While rekindling an idea for one of the numerous designs of a courtyard house I am working on, I wanted to use a model sketching technique ( that involves folding paper to rapidly create an object in three dimensions.
Continue reading Why Model Sketching? Part 5
Model sketching, Part 4. After rereading my blog Architectural Education: A question of section. Part 2, I located drawings of that undergraduate project, as well as a collaborative sketch between one of the students and myself created during a desk critique. The three drawings (Image 1, below) show a progression by the student following my suggestion to focus on a detail, which pushed the project forward with more precision and clarity.
Continue reading Why Model Sketching, Part 4
Architecture techniques. As an architect, I have always cherished designing a project. Over the years, I’ve come to understand that making a project is more about projecting a model of life than designing, which comes from the Italian designare, meaning to draw.
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Carlo Scarpa Gavina Showroom in Bologna, Part 2. When I wrote my initial three blogs (1, 2, 3) on the work of Italian architect Carlo Scarpa (1906-1978), in the back of my mind I had planned a sequel to the earlier Gavina Showroom blog which would analyze how its façade was conceived and erected. The topic might seem obvious or redundant since Scarpa’s oeuvre has been studied from so many perspectives.
“The material, detail and structure of a building is an absolute condition. Architecture’s potential is to deliver authentic meanings in what we see, touch and smell; the tectonic is ultimately central to what we feel…”
Steven Holl
Le Corbusier and the horizon. Regardless of the pedagogy surrounding how history and theory is taught in architecture schools, Le Corbusier’s (1886-1965) oeuvre can rarely be avoided because it is central to the experience of modernity; especially when talking about the innovative and revolutionary architectural ideas conceived by him during the early part of the 20th century.
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Le Baron Tavernier: a cafe. There is a myth that Switzerland is one of the most beautiful countries on earth. Indeed, its picturesque landscape, pristine cities, orderly society, and unconditional belief in a constitution that engages each citizen through direct representation—often to a fault—are all accurate descriptions of the place and culture. While the country of my youth is truly magnificent, there is a mundane reality that mitigates the perfection. Throughout the project that I will describe of Le Baron Tavernier Hotel Restaurant, there is a sense of craftsmanship that accompanies the entire design.
Question of Pedagogy, Part 6. During my over thirty years in architectural education, I have taught at every undergraduate level, always with a specific focus on design studios, and with punctual forays into graduate instruction both in Switzerland and in the US.
Unbuilt projects and competitions. Years ago, when I had the occasion to teach in Venice, Italy, I became aware of the famous 18th century vedute (view paintings) and capricci (imaginary view paintings); specifically those of Italian painters Guardi and Canaletto.
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At the age of five I moved to Vienna, Austria—the heart of the Austro-Hungarian political, economic, and cultural Empire—and ever since then, I have been fascinated by urban environments. Simply stated, the bigger the better, although that doesn’t capture the complexities that I have come to enjoy when living in or visiting metropolises around the world.
Doing and Knowing. Usually the task at hand is trivial. While working, the banality of the task is quickly overcome and turns into a necessity of a spiritual nature: the need to build a thought. Making a project means indulging in the pleasure of constructing a thought.
Livio Vacchini
Capolavori, 2006[1]