted in discoveries of new materials and/or methods of construction.

11. As cities grew crowded at the end of the 19th century, mostly due to the Industrial Revolution, downtown real estate became expensive. There was a realization that if buildings could climb skyward, space could be saved, money could be made. Masonry structures lost too much area to pure structural needs. You have to pile bricks and stones on top of each other as you climb, but the base has to be quite large, and you have to set back as you go up. The ziggurats and stepped pyramids of ancient Egypt exemplified that. Steel began to be used commonly near the end of the 19thcentury, replacing shorter, heavier masonry structures. Frank Lloyd Wright seems to have been the first to combine steel with concrete, giving us "reinforced concrete," which began to rival steel as a structural component. Do realize that construction cannot advance without companion technology; skyscrapers could not have been developed without the invention of the elevator!

12. There are five basic structural principles, which have been of prime importance to the history of building, and in various forms, and variations account for almost all types of construction, as force and gravity fight it out. The five types are as follows. Post and lintel Corbel Arch and vault Truss Cantilever Two vertical members supporting a horizontal one - this is the simplest. The vertical is also known as a column, the horizontal as a beam. A major problem throughout history has been that if the span is great, the material used as the lintel or beam might fail from its own weight. You cannot stretch stone. Sometimes the horizontal member might split in the middle or shear at its points of support. In early construction,spans had to be small, resulting in spaces cluttered with columns. See the Hall of the Hundred Columns in Persepolis.

14. Corbels are overlapping arrangements of bricks or stones in which each course projects farther out than the course below.

15. Arches can be round (Classical or Moorish), or pointed (Gothic) as they leap upward into space, and descend down to the opposite side. Arches are composed of wedge-shaped or tapered masonry units with their narrow ends down and the wider ends on top of the curve

17. Trussed construction grew from or with the pointed roof (gable or hip). It can be assumed that flat roofs leaked, and the wetter the climate the more leakage. So people began to slope their roofs to shed rain, using rafters to span two parallel walls (rafters are, in essence, angled beams).

18. Cantilevers are horizontal projections, they can be thought of as brackets, projecting out in space while being supported at one end. In essence they exist through history, but not in a serious structural or supporting way. We mostly will see them as projecting cornices in roof overhangs. It was not until the development of steel and reinforced concrete that cantilevers took on a structural life of their own.

19. The Stone Age is acknowledged to be the beginning of human use of tools - stone, supplemented or accompanied by wood, bone, antlers, and used for weapons. So much of human development stems from aggression or defense. Many natural implements were shaped, carved, or bent for purposes of warfare. Metals and their alloys advanced the causes of war first, and then were used for domestic, peaceful purposes

20. At some point in societal development, the concept of life after death evolved. The pyramids in Egypt, for example, are a major example, in which the body of a Pharaoh was buried in a place that would secure passage of the spirit through eternity. Bodies were buried with provisions of food, precious gems and metals - all of which would have aided, albeit in a physical way, the spiritual journeys. For whatever reason, probably durability in reverence to the concept of eternal life of the spirit, tombs or burial chambers were built to last, and their age seems to indicate that they predate other types of construction, at least with regards to durability.

21. An artificial mound, built to conceal burial chambers beneath. The place: Antequera, Spain…..this town of about 30,000 inhabitants has been continually occupied from pre-historic times. The Andalusia site contains three ancient burial mounds known as dolmens. Of the three, the earliest is about 6,000 years old, while the other two go back about 4000 years. We're talking about the 4thMillennium B.C.E., close to the 5thmillennium, a time in which similar types of construction were built as houses for the dead, probably chieftains of local tribes. These were tombs, houses for the dead, to be remembered, as a symbol of veneration for the departed chiefs.

24. The Renaissance Gothic 19th Century Frank Gehry Frank Lloyd Wright Le’Courbusiea

25. Modern

26. HARPA Concert Hall and Conference Center ReykjavÍk, Iceland The crystalline shell, conceived by artist Olafur Eliasson, wonderfully complements the structure’s aggregate of jagged, geometric volumes. At night, exterior LED strips activate, transforming the waterfront landmark into a shimmering beacon of beauty.

27. Burj Khalifa Dubai, United Arab Emirates2010 Rising a dizzying 2,717 feet above the desert, this spectacular super tower reigns as the tallest structure in the world. Its 162 floors contain offices, residences, restaurants, an Armani hotel, and an observation deck, 124 stories up. The strength of its design stems not only from its awe-inspiring verticality but also from its sleek silhouette. Wrapped in a glass curtain wall with steel mullions that catch the Arabian sun, the building tapers gradually from its Y-shaped base, with setbacks culminating in a 700-foot spire.

28. Gardens by the Bay Singapore 2012 Side-by-side parabolic conservatories of glass and steel anchor this cutting-edge botanical garden in Singapore’s booming Marina Bay district. Named the 2012 building of the year by the World Architecture Festival, the Wilkinson Eyre–designed structures replicate distinct climates—one dry, the other humid—allowing for diverse attractions like a flower meadow and a misty mountain forest.

29. Gardens by the Bay No less extraordinary is the adjoining grove of vertical gardens by Grant Associates. Visitors can stroll an elevated walkway connecting the “super trees,” some of which are fitted with photovoltaic cells to harness solar energy.

30. Linked Hybrid Beijing2009 Composed of eight connected towers, this mixed-use complex represents a compelling vision for 21st-century urban development. To combat the isolation often associated with luxury residential buildings and gated communities, the architects placed wide, open passages at ground level, ushering pedestrians into a series of public spaces that include gardens, shops, restaurants, and schools.

31. Linked Hybrid High overhead, glass-and-steel bridges also contain retail spaces and a café, providing another sphere for community-fostering encounters between visitors and neighbors.

32. The Shard London 2012 this 72-story skyscraper—the tallest in Western Europe—has transformed the British capital’s skyline, rising arrestingly on the southern banks of the Thames. Inspired by church steeples, the structure comprises eight angled glass façades that variously reflect the surrounding city and sky and offer crystal-clear glimpses inside. Intended by Piano to act as a vertical village, the multifunctional building includes offices, apartments, restaurants, and a hotel—all crowned by a recently opened observation platform, which affords stunning views up to 40 miles in every direction.

33. Perot Museum of Nature and Science Dallas 2012 Architect Thom Mayne, the Pritzker Prize–winning founder of Morphosis, is famous for breaking the mold, and his latest building is no exception. Sheathed in panels of textured concrete, it consists of a five-story cube, fractured at one corner and set atop a sweeping plinth planted with Texas grasses. Slashed across the cube’s exterior is a dramatic glass-enclosed escalator, which whisks visitors to the top-floor entrance to the exhibits.

34. Parrish Art Museum Water Mill, New York, 2012 Topped by a double-gable roof of white corrugated metal, the Parrish’s strikingly horizontal new home melds brilliantly with its setting, nodding in form to both the traditional barns and the cottage like artist studios that have long been associated with Long Island’s East End.

37. Guangzhou Opera House Guangzhou, China, 2010 China’s building boom has produced some audacious projects, and few are as eye-popping as Hadid’s performance center for the southern industrial city of Guangzhou. The venue consists of two dynamic fluid-form structures, the larger housing an undulating, gilded 1,800-seat hall and the smaller home to a more intimate 400-seat space.

39. Metropol Parasol Seville, Spain, 2011 When excavation for a parking garage unearthed Roman artifacts in Seville’s Plaza de la Encarnación, city officials opted to commission this welcoming landmark instead.

40. Some 90 feet high and nearly 500 feet long, the billowing timber pavilion is part pergola, part urban parlor. Viewing platforms are perched atop the organic forms, which also shelter restaurants and an archaeological museum.

41. Absolute World Mississauga, Ontario, 2012 These residential high-rises strike a voluptuous profile in Toronto’s largest suburb. With continuous balconies and elliptical floor plans, the 50- and 56-story skyscrapers appear to shimmy and twist, each around its own axis.

43. The architect’s latest surprise is in Oslo, where his new home for the Astrup Fearnley Museet, a privately owned museum of contemporary art, opened in September. Straddling a series of canals in a revitalized waterfront neighborhood, the structure features rugged aspen-wood siding, thin steel columns with cable riggings that recall sails, and a curving roof that brings to mind a thrown fishing net. The institution itself isn’t exactly an advertisement for Scandinavian culture; the collection focuses largely on American artists such as Jeff Koons, Cindy Sherman, and Christopher Wool. But pending political support, the museum may one day be joined by another devoted to the Norwegian painter Edvard Munch, making the area a new cultural center for the city