Thomas Coram, View of Mulberry House and Street, c. 1800.

Oil
on paper.
This painting represents slave housing in South Carolina in the 18th
century. These houses are very similar to ones found from the
same time period in West Africa. The similar climate of the two
areas required a similar structure. The tall roofs trap hot air, so the
living space is filled with cooler air.
Walls that will hold up a roof…
 The basic technological challenge faced by
architecture is to build upright walls and put a roof
over the empty space they enclose. Walls may use
one of two basic structural systems: the shell system
or the skeleton-and-skin system.

 The shell system is when one basic building material

provides both the structural support and the outside
covering of the building.

 The skeleton-and-skin system consists of basic

interior frame (the skeleton) that supports the more
fragile outer covering (the skin).
 Examples of load-bearing construction. The
material that we see on the outside of the
buildings is directly responsible for holding the
buildings together, and supporting them.
 Top left: Pyramids at Menkaure (c. 2470 BCE),
Khafre (c. 2500 BCE), and Khufu (c. 2530 BCE).
 Top right: The Lion Gate, Mycenae, Greece,
1250 BCE.
 Bottom: Corner of the First Temple of Hera,
Paestum, Italy, c. 550 BCE.
Examples of skeleton-and-skin construction. It would
be impossible for glass walls to hold up such large
buildings. The fragile glass exterior is the skin that
surrounds the skeleton of (in this case) reinforced
concrete and steel.
Tensile strength and technology…

 The span between the elements of the supporting

structure (walls or columns, for example) is determined by
the tensile strength of the roof material.

 Tensile strength is the ability of a building material to span

horizontal distances without support and without buckling
in the middle. The greater the tensile strength of the
material, the wider its potential span.

 Almost all technological advances in the history of

architecture depend on either the invention of new ways
to distribute weight or the discovery of new materials with
greater tensile strength.