Information was collated from various sources.

You may collect more information and sketches while preparing for your exam

Understanding Architecture:
Introduction:
Architecture is arguably is the most accurate, the most truly revealing, human cultural
artefact. Architecture is something many people take for granted, moving through it and using it
without a second thought. Architecture, however, is the crystallisation of ideas. It has been defined
many ways – as shelter in the form art, a blossoming in stone and a flowering of geometry, frozen
music, human triumph over gravitation and the will to power. One should remember that
architecture, besides providing shelter, is symbolic expression.

“Commoditie” How Does the Building Function?

A basic definition of architecture was framed by the ancient Roman architect Marcus
Vitruvius Pollio, according to him, it should provide “utility, firmness, and beauty”. This was
rephrased by 17th centry critic as “commodity, firmness, and delight”.
Utility: Vitruvius meant the functional arrangement of rooms and spaces so that there is no
hindrance to use and so that a building is perfectly adjusted to its site.
Firmness: Vitruvius meant to foundations that were solid and to building materials being used
wisely.
Beauty: Vitruvius meant “the appearance of the work is pleasing and is good taste, that its members
are in due proportion according to correct principles of symmetry”
The element Function – pragmatic utility of an object – fitted for particular use. But the
definition of function was varied as per local culture, weather conditions, and work. According to
Louis-I-Kahn “when you make a building, you make a life. It comes out of life, and you really
make a life. It talks to you. When you have only the comprehension of the function of a building, it
would not become an environment of a life”. The functionally designed building serves it purpose
for the particular era, would it accommodate to the changes of business or cultural environment?
This problem had been a contention for last two centuries, old buildings was never easily
accommodated to new use we want to put in it. Function, has many components, the most basic of
which is pragmatic utility, or the accommodation of a specific use or activity in a specific room or
space.
Latter part of 20th Century, the function of building was challenged. It was taken to
accommodate any change and users needs. Mies van der Rohe – devised ‘vielzweckraum’ – all
purpose space. He devised that only practical way to build, it to make funcations of most buildings
as continually changing, when economically cannot change. His multifunctional approach is
demonstrated in the huge single room of Crown-Hall, school of architecture in Illinois Institute of
Technology, Chicago in 1956.

UNIT-5: Understanding Architecture AR6203 B.Arch, MCE-SOA, Chennai, Page 1 of 3

Information was collated from various sources. You may collect more information and sketches while preparing for your exam

‘Crown Hall’ by Mies consists of one vast room designed

to house a variety of differing utilitarian functions (1952-1956). While such a vast single room can
indeed hold any variety of function at all well except acoustically. Mies simple put in to built form
what a modernist believed that there was a universality of human needs and function. Le Corbusier
even claimed that function of a building as “one single building for all nations and climate”.
Unfortunately, this notion ignores culture, social and psychological character, its physical settings
and the climate.
During early 20th century Louis Sullivan set out the design first metal framed commercial
skyscrapers. He discovered four distinct zones – basement, ground floor (entrance, lobby, and
elevators), core, and typical upper floors.

UTILITY
10% 90%
FACTORY

LIBRARY (1880)

MODERN RESIDENCE

LIBRARY (1980)

CORPORATE HEADOFFICE

CHURCH

90% 10%
MONUMENT

SYMBOLISM

UNIT-5: Understanding Architecture AR6203 B.Arch, MCE-SOA, Chennai, Page 2 of 3

Information was collated from various sources. You may collect more information and sketches while preparing for your exam

The above picture shows the relative components of function in different types. A factory is largely
utilitarian, where as monument is largely symbolic.

←British Council Library

New Delhi
Ar. Charles Correa
& M F Hussain

↑Louis I Kahn’s Salk Institute, La Jolla, California, the working laboratory area – large,
multifunctional spaces, with small individual private study rooms with central courtyard. L I Kahn
showed that architecture is more than functional utility or structural display – it is the vessel that
perpetually and inescapably shapes human life.

UNIT-5: Understanding Architecture AR6203 B.Arch, MCE-SOA, Chennai, Page 3 of 3