curtkram, sorry, but I don't really get the meaning of your comment. Please explain.
In any case, non sequitor, I wish you luck in your government commission. I hope it turns out so that you're happy with it, as well as the countless citizens that pay for it and will live with it throughout the lifetime of the building(s).
Not all classical work needs to be opulently and elaborately decorated. There is a spectrum of work that ranges from the high classical on one end, suitable for important public buildings, and relatively rare, and the vernacular at the other end, which is simple and humble, usually detailed in a way that is easy to construct with local labor and material, and is suitable for small residential buildings. All classical buildings fall on this spectrum, in a place suitable to client, budget and intended use.
Notre Dame was started in the 1100s. The sculptors of the day did not usa a hammer and chisel because it was traditional; they did it because that was all they had. Today a sculptor would probable use power tools for the first and second cut and finish off with hand tools for the finish. Point being no one knows how much it would cost to create something similar today.
As far as the Medicis, the Church, and rich people commissioning projects, what has changed? Substitute generic "business" for the Meds and there you are.
With regards to the ordinary housing shown in the painting, I see some nice arches and some pretty good stonework. Might last longer than a glass cube with a flat roof? Might still be there?
trip, you said you could provide examples of traditional architecture in any country. this thread was started by a regular person that felt the need to dictate the direction of the architecture in their environment. my assumption, which has not been verified, was that this person does not have the money or influence of god, government, or medici's. keeping to the original intent of this topic, which is to provide traditional architecture in the environment of regular people who work for a living, i was asking that any example you provide be a building designed by and for regular people instead of those with unlimited budgets.
you posted some examples of state monuments, which were paid for by tax dollars. the people who paid for the building never actually had any input in the design process. it's not like every tax payer was on the conference call where they were discussing VE options. also, all of your 'traditional' examples are from before the depression. i still believe the economy today is different than it was back then, and these are examples built before fypon was an option, but i suppose if some people here insist on holding to the notion that nothing has even changed in 2,000 years of history, there isn't anything i can do about that.
And who are government buildings designed for if not regular people?
Furthermore any building built in my environment is part of my environment, regardless of who built it.
The original purpose of the thread was asking why are the majority of architects in lock step against traditional architecture when the majority of the public prefer it.
But having stepped out and let actual architects continue the discussion, you can take it in any direction you want. I am irrelevant at this point so you can stop trying to use me to dodge and avoid points made against you. It's not helping you any to recover from the hilarious blunders you've made thus far either.
The only ones using the term Neo-Classical are those attempting to show derision towards traditional design.
Anyway, I take it this was common knowledge since many assume (wrongly, presumably) that this is taught in all architecture schools...
When you get down to it, there are only two types of architecture: arcuated (using arches) and trabeated (post and lintel).
Vernacular building uses one or the other to sustain a roofed dwelling. Classical, be it Greek, Roman, Indian, Chinese, is the canonical use of the utmost refined of these resultant vernacular forms. High classical is normally reserved for public/important buildings- temples, courthouses, government centers.
curtkram, as I know sometimes we skip posts, those examples were actually part of the discussion spurred by nonsequitor's government project.
In any case, LMAO about financing. As if the average person could come close to financing a Zaha, Calatrava, Gehry project. That's even before it spurs it's first leak(s). You need petro dollars kinda wealth for that.
You want a building designed by and for regular people in the traditional manner? Well, would that be the Federal and Greek Revival houses of New England, the stone houses of Pennsylvania and later Texas, the brick Tidewater homes in Maryland, the farmhouses in the Shenandoah Valley, the townhomes of Charleston, the Dutch homes in upstate New York, the Victorian houses of the West, the Spanish Colonial homes of the same area, the French Quarter houses in New Orleans...and on and on.
These styles were brought by immigrants and adapted and changed to meet the climate and the needs of their owners. Along comes the Modernest Movement and trys to put everybody into a glass box. Then a brutalist concrete box. Then a deconstructed house that looks like it was frozen in time an instant after the furnace exploded. Now we are all suposed to live in Gehry what-ever-it-is?
The last laugh is that the traditional architecture was usually much better suited to its' locale than the modernist "improvements" ever were.
Traditional design is simply design based on great traditions. Simple as that. Greco-Roman classicism is one such tradition. There are others.
Traditional design has as its cornerstone the notion that wisdom passed down from practitioner to practitioner has great value. That's what a tradition is.
Traditional design uses the strategy of embedding wisdom in beauty, which is a strategy that nature employs. The human genome is dense with information, but in order to pass that information along, we don't need to understand that information. We simply need to fall in love with someone we find beautiful, and we do what comes naturally to us. The wisdom embedded in our DNA is passed along nearly effortlessly, through beauty.
Architecture once did something very similar. Someone might work for years to figure out the best possible eave design for a region of the world, for example. They might do countless calculations of sun angles, storm winds, etc., and might do numerous experiments. But if they can then embed that wisdom in beauty by designing the eave in such a manner that the people of the region consider it to be beautiful, then nobody else needs to do the calculations, or the experiments, or show their work; they simply need to love the pattern, and repeat it.
Modern movements in architecture generally have valued uniqueness over beauty. If they want to be recognized and published, it is to their advantage to be as different from the last guy as possible. Because of this, traditions cannot develop, and wisdom doesn't get passed along. This is a key difference between modernism and traditional architectural movements.
What is it you want? Do you want an apology? Do you want us to thank you for finally opening our eyes to that which we've been so blind to for the past 50, 80, 2000 years? To hail you as the savior of western culture? Because all you seem to want to do is insult anyone who dares disagree with you.
Why can't software developers write good software? It must be because you guys don't care enough about your end user to deliver a quality product. I took a quick poll here in the office, everyone else hates you too. Take this well-intentioned criticism to heart, I've been using software practically my entire life and I know what I'm talking about. I really liked the way Windows NT worked, I don't know why you feel the need to keep changing stuff every few years. Also, autosave. Who in the world wants to do work and then lose it? The fact that there is a save button at all is proof that you don't care about us users and are just after our money and making annoying fancy interfaces. You know who wrote good quality software? Atari. Plug in that cartridge and it worked everytime. Hell, it still works. But you and your ilk drove them out of business with all that nonsense you learned in college. Elitist. Go enjoy your yacht and Swedish trophy wife.
Porte-cocheres.....that's what we need more of...Porte-cocheres...I can't tell you how many times that I've been out on a carriage ride just to arrive back at the manor to a sudden down pour! I mean, My God, Man...don't you know what rain can do to wool, velvet and leather?
Well the libraries, city hall, and courthouses are designed to be used by regular citizens. Many communities go to great lengths and expense to restore and improve city buildings built in the 1800s And early 1900s because it is part of their heritage.
Government buildings are designed by architects to specifications determined by bureaucrats. The "public" has no guaranteed participation in the process other than footing the bill.
For example, schools are not designed for students, they are designed for the bureaucrats who manage school systems. It's important to understand the difference. If students (or teachers) had any say in the matter, schools would be designed very differently.
"The original purpose of the thread was asking why are the majority of architects in lock step against traditional architecture when the majority of the public prefer it."
Traditions should be questioned. For example, it is a tradition to cut off part of little boys' penises throughout the world. But why? The majority of the public might favor it, so it must be the right thing to do. The same thing goes for architecture. Why don't you take a course in architecture? there is a free one online at https://www.edx.org/ I think you would begin to understand that there is not one definition of architecture and no easy way to distinguish what is good and bad and that there are multiple traditions that mean different things to different people.
Interesting thoughts and analogy. However, a key distinction I feel we can all recognize is that whatever does or does not happen to said boy's penis will directly affect only said boy.
Buildings are the key building blocks of our urban environment, which is shared by all today and into a, hopefully, durable future.
Of course traditions should be questioned, but they should also be examined and respected. There are many useful things to be gained by doing so. Actually modernism has become tradtion of a sort today, especially in the schools. Unfortunately in doing so training in how to design for clients who want an earlier tradition gives us buildings such as this:
That is why I am advocating for teaching traditiomal design in architecture schools.
Can someone shed light on why an appreciation of traditional architecture is intuitive, while an appreciation of contemporary architecture is instead an acquired taste which requires a specialized education in the arts?
Why do so many (modern) people vacation to traditional urban places?
Why are (well done) traditional homes often more expensive then their contemporary counterparts on the housing market?
Why do some architecture schools still send their students abroad to live in old European cities, if the traditional architecture is really deemed by the academies to be so irrelevant for 21st century living?
How is it that I live in a traditional building, and yet I am not a luddite who writes letters with a feather quill by candlelight?
Lets not forget the amusing fact that Porte cocheres are actually very much still elements in new buildings today and even employed by modernist architects. Even the hapless attempts to create diversion through sophomoric humor seems to have fallen somewhat short of whatever their intended objectives.
I like that this degenerated to circumcised penises. When talking traditions, that is one that surely we will see the it's well overdue death very soon.
Houses in my neighbourhood still have carriage lanes between houses... just in case... you never know when horses come back in style
Rest assured, the NSA building in Ft. Meade, MD, the icon of our time, does not have Porte Cocheres. No trees in the parking lots either. MInimalist rules.
If that is not a nightmare out of George Orwell, I don't know what is.
Kudos, however, to the tacky electronic sign in front.
It's really interesting to me how these conversations about traditional architecture elicit such rude and childish outbursts. This is the kind of stuff that thirteen year old children resort to when made uncomfortable.
Back to the topic, I just ran across this English survey taken in 2002:
"People were asked to choose where they would most like to live from a selection of images of houses. These ranged from a bungalow, a traditional village house, a 1930s semi and a Victorian terrace to a modern Wimpey style semi, a loft apartment and a tower block. The two most desirable housing types overall were the bungalow (30%) and the village house (29%), followed by the Victorian terrace (16%) and the modern semi (14%).
Only two per cent of people — just one in 50 — chose a modern loft style apartment and no one at all selected the tower block. Young people, aged 16 to 24, were most likely to choose the modern buildings, with around one in six (17%) selecting one of the modern developments compared to only one in a hundred (1%) of older people."
"I like that this degenerated to circumcised penises."
Of course you do, becasue you can't actually rebut any of the substantive points laid out here. It's no surprise that the ideologues have devolved into screeming.
The Washington Post opinion section article I read this morning quoting Clinton...
"If we become ideological, then we’re blind to evidence"
This is what's become of the modernist hold on academia for the last 60 years. They've stopped learning from the mounting evidence all around them and retreated into the insular world of the ideologue who rejects anything that distorts thier precious view of the world. Even at the begining, when Walter Gropius took charge of Harvard's school of architecture, he forbade students from accesing history books becasue he felt they would pollute the young students minds. Instead of allowing the open and free flow of information as academia is supposed to allow, they are too afraid to let students think for themselves by telling them they don't know a thing about architecture. Treating them like the tabula rasa they wanted to create in historic center after historic center. Rip out the past so people won't have it around to compare how bad the new stuff really is. The students then turn around and shield their own ignorance by telling themselves thier clients don't know what's good for them, yet they themselves flock to neighborhoods where carriages once rode through like Koolhouse, who says it's money that keeps him from living in the kind of buildings he tells everyone else they should live in. Right.
ThayerD, I can rebut just fine, but honestly, I'd rather see this degenerate further than waste my time debating aesthetics and semantics.
I do however like this "big architecture" conspiracy theme going on suggesting some high level of back-door deals in order to squash traditional design elements/ideals. It's amusing but like all "big X" conspiracies, it's just false agenticity and easy pattern finding.
Non Sequitor, you gave it a good shot. What you don't seem to understand is that this isn't a battle between two opponents. Any city looks fine with multiple styles along a street, as long as some basic rules are held to keep the street coherent. There will always be room for the large iconic buildings of any style, but good urbanism requires a modicum of architectural comity, something that can easily be learned from traditional archtiecture. And as our cities become even more important as we begin to reject the earth destroying sprawl envirionment of the last 50 years, it will become all the more important for schools to teach what is needed.
No need to resort to conspiracies or back door deals to explain it. With very few exceptions, every single major architectural university in the world teaches an exclusively modernist approach, despite the demonstrable fact that the general public prefers at least a more eclectic point of view, and probably prefers traditional architecture outright (see British poll above). Has there ever been a profession further estranged from the public they profess to serve?
when you design a building today, it's often times going to have a concrete foundation, perhaps in the form of a grade beam or maybe a pier, and if it's a big building it might have steel columns along the perimeter, or maybe a pre-engineered space frame. if it's a building 3 stories or less, you might want to do a balloon frame with steel studs (which is neither trabeated or arcuated). for retail and often times commercial, you're going to want an aluminum curtainwall or storefront system to meet your client's needs. you're also going to want insulated glass. etc., etc.
my view is that modernism tries to use those materials (among others) to make buildings that people want to live in and around. they often fail. it might be a worthwhile discussion to figure out why architects are unable to make great buildings with the materials, methods, and financial systems that exist today. anyway, to eke's point:
Traditional design is simply design based on great traditions. Simple as that. Greco-Roman classicism is one such tradition. There are others.
Traditional design has as its cornerstone the notion that wisdom passed down from practitioner to practitioner has great value. That's what a tradition is.
a brick arch support by brick ties and stud framed construction is different than the brick arch they built 100 years ago. there is still a keystone in that arch, but the fact is, it's fundamentally different than a keystone 100 years ago, because now it's just a veneer. 100 years ago, that keystone was part of a bearing wall. same thing applies to quoins and cornerstones. they just aren't what they used to be. handing down the tradition of how to stack brick and stone to make a building is not that applicable to architects today, because we aren't stacking brick and stone to build buildings anymore (though we do stack concrete block sometimes).
there are a lot of different structural/framing systems in common practice today. we should be teaching young architects how those systems work, not the traditions that are no longer in practice. we should be teaching them about tpo roofs and how to weep brick because that's what you need to know when designing a building. if you want to slap a big keystone on a brick arch to make a building look traditional, i don't have anything against that, but do it with respect to the material and methods that exist today, not a nostalgic dream your contractor isn't likely to share with you.
perhaps the reason architects today are doing a shitty job of working with the materials and methods in common practice today, is that they were trained in working with traditional materials that are no longer applicable. maybe that's why contractors and engineers keep taking bits of what used to be under our umbrella. all we know how to do anymore is draw a picture of a brick arch, we need them to explain how it will actually work.
thayer, i'm pretty sure every comment you've ever made suggests your views on 'traditional" architecture are ideological, and it's pretty clear you don't consider other views. also, i support circumcision and think it will continue in common practice for a long time to come.
regarding your suggestion "...telling themselves thier clients don't know what's good for them"
this is what you said in a 9:46 comment: "The public dosen't care."
ThayerD, agreed in principle but the OP of this tread states that "the public" is upset that the built environment does not reflect his/her interpretation of traditional which differs from mine, from yours, from that one the lonely government worker I see in window in the building across from my office as would anyone else's.
Sprawl and other urban strategies like it are not a product of architectural education but a combination of loose local zoning regulation and social pressure to get people into mortgages. Economics aside, I would not be surprised to find the majority of people wanting a historic San Francisco painted Ladies House or a classic NY brownstone townhouse. We as architects and designers as subject to the same market forces and can only influence it as far as our client's money and ambitions (or courage) will allow us. To focus on the few Koolhass, Ghery, Hadid, etc is to do a disservice to the thousands of other professionals not in the spotlight but who still strive to make each project as best as they can for the rest. This is something I see the OP does not want to understand. Design elements change, but from my experience in academia and practice, the intentions remain. Sometimes they are clad in titanium scales or (to Borrow from Kunstler) clad in Gillette Razor blades (Seattle library), but to insist that the design team imposes this on the public on their own accord is too simplistic of an argument.
"a brick arch support by brick ties and stud framed construction is different than the brick arch they built 100 years ago. there is still a keystone in that arch, but the fact is, it's fundamentally different than a keystone 100 years ago, because now it's just a veneer."
So are we to dismiss Roman architecture that applied stone veneer decoration to an essentially concrete structure? Your standards of truth just don't hold up.
"thayer, i'm pretty sure every comment you've ever made suggests your views on 'traditional" architecture are ideological, and it's pretty clear you don't consider other views."
Yet I've said many times that I've designed modernist stuff which actually has won awards, yet you still think I'm an ideologue? I'll repeat, an ideologue is someone who dosen't look at evidence that contradicts their point of view. I'm not for the banishment of modernism or glass or aluminim store fronts or whatever, I'm for an architectural eucation that is not ideological. But since you refuse to accept my own words, you are the ideolgue here.
In my little city the carriage lanes are used for - gasp! - carriages. At least the motorized kind. The garage doors open to the back lane eliminating having the garage doors and driveways at the front of the house. Also residents put their trash out in the back lane to be picked up trashmen rather than in front of the house. Clever, no?
"but to insist that the design team imposes this on the public on their own accord is too simplistic of an argument."
I completely agree. That's why if you start with a good education that at least accepts what you seem to have accepted...
'I would not be surprised to find the majority of people wanting a historic San Francisco painted Ladies House or a classic NY brownstone townhouse."
then as architects we might be a lot closer to resolving the original intent of this posting.
"The original purpose of the thread was asking why are the majority of architects in lock step against traditional architecture when the majority of the public prefer it."
Volunteer, I was being a little facetious with the carriage lane comment. Blame it on my lack of coffee. 2 cups is not enough for internet commenting.
The lanes I make reference too are too small for fire access and have, illegally, been converted to private property. I believe the city has access rights but after 30 to 50 years of disservice, residents slowly moved fences outwards and commandeered the space.
Anyways, I've lived in a neighbourhood as you describe while in grad-school. My basement apartment gave out into an old dirt carriage way several houses used to access their parking spaces. It's a nice idea, but given that these remain mostly in effluent neighbourhoods, it is not something that can be brought into larger scale urban planning.
Thayer-D, you forgot the first part of my sentence where I wrote "economics aside". If I give you the option of a first class train ticket or a an old bicycle with a flat tire, which would you choose if the only investment required is a moment of fantasy?
I think an issue here is that the general public hinted at by the OP sees cheaply made sprawl and Walmart parking lots and instantly thinks: "this is architecture".
4th coffee almost done, perhaps it is time I return to fighting for the integrity of this public lobby I am currently working on.
So are we to dismiss Roman architecture that applied stone veneer decoration to an essentially concrete structure? Your standards of truth just don't hold up.
are you living in the 21st century in 700AD rome? we have tilt-up concrete that you can embed thin-brick into. that's not what the romans did, though, is it? their way of mixing concrete was different than what we do today. i bet the way they build formwork is different, the way they hauled concrete to the site was different, the way the poured concrete into formwork (if they even did that, i don't know), and i'm pretty sure their brick was different too.
are you seriously trying to suggest that ancient roman architecture was built the same as it is today, and thinking that somehow suggests you are not an ideologue that refuses to listen to other ideas?
no, you're pretty smart and you make modernist buildings. so when you tell the contractor to design and build something from ancient rome using your traditional education, i bet they do it just the way you read about.
Sprawl and other urban strategies like it are not a product of architectural education but a combination of loose local zoning regulation and social pressure to get people into mortgages.
I'm sure we wouldn't be having this debate if the auto/oil companies hadn't bought and destroyed public transit in the 1940s and dictated transportation and urban development policy to lawmakers for several decades following. The general decline in public satisfaction of our built environment is DIRECTLY related to the rise of auto-centric infrastructure and architecture. I am betting that this level of dissatisfaction is not the same in places with lower levels of car usage.
"traditional" design (or, should we say - materially rich, subtle, and skillfully crafted) is almost always exclusively pedestrian-orientated, very human scaled - meant to be experienced by foot and hand... at a slower speed. Right now, most buildings are forced to become "icons" because they are meant to catch the eye at longer distances and higher speeds. This isn't really the fault of architects - before these iconic structures would be reserved for culturally important buildings with large budgets - these days everything must be some kind of monument. EIFS and glass and metal panel clad "monuments" with tiny budgets that somehow need to distinguish themselves from all the other increasingly grotesque monuments.
Of course this is only part of the puzzle, but the biggest piece of this puzzle are cars. until we stop designing our cities around them, nothing is going to change.
OK, so the masses prefer traditional architecture. What exactly does that mean? That we should all gather as sheep to give the masses what they want? Are the masses always correct? Does the popular vote always give us the finest, most appropriate result? Fortunately there have been (as still are) those who really don't live for the masses. If you want traditional, there is someone out there to fill the bill, and just the opposite. Imagine Oak Park without a Frank Lloyd Wright, other examples are obvious.
Why won't you design what we (the public) want?
curtkram, sorry, but I don't really get the meaning of your comment. Please explain.
In any case, non sequitor, I wish you luck in your government commission. I hope it turns out so that you're happy with it, as well as the countless citizens that pay for it and will live with it throughout the lifetime of the building(s).
Not all classical work needs to be opulently and elaborately decorated. There is a spectrum of work that ranges from the high classical on one end, suitable for important public buildings, and relatively rare, and the vernacular at the other end, which is simple and humble, usually detailed in a way that is easy to construct with local labor and material, and is suitable for small residential buildings. All classical buildings fall on this spectrum, in a place suitable to client, budget and intended use.
Notre Dame was started in the 1100s. The sculptors of the day did not usa a hammer and chisel because it was traditional; they did it because that was all they had. Today a sculptor would probable use power tools for the first and second cut and finish off with hand tools for the finish. Point being no one knows how much it would cost to create something similar today. As far as the Medicis, the Church, and rich people commissioning projects, what has changed? Substitute generic "business" for the Meds and there you are. With regards to the ordinary housing shown in the painting, I see some nice arches and some pretty good stonework. Might last longer than a glass cube with a flat roof? Might still be there?
trip, you said you could provide examples of traditional architecture in any country. this thread was started by a regular person that felt the need to dictate the direction of the architecture in their environment. my assumption, which has not been verified, was that this person does not have the money or influence of god, government, or medici's. keeping to the original intent of this topic, which is to provide traditional architecture in the environment of regular people who work for a living, i was asking that any example you provide be a building designed by and for regular people instead of those with unlimited budgets.
you posted some examples of state monuments, which were paid for by tax dollars. the people who paid for the building never actually had any input in the design process. it's not like every tax payer was on the conference call where they were discussing VE options. also, all of your 'traditional' examples are from before the depression. i still believe the economy today is different than it was back then, and these are examples built before fypon was an option, but i suppose if some people here insist on holding to the notion that nothing has even changed in 2,000 years of history, there isn't anything i can do about that.
Page 7 and no one has clearly defined "traditional" design.
It is a very Eurocentric to narrow down "traditional" architecture to neo-classicism.
What about the "traditional" architecture of the Hopi or Navajo? How about the Japanese?
What is considered traditional in Yemen is very different from what the Italians or Dutch consider traditional.
And who are government buildings designed for if not regular people?
Furthermore any building built in my environment is part of my environment, regardless of who built it.
The original purpose of the thread was asking why are the majority of architects in lock step against traditional architecture when the majority of the public prefer it.
But having stepped out and let actual architects continue the discussion, you can take it in any direction you want. I am irrelevant at this point so you can stop trying to use me to dodge and avoid points made against you. It's not helping you any to recover from the hilarious blunders you've made thus far either.
The Jefferson Memorial is neo-classical in design and completed in 1943, right in the middle of WWII.
The only ones using the term Neo-Classical are those attempting to show derision towards traditional design.
Anyway, I take it this was common knowledge since many assume (wrongly, presumably) that this is taught in all architecture schools...
When you get down to it, there are only two types of architecture: arcuated (using arches) and trabeated (post and lintel).
Vernacular building uses one or the other to sustain a roofed dwelling. Classical, be it Greek, Roman, Indian, Chinese, is the canonical use of the utmost refined of these resultant vernacular forms. High classical is normally reserved for public/important buildings- temples, courthouses, government centers.
curtkram, as I know sometimes we skip posts, those examples were actually part of the discussion spurred by nonsequitor's government project.
In any case, LMAO about financing. As if the average person could come close to financing a Zaha, Calatrava, Gehry project. That's even before it spurs it's first leak(s). You need petro dollars kinda wealth for that.
You want a building designed by and for regular people in the traditional manner? Well, would that be the Federal and Greek Revival houses of New England, the stone houses of Pennsylvania and later Texas, the brick Tidewater homes in Maryland, the farmhouses in the Shenandoah Valley, the townhomes of Charleston, the Dutch homes in upstate New York, the Victorian houses of the West, the Spanish Colonial homes of the same area, the French Quarter houses in New Orleans...and on and on. These styles were brought by immigrants and adapted and changed to meet the climate and the needs of their owners. Along comes the Modernest Movement and trys to put everybody into a glass box. Then a brutalist concrete box. Then a deconstructed house that looks like it was frozen in time an instant after the furnace exploded. Now we are all suposed to live in Gehry what-ever-it-is? The last laugh is that the traditional architecture was usually much better suited to its' locale than the modernist "improvements" ever were.
Traditional design is simply design based on great traditions. Simple as that. Greco-Roman classicism is one such tradition. There are others.
Traditional design has as its cornerstone the notion that wisdom passed down from practitioner to practitioner has great value. That's what a tradition is.
Traditional design uses the strategy of embedding wisdom in beauty, which is a strategy that nature employs. The human genome is dense with information, but in order to pass that information along, we don't need to understand that information. We simply need to fall in love with someone we find beautiful, and we do what comes naturally to us. The wisdom embedded in our DNA is passed along nearly effortlessly, through beauty.
Architecture once did something very similar. Someone might work for years to figure out the best possible eave design for a region of the world, for example. They might do countless calculations of sun angles, storm winds, etc., and might do numerous experiments. But if they can then embed that wisdom in beauty by designing the eave in such a manner that the people of the region consider it to be beautiful, then nobody else needs to do the calculations, or the experiments, or show their work; they simply need to love the pattern, and repeat it.
Modern movements in architecture generally have valued uniqueness over beauty. If they want to be recognized and published, it is to their advantage to be as different from the last guy as possible. Because of this, traditions cannot develop, and wisdom doesn't get passed along. This is a key difference between modernism and traditional architectural movements.
suri,
What is it you want? Do you want an apology? Do you want us to thank you for finally opening our eyes to that which we've been so blind to for the past 50, 80, 2000 years? To hail you as the savior of western culture? Because all you seem to want to do is insult anyone who dares disagree with you.
Why can't software developers write good software? It must be because you guys don't care enough about your end user to deliver a quality product. I took a quick poll here in the office, everyone else hates you too. Take this well-intentioned criticism to heart, I've been using software practically my entire life and I know what I'm talking about. I really liked the way Windows NT worked, I don't know why you feel the need to keep changing stuff every few years. Also, autosave. Who in the world wants to do work and then lose it? The fact that there is a save button at all is proof that you don't care about us users and are just after our money and making annoying fancy interfaces. You know who wrote good quality software? Atari. Plug in that cartridge and it worked everytime. Hell, it still works. But you and your ilk drove them out of business with all that nonsense you learned in college. Elitist. Go enjoy your yacht and Swedish trophy wife.
Porte-cocheres.....that's what we need more of...Porte-cocheres...I can't tell you how many times that I've been out on a carriage ride just to arrive back at the manor to a sudden down pour! I mean, My God, Man...don't you know what rain can do to wool, velvet and leather?
And who are government buildings designed for if not regular people?
Bureaucrats. Duh.
Well the libraries, city hall, and courthouses are designed to be used by regular citizens. Many communities go to great lengths and expense to restore and improve city buildings built in the 1800s And early 1900s because it is part of their heritage.
Not to mention the public schoolhouses are "government buildings" where the youngest citizens spend all day.
Government buildings are designed by architects to specifications determined by bureaucrats. The "public" has no guaranteed participation in the process other than footing the bill.
For example, schools are not designed for students, they are designed for the bureaucrats who manage school systems. It's important to understand the difference. If students (or teachers) had any say in the matter, schools would be designed very differently.
"The original purpose of the thread was asking why are the majority of architects in lock step against traditional architecture when the majority of the public prefer it."
I think you have your answer.
Traditions should be questioned. For example, it is a tradition to cut off part of little boys' penises throughout the world. But why? The majority of the public might favor it, so it must be the right thing to do. The same thing goes for architecture. Why don't you take a course in architecture? there is a free one online at https://www.edx.org/ I think you would begin to understand that there is not one definition of architecture and no easy way to distinguish what is good and bad and that there are multiple traditions that mean different things to different people.
Nah, that would conflict with suri's belief system.
Buildings are the key building blocks of our urban environment, which is shared by all today and into a, hopefully, durable future.
Vous avez dit pénis?
Oh yeah, she is definitely circumcised!
Of course traditions should be questioned, but they should also be examined and respected. There are many useful things to be gained by doing so. Actually modernism has become tradtion of a sort today, especially in the schools. Unfortunately in doing so training in how to design for clients who want an earlier tradition gives us buildings such as this:
That is why I am advocating for teaching traditiomal design in architecture schools.
This thread has gone off the rails.
Can someone shed light on why an appreciation of traditional architecture is intuitive, while an appreciation of contemporary architecture is instead an acquired taste which requires a specialized education in the arts?
Why do so many (modern) people vacation to traditional urban places?
Why are (well done) traditional homes often more expensive then their contemporary counterparts on the housing market?
Why do some architecture schools still send their students abroad to live in old European cities, if the traditional architecture is really deemed by the academies to be so irrelevant for 21st century living?
How is it that I live in a traditional building, and yet I am not a luddite who writes letters with a feather quill by candlelight?
Sorry, that image didn't seem to come through. It was a Homewood Suites in Slidell, LA: http://ibookedo.it/hotel/homewood-suites-by-hilton-slidell-la-334075
How about this link for a Best Western:
<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/jdfalk/255440068/" title="Best Western by dr.jd, on Flickr"><img src="http://farm1.staticflickr.com/86/255440068_77a3db9012_m.jpg" width="240" height="180" alt="Best Western"></a>
I like that this degenerated to circumcised penises. When talking traditions, that is one that surely we will see the it's well overdue death very soon.
Houses in my neighbourhood still have carriage lanes between houses... just in case... you never know when horses come back in style
Formerly for carriages, now required by code for fire trucks. Times change.
Rest assured, the NSA building in Ft. Meade, MD, the icon of our time, does not have Porte Cocheres. No trees in the parking lots either. MInimalist rules. If that is not a nightmare out of George Orwell, I don't know what is. Kudos, however, to the tacky electronic sign in front.
It's really interesting to me how these conversations about traditional architecture elicit such rude and childish outbursts. This is the kind of stuff that thirteen year old children resort to when made uncomfortable.
Back to the topic, I just ran across this English survey taken in 2002:
http://www.ipsos-mori.com/researchpublications/researcharchive/973/Bungalows-Are-Peoples-Choice-In-England.aspx
"People were asked to choose where they would most like to live from a selection of images of houses. These ranged from a bungalow, a traditional village house, a 1930s semi and a Victorian terrace to a modern Wimpey style semi, a loft apartment and a tower block. The two most desirable housing types overall were the bungalow (30%) and the village house (29%), followed by the Victorian terrace (16%) and the modern semi (14%).
Only two per cent of people — just one in 50 — chose a modern loft style apartment and no one at all selected the tower block. Young people, aged 16 to 24, were most likely to choose the modern buildings, with around one in six (17%) selecting one of the modern developments compared to only one in a hundred (1%) of older people."
"I like that this degenerated to circumcised penises."
Of course you do, becasue you can't actually rebut any of the substantive points laid out here. It's no surprise that the ideologues have devolved into screeming.
The Washington Post opinion section article I read this morning quoting Clinton...
"If we become ideological, then we’re blind to evidence"
This is what's become of the modernist hold on academia for the last 60 years. They've stopped learning from the mounting evidence all around them and retreated into the insular world of the ideologue who rejects anything that distorts thier precious view of the world. Even at the begining, when Walter Gropius took charge of Harvard's school of architecture, he forbade students from accesing history books becasue he felt they would pollute the young students minds. Instead of allowing the open and free flow of information as academia is supposed to allow, they are too afraid to let students think for themselves by telling them they don't know a thing about architecture. Treating them like the tabula rasa they wanted to create in historic center after historic center. Rip out the past so people won't have it around to compare how bad the new stuff really is. The students then turn around and shield their own ignorance by telling themselves thier clients don't know what's good for them, yet they themselves flock to neighborhoods where carriages once rode through like Koolhouse, who says it's money that keeps him from living in the kind of buildings he tells everyone else they should live in. Right.
ThayerD, I can rebut just fine, but honestly, I'd rather see this degenerate further than waste my time debating aesthetics and semantics.
I do however like this "big architecture" conspiracy theme going on suggesting some high level of back-door deals in order to squash traditional design elements/ideals. It's amusing but like all "big X" conspiracies, it's just false agenticity and easy pattern finding.
Let's leave it to these geniuses: http://www.explosm.net/comics/3330/
Non Sequitor, you gave it a good shot. What you don't seem to understand is that this isn't a battle between two opponents. Any city looks fine with multiple styles along a street, as long as some basic rules are held to keep the street coherent. There will always be room for the large iconic buildings of any style, but good urbanism requires a modicum of architectural comity, something that can easily be learned from traditional archtiecture. And as our cities become even more important as we begin to reject the earth destroying sprawl envirionment of the last 50 years, it will become all the more important for schools to teach what is needed.
No need to resort to conspiracies or back door deals to explain it. With very few exceptions, every single major architectural university in the world teaches an exclusively modernist approach, despite the demonstrable fact that the general public prefers at least a more eclectic point of view, and probably prefers traditional architecture outright (see British poll above). Has there ever been a profession further estranged from the public they profess to serve?
when you design a building today, it's often times going to have a concrete foundation, perhaps in the form of a grade beam or maybe a pier, and if it's a big building it might have steel columns along the perimeter, or maybe a pre-engineered space frame. if it's a building 3 stories or less, you might want to do a balloon frame with steel studs (which is neither trabeated or arcuated). for retail and often times commercial, you're going to want an aluminum curtainwall or storefront system to meet your client's needs. you're also going to want insulated glass. etc., etc.
my view is that modernism tries to use those materials (among others) to make buildings that people want to live in and around. they often fail. it might be a worthwhile discussion to figure out why architects are unable to make great buildings with the materials, methods, and financial systems that exist today. anyway, to eke's point:
Traditional design is simply design based on great traditions. Simple as that. Greco-Roman classicism is one such tradition. There are others.
Traditional design has as its cornerstone the notion that wisdom passed down from practitioner to practitioner has great value. That's what a tradition is.
a brick arch support by brick ties and stud framed construction is different than the brick arch they built 100 years ago. there is still a keystone in that arch, but the fact is, it's fundamentally different than a keystone 100 years ago, because now it's just a veneer. 100 years ago, that keystone was part of a bearing wall. same thing applies to quoins and cornerstones. they just aren't what they used to be. handing down the tradition of how to stack brick and stone to make a building is not that applicable to architects today, because we aren't stacking brick and stone to build buildings anymore (though we do stack concrete block sometimes).
there are a lot of different structural/framing systems in common practice today. we should be teaching young architects how those systems work, not the traditions that are no longer in practice. we should be teaching them about tpo roofs and how to weep brick because that's what you need to know when designing a building. if you want to slap a big keystone on a brick arch to make a building look traditional, i don't have anything against that, but do it with respect to the material and methods that exist today, not a nostalgic dream your contractor isn't likely to share with you.
perhaps the reason architects today are doing a shitty job of working with the materials and methods in common practice today, is that they were trained in working with traditional materials that are no longer applicable. maybe that's why contractors and engineers keep taking bits of what used to be under our umbrella. all we know how to do anymore is draw a picture of a brick arch, we need them to explain how it will actually work.
thayer, i'm pretty sure every comment you've ever made suggests your views on 'traditional" architecture are ideological, and it's pretty clear you don't consider other views. also, i support circumcision and think it will continue in common practice for a long time to come.
regarding your suggestion "...telling themselves thier clients don't know what's good for them"
this is what you said in a 9:46 comment: "The public dosen't care."
ThayerD, agreed in principle but the OP of this tread states that "the public" is upset that the built environment does not reflect his/her interpretation of traditional which differs from mine, from yours, from that one the lonely government worker I see in window in the building across from my office as would anyone else's.
Sprawl and other urban strategies like it are not a product of architectural education but a combination of loose local zoning regulation and social pressure to get people into mortgages. Economics aside, I would not be surprised to find the majority of people wanting a historic San Francisco painted Ladies House or a classic NY brownstone townhouse. We as architects and designers as subject to the same market forces and can only influence it as far as our client's money and ambitions (or courage) will allow us. To focus on the few Koolhass, Ghery, Hadid, etc is to do a disservice to the thousands of other professionals not in the spotlight but who still strive to make each project as best as they can for the rest. This is something I see the OP does not want to understand. Design elements change, but from my experience in academia and practice, the intentions remain. Sometimes they are clad in titanium scales or (to Borrow from Kunstler) clad in Gillette Razor blades (Seattle library), but to insist that the design team imposes this on the public on their own accord is too simplistic of an argument.
"a brick arch support by brick ties and stud framed construction is different than the brick arch they built 100 years ago. there is still a keystone in that arch, but the fact is, it's fundamentally different than a keystone 100 years ago, because now it's just a veneer."
So are we to dismiss Roman architecture that applied stone veneer decoration to an essentially concrete structure? Your standards of truth just don't hold up.
"thayer, i'm pretty sure every comment you've ever made suggests your views on 'traditional" architecture are ideological, and it's pretty clear you don't consider other views."
Yet I've said many times that I've designed modernist stuff which actually has won awards, yet you still think I'm an ideologue? I'll repeat, an ideologue is someone who dosen't look at evidence that contradicts their point of view. I'm not for the banishment of modernism or glass or aluminim store fronts or whatever, I'm for an architectural eucation that is not ideological. But since you refuse to accept my own words, you are the ideolgue here.
In my little city the carriage lanes are used for - gasp! - carriages. At least the motorized kind. The garage doors open to the back lane eliminating having the garage doors and driveways at the front of the house. Also residents put their trash out in the back lane to be picked up trashmen rather than in front of the house. Clever, no?
"but to insist that the design team imposes this on the public on their own accord is too simplistic of an argument."
I completely agree. That's why if you start with a good education that at least accepts what you seem to have accepted...
'I would not be surprised to find the majority of people wanting a historic San Francisco painted Ladies House or a classic NY brownstone townhouse."
then as architects we might be a lot closer to resolving the original intent of this posting.
"The original purpose of the thread was asking why are the majority of architects in lock step against traditional architecture when the majority of the public prefer it."
Volunteer, I was being a little facetious with the carriage lane comment. Blame it on my lack of coffee. 2 cups is not enough for internet commenting.
The lanes I make reference too are too small for fire access and have, illegally, been converted to private property. I believe the city has access rights but after 30 to 50 years of disservice, residents slowly moved fences outwards and commandeered the space.
Anyways, I've lived in a neighbourhood as you describe while in grad-school. My basement apartment gave out into an old dirt carriage way several houses used to access their parking spaces. It's a nice idea, but given that these remain mostly in effluent neighbourhoods, it is not something that can be brought into larger scale urban planning.
Thayer-D, you forgot the first part of my sentence where I wrote "economics aside". If I give you the option of a first class train ticket or a an old bicycle with a flat tire, which would you choose if the only investment required is a moment of fantasy?
I think an issue here is that the general public hinted at by the OP sees cheaply made sprawl and Walmart parking lots and instantly thinks: "this is architecture".
4th coffee almost done, perhaps it is time I return to fighting for the integrity of this public lobby I am currently working on.
So are we to dismiss Roman architecture that applied stone veneer decoration to an essentially concrete structure? Your standards of truth just don't hold up.
are you living in the 21st century in 700AD rome? we have tilt-up concrete that you can embed thin-brick into. that's not what the romans did, though, is it? their way of mixing concrete was different than what we do today. i bet the way they build formwork is different, the way they hauled concrete to the site was different, the way the poured concrete into formwork (if they even did that, i don't know), and i'm pretty sure their brick was different too.
are you seriously trying to suggest that ancient roman architecture was built the same as it is today, and thinking that somehow suggests you are not an ideologue that refuses to listen to other ideas?
no, you're pretty smart and you make modernist buildings. so when you tell the contractor to design and build something from ancient rome using your traditional education, i bet they do it just the way you read about.
@Non Sequitur:
Sprawl and other urban strategies like it are not a product of architectural education but a combination of loose local zoning regulation and social pressure to get people into mortgages.
I'm sure we wouldn't be having this debate if the auto/oil companies hadn't bought and destroyed public transit in the 1940s and dictated transportation and urban development policy to lawmakers for several decades following. The general decline in public satisfaction of our built environment is DIRECTLY related to the rise of auto-centric infrastructure and architecture. I am betting that this level of dissatisfaction is not the same in places with lower levels of car usage.
"traditional" design (or, should we say - materially rich, subtle, and skillfully crafted) is almost always exclusively pedestrian-orientated, very human scaled - meant to be experienced by foot and hand... at a slower speed. Right now, most buildings are forced to become "icons" because they are meant to catch the eye at longer distances and higher speeds. This isn't really the fault of architects - before these iconic structures would be reserved for culturally important buildings with large budgets - these days everything must be some kind of monument. EIFS and glass and metal panel clad "monuments" with tiny budgets that somehow need to distinguish themselves from all the other increasingly grotesque monuments.
Of course this is only part of the puzzle, but the biggest piece of this puzzle are cars. until we stop designing our cities around them, nothing is going to change.
kerfuffle, that was a rich, subtle, and skillfully crafted point.
thank you.
OK, so the masses prefer traditional architecture. What exactly does that mean? That we should all gather as sheep to give the masses what they want? Are the masses always correct? Does the popular vote always give us the finest, most appropriate result? Fortunately there have been (as still are) those who really don't live for the masses. If you want traditional, there is someone out there to fill the bill, and just the opposite. Imagine Oak Park without a Frank Lloyd Wright, other examples are obvious.
I concur, decent points Kerf.
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