Nexus Network Journal (2022) 24:733–736

https://doi.org/10.1007/s00004-022-00642-8

LETTER FROM THE EDITOR

Guiding the New, Revealing the Old

Kim Williams1

Published online: 21 November 2022

© Kim Williams Books, Turin 2022

Abstract
Editor-in-Chief Kim Williams discusses the versatility and range of tools used in
exploring questions of form-finding, both ancient and modern, and introduces the
articles in Nexus Network Journal vol. 24 no. 4 (2022). She also makes an important
announcement about the future of the NNJ.

Keywords Nexus Network Journal · Design guides · Models · Design tools · Historic
investigation

Introduction

This issue opens with an analysis that is rather unexpected: the subject is the
Nexus Network Journal itself. Daniz Sheibaniaghdam and Semra Arslan Selçuk, in
“A Bibliometric Analysis of the Nexus Network Journal” carried out a survey of
articles published between 2008 and 2021 in order to identify core literature and
sources, leading figures and their social networks, and core themes. The results of
the analysis offer insights and sources of inspiration for researchers who want to
study themes related to those identified in this paper, and help them determine areas
for research where further investigation would be profitable.
The research papers in the rest of this issue present the wide range of research
topics, geographical regions, and collaborative approaches that are included in
the scope of our journal, and underscore the findings of the bibliometric analysis.
Present here are discussions of complexity and pattern, concerns with models
and digital representations, investigations of built expressions of the relationships
between architecture and mathematics, the use of geometry as a governing device,
and even geometry as a cultural concept.
Four of the papers in this issue are concerned with providing tools that today’s
architects can use to guide and evaluate their designs in the early stages of
development.

* Kim Williams
kwb@kimwilliamsbooks.com
1
Kim Williams Books, Corso Regina Margherita, 72, 10153 Turin, Italy

Vol.:(0123456789)
734 K. Williams

In “Measuring the Formal Complexity of Architectural Curved Surfaces Based on

3D Box‑Counting Dimension”, the Chinese research team of Weiqiang An, Chong
Wang, Hua Zhang, and Zhenning Bi developed an approach using intersection
testing on triangles and the octree structure derived from the geometric theory of
the 3D box-counting fractal dimension to calculate a fractal parameter for a building
surface. This tool can help architects to analyze the spatial complexity of a building
model, and guide its digital generation, while in the design phase for a building,
the fractal parameter can provide a reference for comparing models and selecting
different parameters and stages.
The Polish research team of Michał Malewczyk, Antoni Taraszkiewicz, Piotr Czyż
analyzed 113 examples of architecture from Poland identified groups of common
features of facades. The results, in “Composition Patterns of Contemporary Polish
Residential Building Facades”, identify and abstract six types of compositional
patterns used on the facades of contemporary Polish multi-family buildings, as well
as the frequency of each type. Defining the types of facade composition and, in the
longer term, examining the public’s opinion on abstract composition patterns may
contribute to improving the aesthetic quality of future multi-family buildings that
are better suited to the tenants
Concerns about residential buildings are also addressed by the Iranian research
team of Kaveh Khodabakhshi, Saeid Khaghani and Ali Andaji Garmaroodi. In “A
Procedural Approach for Configuration of Residential Activities Based on Users’
Needs and Architectural Guidelines” they propose a generative mechanism in which
different user requirements and architectural design constraints play essential roles.
The primary purpose of this study is to create a tool that helps architects in the early
phases of design explore various alternatives in a short time.
Another research team from the University of Tehran, composed of Atousa
Momenaei, Saba Salehi Sheijani, Homa Hassanzade, and Ali Andaji Garmaroodi,
have created a tool that allows architects with no prior knowledge of programming
to generate a digital model. In “Introducing a Real-Time Tangible User Interface
to Convert Modular Multi-Story Physical Models to Digital Format”, they describe
their platform and its algorithm, whose novelty lies in establishing a simple-use
interface with the minimum extra equipment.
Four of the papers presented here present investigations ways in which architects
of the past applied geometry to their designs, both explicitly as decoration and
implicitly as to guarantee both aesthetic and structural integrity.
Korean researcher Jin-Ho Park of Inha University presents a new reading of the
eighth-century Seokguram Grotto. In “The Seokguram Grotto in Korea and the
Gougu Rule: Rebuttal of the √2 and √3 Hypothesis and a New Interpretation of the
Underlying Method” Park begins by discussing mathematical knowledge at the time
of the Grotto’s construction, with a focus on the Gougu rule (Pythagorean theorem
in Chinese), convincingly arguing that this provides the fundamental organizing
principle.
Ahad Nejad Ebrahimi and Mahya Tooranpoor of Tabriz Islamic Art University
present “Geometry and Mathematics in Timurid architecture: Abu’l-Wafa and
Shirazi”. This study uses problems 9 and 159 from the mathematician Mohammad
Abu’l-Wafa al-Buzjani’s tenth-century treatise Kitāb fī mā yaḥtāj ilayh al-ṣāniʿ min
Guiding the New, Revealing the Old 735

al-aʿmāl al-handasiyya and numerical calculations to analyze the fifteenth-century

works of architect Qavamuddin Shirazi. The results show that Shirazi was aware
of geometric problems presented by Abu’l-Wafa and the underlying mathematical
principles, and that he tried to make use of specific geometries in his works.
In their study of “The Geometric Patterns of Izzettin Keykavus Tomb”,
researchers Makbule Özdemir, Semra Arslan Selçuk and Hasan Fevzi Çügen of Gazi
University in Ankara, Turkey, used a combined technique of simple drawing tools
such as point-joining with the seventeen wallpaper patterns to classify the geometric
patterns used in to ornament this thirteenth-century monument. Their results show
how similar patterns can be diversified, and how those with similar basic units can
differ with the change of symmetry elements.
Development of the flying buttress began as early of the fourth century and
reached its height from the twelfth through sixteenth century, but is still today the
object of investigation. Albert Samper, Rodrigo Martín-Sáiz and Blas Herrera of the
Universitat Rovira i Virgili continue their studies in “On the Inclination of a Flying
Buttress Arch”. While historically, the inclination of a flying buttress arch, called
a flyer, has been determined as the amplitude of the angle that spans between the
horizontal straight line and the straight line connecting the two ends of the arch’s
lower edge, the Spanish researchers affirm that this represents at most only the lower
edge of the flyer. Based on a study of twenty-five such arches, they present a new
proposal for a definition of inclination which represents the arch in its entirety.
Moving forward to our own times, Federico Luis del Blanco García of the
Universidad Politécnica de Madrid examines an important work of the 1970s.
In “Reconstructing Pérez Piñero’s Anoeta Velodrome”, he describes a virtual
reconstruction and analyses its geometry, which is based on the subdivision of the
sphere into polygons onto which hyperbolic paraboloids were then inserted. What
is fascinating is the way in which Félix Candela’s expertise in thin concrete shells
and Emilio Pérez Piñero’s expertise in the design of deployable reticular structures
mutually influenced each other.
Closing this issue is an investigation of geometry as a cultural construct. It often
happens that a researcher from one culture becomes fascinated by the architecture
of a different culture and attempts to explain the concepts that underlie it. In
“Rules of Geometries of Control in Muslim Architecture: Emergence and Conflicts
of a Research Field in France (1863–1899)” Francisco Javier Giron Sierra of the
Universidad Politécnica de Madrid describes how research on regulating geometric
lines of Muslim architecture emerged and developed in France, carried out by a
small group of architects, engineers, and diplomats who were all influenced in some
way by Viollet-le-Duc.

An Important Announcement from Kim Williams

The Nexus Network Journal was founded in 1998 by me, and I was the owner and
sole Editor-in-Chief from that time until 2014, when I was joined in the editorship
by Michael Ostwald. We have worked together well and happily these eight years.
Now we are turning a new leaf, for I am retiring. As of 1 January 2023, ownership
736 K. Williams

of the Nexus Network Journal will pass to Springer Nature Switzerland AG, and
Michael will become the sole Editor-in-Chief. I will remain on the masthead of
the NNJ as “Founder and Editor-in-Chief Emerita”, and for a time I will remain
as a consultant to ensure a smooth transition. I will also continue as director of the
conference series “Nexus: Relationships Between Architecture and Mathematics”,
the next edition of which will take place in Torino, Italy, 12–15 June 2023.
Since I began keeping a log in 2000, 1533 research papers, didactic articles,
articles for the “Geometer’s Angle” column, book and articles reviews, conference
reports and viewpoints have crossed my desk. It has been an enormous privilege to
nurture and grow this international community of researchers, and to learn about
the many facets of the relationships between architecture and mathematics that have
emerged over the years. I thank all of you for allowing me to work with your texts
and images, and for the patience you have shown me as I strove to create a scientific
journal of the highest quality.

Publisher’s Note Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps
and institutional affiliations.

Kim Williams received her degree in Architectural Studies from the University of Texas in Austin. She
became interested in mathematics and architecture while writing Italian Pavements: Patterns in Space
(Anchorage Press, 1997) about the role of decorated pavements in the history of Italian architecture,
and it has been her field of research ever since. She is the founder and director of the international,
interdisciplinary conference series “Nexus: Relationships Between Architecture and Mathematics”, and
is the founder and co-editor-in-chief with Michael Ostwald of the Nexus Network Journal. Following her
publication of Daniele Barbaro’s Vitruvius of 1567 (Birkhäuser, 2019), her latest publication, co-authored
with Cosimo Monteleone, is Daniele Barbaro’s Perspective of 1568 (Birkhäuser, 2021).