What is Architecture?

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What is Architecture?

• Architecture is..
• All Buildings? Only Cool Buildings?
• Anything Created by an Architect?
• or just ..
• Complex?

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Architecture is?..................
Architecture is roughly concerned with
carefully balancing horizontal things on top
of vertical things. Reyner Banham, design critic
Architecture starts when you carefully put two
bricks together. Ludwig Mies van der Rohe,
architect
All architecture is shelter, all great
architecture is the design of space that
contains, cuddles, exalts or stimulates the
persons in that space. Phillip Johnson, architect
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Architecture is?..................
Architecture is more than construction The
historian Nikolaus Pevsner famously wrote that
Lincoln Cathedral is architecture but a bicycle
shed is not. What he meant was that architecture
addresses aesthetics, unlike purely functional
buildings. Some critics disagree with
Pevsner about this (including Reyner Banham who
was a keen cyclist!), but the main point is that
architecture aims to fulfil our cultural needs as
well as provide for our basic need for shelter.
Architecture is unique to human beings No other
living organism can plan, construct, inhabit
and adapt three-dimensional structures in the way
that human beings can. Architecture holds a
mirror up to culture, history and society.
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Architecture is?..................

• Contemporary buildings
• Have to deal with many issues. The design
• of a building or public space must
• address three main areas
• Function
• Location
• Construction

• Architectural Fundamentals
• Shelter
• Aesthetics
• Structure
• Meaning (natural/cultural)
• Material

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Click on the strongest three features of this
building
functional
stimulating
originality
environmental design
balance
pleasing to the eye
blend with surroundings
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stimulating
functional
originality
environmental design
balance
pleasing to the eye
blend with surroundings
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stimulating
functional
originality
environmental design
balance
pleasing to the eye
blend with surroundings
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Click on key elements to reflect the impact of
the building
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Functionality
Harmony with surroundings
Environmental features
Aesthetic design
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Click on key elements to reflect the impact of
the structure
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Functionality
Harmony with surroundings
Environmental features
Aesthetic design
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Click on key elements to reflect the impact of
the building
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Functionality
Harmony with surroundings
Environmental features
Aesthetic design
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Click on key elements to reflect the impact of
the building
Low
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Functionality
Harmony with surroundings
Environmental features
Aesthetic design
Low
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Click on key elements to reflect the impact of
the building
Low
Low
Med
High
Med
High
Functionality
Harmony with surroundings
Environmental features
Aesthetic design
Low
Med
High
Low
Med
High
13
Click on key elements to reflect the impact of
the building
Low
Low
Med
High
Med
High
Functionality
Harmony with surroundings
Environmental features
Aesthetic design
Low
Med
High
Low
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High
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Architectural Inspiration

• Inspiration for design can come from many
  sources.
• For your project you may choose to adopt an
  approach to your designing
• that features a theme for example
• Concepts of illusions, reflections and vistas.
• Flowing space and purity.
• Wilderness, sustainability and contemporary
  built environments.
• The architecture of change new forms, old
  structures.
• Time, place and function.
• Traditional materials, contemporary space and
  flexible systems.
• Low cost, high concept.
• Abstraction and erratic light.
• The way we should live.
• Austerity or simplicity.
• Eclecticism and environmental design.
• The unidentified object.
• Big ideas, simple methods, things that last.
• Creating a difference, beginning as new.