EGCE 415 Architectural Design Terms and Definitions

Comprehensive vocabulary flashcards covering architectural integration, system types, theoretical paradigms, five modern architectural trends, building subsystems, and historic case study examples from the EGCE 415 course.

Isolationist approach

A design approach in which building components or systems are treated as independent pieces, where each part is given a single purpose and is fitted into place with little interaction with the other parts.

Architect approach

An integrated design approach that begins with the building as a complete, constructed whole and studies the relationships among its parts, systems, functions, and appearance.

Physical Integration

An integration type where building components and systems share space, such as structure, mechanical equipment, and circulation occupying and organizing the same building zones.

Visual Integration

An integration type where building components and systems share a coherent image, with arrangement, materials, proportions, and visual expression appearing intentionally related rather than accidental or conflicting.

Performance Integration

An integration type where building components and systems work together to share or support function and improve overall performance instead of interfering with one another.

Kimbell Art Museum

A Louis Kahn museum in Fort Worth, Texas, used as an example of physical, visual, and performance integration through its concrete vaults, skylights, reflectors, structure, galleries, and natural-light system working together.

Architect-as-artist

The view of the architect as a creative designer who shapes form, space, material, proportion, and visual experience.

Architect-as-scientist

The view of the architect as an analytical problem solver who uses evidence, technology, measurements, and performance criteria to develop a building.

Hardware integration

Coordination and interaction among the physical systems of a building, such as structure, envelope, services, interior, and site.

Software integration

Integration within the design process, encompassing sharing information, coordinating decisions, evaluating alternatives, and managing the relationships among the architect and other participants.

Integration as a team approach

A collaborative design process in which the architect coordinates the critical input of engineers, contractors, owners, specialists, and other professionals so that the final building works as a unified whole.

Domain

The external order of architecture that includes objective and technical concerns such as structural equilibrium, air-conditioning or environmental control, and system performance.

Realm

The internal order of architecture referring to the creative and interpretive side of design, including how spaces, forms, and experiences are composed.

Le Corbusier's description of architecture

The masterly, correct, and magnificent play of masses brought together in light, where light and shadow reveal forms and make their proportions and surfaces perceptible.

Industrialized system

A building system based on standardized, prefabricated, or pre-engineered parts that can be manufactured, specified, and assembled efficiently, improving speed and repeatability but potentially reducing design control.

Wet building construction

Construction using materials that can be mixed, poured, shaped, or molded on site according to the design (such as concrete, wood, and some plastics), remaining adaptable during construction.

Dry building construction

Construction using preconfigured, prefabricated, or pre-engineered components that are selected and assembled rather than freely molded on site.

Mathematization (quantification) of architecture

The increasing use of numbers, measurements, calculations, performance criteria, and computer analysis to describe, evaluate, and translate design qualities into measurable terms.

Preindustrial belief

A worldview associated with intuition, superstition, mystery, and explanations based more on tradition or unseen forces than on scientific measurement.

Industrial thought

A worldview that views the universe as a great extension of the machine, emphasizing mechanical order, production, standardization, efficiency, and technical control.

Postindustrial mindset

A worldview that views the universe as a vast single ecology, emphasizing interdependence, environmental relationships, resource limits, and the interaction of natural and human systems.

Architect's academic education

An education that develops both creative design ability and technical understanding, preparing the architect to coordinate program, form, technology, building systems, and multidisciplinary collaboration.

Part I of the textbook

The portion of the textbook that presents fundamental methods and principles of architectural design, including integration, systems, technology, and the design process.

Part II of the textbook

The portion of the textbook that presents architectural case studies applying fundamental methods and principles to actual buildings.

Case study

A detailed examination of an actual building used to understand how design ideas, program, site, technology, building systems, and construction decisions are combined.

Common components of a case study

Elements typically including building descriptions and parameters, basic documentation (plans and sections), a fact sheet or project highlights, building systems identification, climate data/analysis, and system relation discussions.

Design, Technology, and Integration

The course theme stating that design establishes goals and experiences, technology provides means and constraints, and integration coordinates systems so the building performs as a whole.

Design as structured methodology

The view that design is a repeatable, organized process for identifying requirements, testing alternatives, coordinating systems, and making decisions within a framework for creativity.

Design as free creative exploration

The view that design is an open-ended creative investigation emphasizing invention, interpretation, and discovery, resulting in a building that is not completely predictable from a fixed procedure.

Systems thinking

An effort to understand how flows of information, energy, materials, or people move through a system and how relationships among the parts affect the final outcome.

Primary Five Architectural Systems

site, structure, envelope, service, and interior.

System as Hardware

A system viewed as a collection of physical, standardized parts that can be produced, transported, and assembled, exemplified in the course by the Crystal Palace.

System as Prototype

A system viewed as a repeatable building type or model that establishes a new way of organizing components, exemplified by the Home Insurance Building.

System as Grammar

A system viewed as a set of rules for coordinating and expressing relationships among building components, exemplified by the Centre Georges Pompidou.

System as Species

A system viewed by analogy to an organism, featuring interdependent subsystems that adapt to conditions and support the life of the whole building, exemplified by green-building and LEED-oriented design.

LEED

Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design; a green-building rating system evaluating energy efficiency, water use, materials, indoor environmental quality, and sustainable site design.

Precept

A guiding principle or basic idea used to direct design decisions.

Bauhaus

A German school of art, design, and architecture founded by Walter Gropius in 1919 that connected function with design and promoted industrial standardization and mass-produced building systems.

Brutalism

A post-World War II architectural movement associated with rationally organized, rapidly constructed, and materially economical buildings, commonly featuring exposed concrete, limited ornament, and direct material expression.

Trend One: From handmade buildings to kit of parts

The architectural shift from one-off, craft-based construction toward factory-manufactured standardized components assembled on site to improve speed, reliability, repeatability, and cost.

Handmade building

A building made primarily through site-specific craft and custom fabrication, with components shaped or adjusted individually for the project.

Kit of parts

A building system made from standardized components designed to be manufactured, transported, and assembled in different combinations.

Trend Two: From formal constraints to technical constraints

The shift wherein design decisions are increasingly driven by measurable performance requirements (such as thermal behavior, acoustics, and energy use) rather than by form alone.

Formal constraints

Limits on architectural design that arise primarily from desired shape, composition, style, or visual expression.

Technical constraints

Limits or requirements arising from science, engineering, building technology, codes, materials, performance, constructability, and environmental conditions.

Trend Three: From structural issues to environmental issues

The expansion of design focus from load-bearing structure and physical assembly to broad environmental concerns such as energy, climate, resource limits, and indoor environmental quality.

Structural issues

Design concerns related to how a building carries gravity and lateral loads, maintains stability, and transfers forces through its structural system.

Environmental issues

Design concerns related to the building's interaction with climate, energy, water, materials, ecosystems, pollution, resource use, and occupant health and comfort.

Trend Four: From intuitive to optimized

The movement in design from decisions based mainly on intuition and experience toward decisions supported by measurements, calculations, computer modeling, simulation, and numerical optimization.

Intuitive design

Design based primarily on experience, judgment, perception, and creative instinct rather than formal numerical analysis.

Optimized design

Design developed by comparing alternatives using objective criteria and analysis to meet goals efficiently or achieve the best balance among competing requirements.

Trend Five: From monumental to sustainable

The shift in architecture from emphasizing isolated objects toward buildings that work with climate and nature, conserve resources, and perform responsibly over time.

Monumental architecture

Architecture that emphasizes symbolic presence, permanence, size, form, or cultural representation, often treating the building as an important independent object.

Sustainable architecture

Architecture that reduces environmental impacts and resource use while supporting occupant health, long-term performance, resilience, and compatibility with natural systems.

Passive design

A design strategy using orientation, envelope, shading, natural ventilation, and daylight to provide comfort with little or no mechanical energy.

Active systems

Mechanical or electrical systems that capture, convert, or control natural energy or environmental conditions, including photovoltaic systems, mechanical ventilation, and heat pumps.

Site system

The landscape and support systems outside or around the building, including grading, drainage, parking, vegetation, utilities, and accessibility

Structure system

The elements that provide stability, resist gravity and lateral loads, safely transfer loads to the ground, and maintain the building's shape and equilibrium.

Envelope system

The buildings skin; separation between indoor and outdoor environments that controls the passage of heat, air, water, light, sound, and people.

Service system

The mechanical, electrical, plumbing, vertical transportation, fire protection, and technical systems that support comfort, health, safety, operation, and building use.

Interior system

The occupied interior environment, including partitions, finishes, furnishings, lighting, and spaces for human activities.

Envelope elements

The primary physical components comprising the building: walls, fenestration or openings, and roofs.

Walls

Vertical envelope elements that separate interior from exterior or divide environmental zones, providing enclosure, weather protection, insulation, structure, fire resistance, and visual identity.

Fenestration

Windows, glazed doors, skylights, and other openings in the envelope that admit light, provide views, permit ventilation or access, and affect heat and moisture control.

Roofs

The uppermost envelope elements that protect against weather and control heat, water, air, and solar exposure

Envelope design mandates

The requirement that the envelope separate and protect interior space from exterior conditions while managing heat, air, moisture, light, sound, safety, durability, and energy performance.

Crystal Palace

First kit-of-parts system building constructed of standardized iron and glass components in 1851 in London by Joseph Paxton

Home Insurance Building

An 1880s Chicago building designed by William Le Baron Jenney that established the modern high-rise prototype through a fireproofed iron or steel frame, elevator, and non-load-bearing exterior walls.

Centre Georges Pompidou

A cultural center in Paris designed by Renzo Piano and Richard Rogers; serves as the course example of system-as-grammar and high-tech design through visibly expressed structural and mechanical systems.