ARCH 501 - THEORY OF ARCHITECTURE

Theory

Abstract thought or speculation resulting in a system of assumption or principles used in analyzing, explaining, or predicting phenomena, and proposed or followed as a basis of action.

Descriptive Theory

Type of theory explaining events or phenomena.

Prescriptive Theory

Type of theory prescribing guidelines.

Spatial System

The three-dimensional integration of program elements and spaces accommodates the multiple functions and relationships of a house.

Structural System

A grid of columns supports horizontal beams and slabs.

Enclosure System

Four exterior wall planes define a rectangular volume that contains the program elements and spaces.

Physical

Architectural order pertaining to solids and voids, interior and exterior. Includes space, structure, enclosure, machines.

Perceptual

Architectural order pertaining to the sensory perception and recognition of the physical elements by experiencing them sequentially in time.

Conceptual

Architectural order pertaining to the comprehension of the ordered and disordered relationships among a building's elements and systems and responding to the meanings they evoke.

Initiation

Stage of the design process pertaining to identifying a problem and its social, economic, and physical context.

Preparation

Collecting and analyzing relevant information and establishing goals and criteria for an acceptable solution.

Synthesis

Discovering constraints and opportunities and hypothesizing possible alternative solutions.

Evaluation

Simulating, testing, and modifying acceptable alternatives according to specified goals and criteria.

Action

Selecting and implementing the most suitable solution.

Reevaluation

Assessing how well an implemented solution in use satisfies the specified goals and criteria.

Point

Marks a position in space. Conceptually, it has no length, width, or depth, and is therefore static, centralized, and directionless.

Line

An extended point. Conceptually, has length but no width or depth. It is capable of visually expressing direction, movement, and growth.

Line

Can serve to join, support, surround, or intersect other visual elements; describe edges, give shape to planes, and articulate the surfaces of planes.

Plane

An extended line in a direction other than its intrinsic direction. Conceptually has length and width but no depth.

Shape

The preliminary identifying characteristic of a plane. It is determined by the contour of the line forming the edges of a plane.

Overhead Plane

A generic type of plane which can be either the roof or the ceiling plane.

Base Plane

A generic type of plane which can be either the ground or floor plane.

Roof Plane

The essential sheltering element that protects the interior of a building from the climatic elements.

Volume

A plane extended in a direction other than its intrinsic direction. Conceptually has length, width, and depth.

Form

The primary identifying characteristic of a volume. The formal structure of a work. The manner of arranging and coordinating the elements and parts of a composition so as to produce a coherent image.

Articulation

A method or manner of jointing that makes the united parts clear, distinct, and precise in relation to each other.

Size

The physical dimensions of length, width, and depth of a form.

Texture

The visual and especially tactile quality given to a surface by the size, shape, arrangement, and proportions of the parts.

Color

A phenomenon of light and visual perception that may be described in terms of an individual's perception of hue, saturation, and tonal value.

Hue

Another word for color.

Value

Describes how light or dark the color is.

Temperature

Relates to the feeling of warmth or coolness the color evokes.

Intensity

Measures the range of a color from dull to vivid. Also called Chroma and Saturation.

Warm Colors

Exhibit energy and joy thus, best for personal messages. They have a tendency to appear larger.

Cool Colors

Cconvey calmness and peace, thus best for office use. They have a tendency to appear smaller.

Complementary

Color scheme referring to any two colors opposite each other on the wheel.

Split-Complementary

Color scheme that uses three colors. The scheme takes one color and matches it with the two colors adjacent to its complementary color.

Analogous

Color scheme using any three colors next to each other on the wheel.

Triadic

Color scheme using any three colors that are equally apart on the color wheel.

Tetradic

Color scheme using four colors together, in the form of two sets of complementary colors.

Tint

Comes from adding white to hues.

Shade

Comes from adding black to hues.

Tone

Comes from mixing the hue with grey.

Achromatic

Color scheme using no color, just shades of grey, black and white.

Position

The location of a form relative to its environment or the visual field within which it is seen.

Orientation

The direction of a form relative to the ground plane, the compass points, other forms, or to the person viewing the form.

Visual Inertia

The degree of concentration and stability of a form. Depends on the form's geometry as well as its orientation relative to the ground plane, the pull of gravity, and our line of sight.

Form Articulation

Achieved by a change in material, color, texture, or pattern, developing corners as distinct linear elements, removing corners, and lighting the form.

Linear Pattern

Has the ability to emphasize the height or length of form, unify its surfaces, and define its textural quality.

Linear Sun-Shading Devices

Accentuate the horizontality of the building form.

Linear Columnar Elements

Emphasize the verticality of a high-rise structure.

Pattern of Openings and Cavities

Interrupts the continuity of the exterior wall planes.

Unadorned Corner

Emphasize the volume of the mass.

Rounded Corner

Express continuity of surface, compactness of volume, and softness of form.

Openings at Corner

Emphasize the definition of planes over volume.

Circulation

The passage of persons or things from one place to another or through an area.

Circulation Elements

Include approach, entrance, configuration of the path, and path-space relationships.

Approach

Circulation element referring to the distant view.

First Phase of the Circulation System

Prior to actually passing into the interior of a building, we approach its entrance along a path.

Frontal Approach

Leads directly to the entrance of a building along a straight, axial path. The visual goal that terminates the approach is clear.

Oblique

Approach Enhances the effect of perspective on the front facade and form of a building.

Spiral Approach

Prolongs the sequence of the approach and emphasizes the three-dimensional form of a building as we move around its perimeter.

Portals and Gateways

Have traditionally served as means of orienting us to the path beyond and welcoming or guarding against our entry.

Entrance

Circulation element relating the outside to inside. Involves the act of penetrating a vertical plane that distinguishes one space from another and separates "here" from "there."

Flush Entrance

Maintains the continuity of the surface of a wall and can be deliberately obscured.

Projected Entrance

Forms a transitional space, announces its function to the approach, and provides overhead shelter.

Recessed Entrance

Also provides shelter and receives a portion of exterior space into the realm of the building.

Elaborated Openings Within Vertical Planes

Mark the flush entrance to a building.

Portal

Marks the recessed entrance for pedestrians within a larger opening that includes space for a carport.

Entrance Reinforment

Achieved by making the opening lower, wider, or narrower than anticipated, making the entrance deep or circuitous, or articulating the opening with ornamentation or decorative embellishment.

Configuration of Path

Circulation element referring to the sequence of spaces.

Linear Path Configuration

A straight path is the primary organizing element for a series of spaces. In addition, it can be curvilinear or segmented, intersect other paths, have branches, or form a loop.

Radial Path Configuration

Has linear paths extending from or terminating at a central, common point.

Spiral Path Configuration

A single, continuous path that originates from a central point, revolves around it, and becomes increasingly distant from it.

Borobudur

A Buddhist stupa monument. In circumambulating the monument, pilgrims passed walls ornamented with reliefs illustrating the life of buddha and the principles of his teaching.

Grid Path Configuration

Consists of two sets of parallel paths that intersect at regular intervals and create square or rectangular fields of space.

Network Path Configuration

Consists of paths that connect established points in space.

Composite Path Configuration

Employing a combination of multiple path configuration patterns. To avoid the creation of a disorienting maze, a hierarchical order among the paths and nodes of a building should be established by differentiating their scale, form, length, and placement.

Cuadricula

A system of streets and blocks laid out in gridiron form. This method was efficient in maximizing space and in the supervision of colonial subjects.

Path-Space Relationship

Refers to edges, nodes, and terminations of the path.

Pass By Spaces

Path-space relationship where the integrity of each space is maintained. The configuration of the path is flexible and the mediating spaces can be used to link the path with the spaces.

Pass Through Spaces

Path-space relationship where the path may pass through a space axially, obliquely, or along its edge. In cutting through a space, the path creates patterns of rest and movement within it.

Terminate In A Space

Path-space relationship where the location of the space establishes the path. This path-space relationhip is used to approach and enter functionally or symbolically important spaces.

Form of the Circulation Space

Refers to corridors, halls, galleries, stairways, and rooms.

Enclosed Circulation Space

Forming a public galleria or private corridor that relates to the spaces it links through entrances in a wall plane.

Open on One Side

Circulation space forming a balcony or gallery that provides visual and spatial continuity with the spaces it links.

Open on Both Sides

Circulation space forming a colonnaded passageway that becomes a physical extension of the space it passes through.

Design

The creation and organization of formal elements in a work of art.

Design Principle

A fundamental and comprehensive concept of visual perception for structuring and aesthetic composition.

Proportion

Design principle referring to the proper harmonious relation of one part to another or to the whole.

Proportioning System

Visually unifies the multiplicity of elements in an architectural design by having all of its parts belong to the same family of proportions. Provides a sense of order in, heightens the continuity of, a sequence of spaces and establishes relationships between the exterior and interior elements of a building.

Golden Section

Defined as the ratio between two sections of a line, or the two dimensions of a plane figure, in which the lesser of the two is to the greater as the greater is to the sum of both.

Regulating Lines

Proportioning system where the diagonals of two rectangles are either parallel or perpendicular to each other, indicating that the two rectangles have similar proportions.

Classical Orders

The Greeks and Romans' representation of proportioning of elements considered as the perfect expression of beauty and harmony. The basic unit of dimension was the diameter of the column.

Vitruvius Rules

Classification of temples according to intercolumniation including pycnostyle, systyle, eustyle, diastyle, and araeostyle.

Renaissance Theories

Belief that buildings had to belong to a higher order, returned to the Greek mathematical system of proportions.

Andrea Palladio

Most influential architect of the Italian Renaissance. In The Four Books on Architecture, first published in Venice in 1570, he followed in the footsteps of his predecessors, Alberti and Serlio, and proposed the seven "most beautiful and proportionable manners of rooms."

Modulor

Proportioning system based on both mathematics (the aesthetic dimensions of the Golden Section and the Fibonacci Series), and the proportions of the human body (functional dimensions).

Modulor

Basic grid system consisting of three measures, 113, 70, and 43 centimeters, proportioned according to the Golden Section.

Unité d'Habitation

The principal work of Le Corbusier that exemplified the use of the Modulor. It uses 15 measures of the Modulor to bring human scale to a building.