Architics

A response to “Principles of Palladio’s Architecture” by Rudolf Wittkower, “The Mathematics of the Ideal Villa” by Colin Rowe, “Multiplicitous and Inorganic Bodies” by Greg Lynn, and “On the Typology of Architecture” by Giulio Carlo Argan

Architecture is a vast field, and today we thrive to create new livable forms. An important part of architecture is its evolution. From thick high walls to thin ones, from squares to circles, straight lines to curves, and with new material and technology comes new forms. As chaotic as evolution may seem, it is a slow process based on principles for it to reach success. These principles form a stable foundation in which we can proceed to build theories and suggestions in shaping the world far beyond fitting our physical needs of shelter to our mental needs of looking at new and challenging concepts. When putting architecture forms in categories, we are also creating a principle we can lay as a foundation. In choosing these foundations, we can design new forms by exploiting the existing categories in favor of “thinking outside the box”. This will result in new categories or subcategories of new forms and shapes, however, if someone was to exploit the new categories he might end up with results similar to the original categories 100 years into the future making it a loophole. This brings us to the question, does categorizing architecture help evolving it, or does it bring its evolution to a dead end?

Palladio was interested in antiquities and wanted to survey the entire field of architecture. This interest lead him to write I quattro libri dell’architettura meaning the four books of architecture.

Palladio’s Quattro Libri, almost entirely concentrated on the practical side, are similarly marked by acuteness, precision, and clear and rational arrangement. And as Trissino with his application of Aristotle’s poetic gave structure, unity and clarity to drama and epic, so Palladio aspired to unchangeable lucidity of architectural planning based on the authority of classical rules.

Wittkower

In that sense, Palladio used classical architecture as the principles of building. His influence by Vitruvius and his mentor Trissino was clearly visible in his villas. In the planning of his villas he followed certain rules which look like follows: A hall in the central axis and absolute symmetry of the rooms on both sides. Palladio used a theme in which he never departed from which revolves around the systemization of the ground floor. It was a distinguishing feature in his architecture in which the country-houses he built in Vicenza where different but following the same base.

Understanding the principles Palladio worked by to building his villas allows us to replicate and recreate the structures he made and work on them in terms of exploitation to create new forms derived from mathematical standards. Villa Garches by Le Corbusier for example shows similarities with Villa Malcontenta by Palladio. This is a clear example were Principles set as foundations (the nine-square grid) were used to produce new forms.

The ornamental adjuncts of humanism, the emblematic representations of the moral virtues, the loves of the Gods and the lives of the Saints have lost their former monopoly; and as a result, while allusion at the Malcontenta is concentrated and direct, at Garches it is dissipated and inferential.    

Rowe

New theories rise from this similarity. If one was to study Villa Garches disregarding the mathematical principles it was built upon, one would realize these principles and exploit them to create forms which could result in a villa like Malcontenta. This theory could simply be called The Loophole. Deriving a design from an already derived design could result in the original design itself. This would result in no evolution of the field but rather a pendulum going back and forth between classical and contemporary, where contemporary is derived from the classical. Another theory is that where categories form principles of construction and new designs result as a shift in interest in the architect occurs, for example Corb’s interest in the open plan allowed him to merge that with the Nine-square grid of Palladio resulting in a different form. This takes us back to the main question, whether building on principles allows us to evolve, or sets a limit to what extent we can evolve?