When considering the “delight” factor in Zumthor’s building, the first thing that comes to our mind is the apparent. Delight, in terms of beauty and leisure. Those are the main characteristics of any spa facility. The aspect of Delight that really is appealing to me on the specific building, is the one associated with quality . Within the vision of the Architect, was the intention to create something “timeless” . The term timeless, in my point of view, is something that is established for its quality throughout the years without allowing time to affect it. The Architect elegantly designed a cavernous interior setting, which he brought to life with his material choices. He writes “…For a moment, I had the feeling that our project had escaped us and become independent because it had evolved into a material entity that obeyed its own laws” . Therme Vals is built from layer upon layer of locally quarried Valser Quarzite slabs . He embodies his “timeless” vision by carefully choosing his materials. This minimal, yet timeless material, the stone, “obeys its own laws”. Zumthor’s work proves, that in the end of every conceptual process, the real architecture starts, which is based on the quality of structure and materials. As stated in the introduction, Zumthor is concerned about the “other things”.
Materiality is a critical feature in all of his projects, and in this case, the architect did not only blend the building with the landscape, by sinking it carefully into the slope, but he also uses genuine local materials to give the space atmospheric ideals. Always working towards a consistent visual appearance, Zumthor uses this quality factor in the interior building method. Using a system of specifically, almost scientifically, arrangem...
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...in his book “The Shape of things that Work” wonders “When we design buildings, are we creating form for form’s sake? or: do we create and choose a form that does something, that interacts with the senses in a discernable and identifiable fashion?” . An answer could be, not every architect does. Zumthor, successfully crafted a building that interacts with the senses in a “discernable and identifiable fashion”. That is, after considering the interior atmosphere, which sets the sensuous and intimate tone of the encounter of subtle light, water, stone and skin, and the effect given from the poetical use of materials. This, makes an atmosphere of intimate serenity, which also adds a mystical dimension to the act of bathing. A dimension, which attracts the most interest from its users, as it is the sensuous nature of the baths that make their actual experience so unique.
Canal is heavy on the use of values. The piece of art work has heavy contrasts and deep shadows. This can be seen with the building on the right’s corridor. In the middle left he uses high light to show the sun light in the horizon. On the right bottom in the building’s outer corridor Canal uses cast shadow and core shadow. The shadows of the individuals walking are consistent in not only in direction, but in length. Canal used planes to divide the surroundings with the building and lines to divide the building to the sky. He also uses lines to create movement and direction as you can see the citizens heading toward the middle of the art work. The “View of the Molo” also gives the building a sense of texture on the surface. The building does not look flat. The windows protrude a bit. One can see depth on the window sills and the bottom corridors. Canal uses one-line perspective and the vanishing point is the building in the bottom middle. Canal’s use of color is minimal. The colors are not vibrant at the same time not dull. The art work uses colors minimally. The temperature of Canal’s art work is
This report is an ekphrasis of John Hejduk’s drawing “Study for Wall House.” Ekphrasis writings intend to compare and unite elements that may be physically visible and elements that may be more conceptual. This report will endeavor to visualize Hejduk’s drawing through the views of physical and metaphysical elements, to expose connections through visual and conceptual perspectives.
First, Cancun has gorgeous hotels. The architecture of one representative hotel is fabulous. Walking into the entrance of the hotel is like walking through a breezeway because there are no doors. Upon entering, the visitor is mesmerized by the colossal tropical floral arrangement that’s so stunning and full of vibrant color that her mouth drops in awe. Soon, she realizes, after the initial shock, that she is walking on marble floors that look like mirrors reflecting rays of dancing light. Indoor waterfalls accompanied with lavish foliage engulf her; every sense is stimulated. Happily greeted and escorted to her hotel room, she is delighted to see that the hotel’s beauty continues throughout every part of it. Posh describes the room exactly. The bathroom floors, counters, and the shower walls are polished stone, native to Mexico. Surprised, she looks over the balcony to see the S-shaped pool with a floating bar and the bar’s roof covered in bamboo. Walking through the hotel lobby, through the fresh gardens, through the pathway to the pool are picture-perfect peacocks flaunting their beauty, and, indeed, they are very beautiful. Every minute detail of the Grand Hotel is designed to give her an unf...
Though the interiors he designed were created to be useful spaces, his focus was more on aesthetic than function . Within his individual objects of art such as chairs, tables, drawers, staircases and many others he focused more on the form of the object than on its intended use. Instead, Kuramata appeared to want the presence of the piece to surpass its function, something that is only possible when there is a symbolic value . One of the best examples of a work of art fitting these stipulations was his design of the Miss Blanche armchair (fig. 3) in 1988 . The chair is made of acrylic resin and embedded with artificial roses and aluminum . Kuramata’s title of the work, choice of materials, color contrast, process of creation and simple aesthetic combine to create a piece of work that forces the viewer to question whether or not it can even be considered a chair. This work of art allows the functionality to disapp...
But these contrived differences give rise to esthetic difficulties too. Because inherent differences—those that come from genuinely differing uses—are lacking among the buildings and their settings, the contrivances repre...
In conclusion, the debate between aesthetics and functionalism has been around for a long time. It becomes clear however, through research, that the first thing architects consider is function, and then aesthetics. It is because of this approach that aesthetics becomes somewhat of a by-product of the whole design process. By looking at examples of various buildings, it is apparent that aesthetics is important to structure and in many instances has been successfully coupled with function. But in no circumstance should aesthetics take precedence over the function and practicality of a building. It seems more likely that a happy medium between function and aesthetics can be reached, on a project by project basis, and then applied to the design process of creating the building.
Gehry’s additional design of the exterior has created an unconventional model form of house. The asymmetrical form characterizes the entire external side of the house. According to Goldstein, Gehry tried to slant the house roofline, create a false perspective and cause an absurd viewer’ perception or expectation (1979, 9). The complexity of the form might also produce a relationship with the house’s elements such as door, wall, and roof. For example, those elements, which linearly constructed, were hardly noticed since the distraction of geometric form around the exterior part of the house. It’s even barely hard to find the entrance of the house as a result of the salient angles of exterior.
Phenomenology can be deemed to be both an unambiguous academic research field and a theoretical design current within contemporary architecture and is usually founded on one’s experience of the materials used in construction inclusive of their sensory characteristics. In this regard, architecture is the impetus towards transformation and inspiration of an individual’s daily existence. Unlike other forms of art, architecture employs the immediacy of an individual’s sensory perception. The complete architectural experience is dependent on many factors such as details, materials, texture, color phenomena, transparency and shadows, time passage, etc. There is the huge phenomenon that phenomenology does not exist in architecture but rather the problems associated with it. This theory is very debatable and this paper will aim at expounding on some of the aspects associated with phenomenology.
After several years of use and abuse of natural resources, humanity begins to awaken from its stunned by the advances of technology, to understand the magnitude of the impact caused by its presence in the environment. At present, trends in various aspects of human activity seek to achieve a harmonious relationship with nature; one of them is the practice of interior design. The main reason because the construction industry, in particular, has incorporated especially such attention, is the result that it has proved to be one of the main sources of pollution in water, air, and noise
The essence of modern architecture lays in a remarkable strives to reconcile the core principles of architectural design with rapid technological advancement and the modernization of society. However, it took “the form of numerous movements, schools of design, and architectural styles, some in tension with one another, and often equally defying such classification, to establish modernism as a distinctive architectural movement” (Robinson and Foell). Although, the narrower concept of modernism in architecture is broadly characterized by simplification of form and subtraction of ornament from the structure and theme of the building, meaning that the result of design should derive directly from its purpose; the visual expression of the structure, particularly the visual importance of the horizontal and vertical lines typical for the International Style modernism, the use of industrially-produced materials and adaptation of the machine aesthetic, as well as the truth to materials concept, meaning that the true nat...
A smaller pool lays adjacent to the building on the opposite side enclosed by a wall of marble. Mies designed the pavilion to blur the lines between inside and outside space. There are parts of the walls that seem to be missing which creates a flow between the two main spaces. The pavilion’s thin sweeping roof is supported by eight cruciform columns clad in chrome. This created an open and free space where he lined the outside of the building with glass. He then carefully placed a thin slab of onyx in the middle of the open volume.
Architecture is the concept of bringing structure, materiality, form and space together as a whole, provide people with enclosed atmosphere to experience. Considering this, it is important to identify that materiality and the purpose of details has been a key methodology to bringing architectural intentions into the design in an affective manner, more over producing an architectural expression. However, this position is rather declining in architecture, reducing tectonics and materiality to being secondary to form and space. With the start of modernism, the attempt to achieve minimalistic style has caused detailing to increasingly develop into a decorative aspect of a building, neglecting its individual contribution to architecture.
Remarkably, unlike in the description of art or music, the notion of atmosphere remains largely unaddressed in architecture. Atmosphere, can be argued, is the very initial and immediate experience of space and can be understood as a notion that addresses architectural quality, but the discussion of atmosphere in architecture will always entail, by definition, a certain ambiguity. After all, atmosphere is something personal, vague, ephemeral and difficult to capture in text or design, impossible to define or analyse. Atmosphere, Mark Wigley says, “evades analysis, it’s not easily defined, constructed or controlled”.
The book as a description of modern architecture, its styles and influence succeeds but falls short as a prescriptive methodology. His work is still recalled for the need by modernists to categorize everything into neat little boxes, not necessarily for the sake of uniformity, but for sake of some ambiguity. The ambiguity may be the triumph of this book as post modern architecture era is supposed to create more questions than the answers.
This usually entails the manipulation of texture, proportion and the setting pleasant utilization of sunshine with the intention to realize symmetry, harmony and an accurate equilibrium in complete human life. The essential ideas of good design are pure and to an enormous extent innate. When analyzing the universal properties of sunshine, house, colour and supplies, the inside designer appears to be like at the interplay of the natural legal tips that govern them. The precise design of a room works not only on the customarily ignored senses of odor and listening to but additionally on the emotions. Coloration schemes are selected to copy the mood of a room. Understanding how every side of a design contributes to a common look and feel of a room or area constantly takes precise experience and each architects and designers manipulate these to good