ARCHITECTUTRAL APPROACH

Vernacular architecture has had continuing and significant

influence on architectural practice throughout its history.

Practicing architects have been influenced by vernacular

architecture as a result of living in vernacular context and

through regulations and building codes that codify vernacular

architecture into a system of features and materials.

 

The manifestations of vernacular architecture in architectural

practice over the centuries are many and diverse.

However, the types of architecture derived from vernacular sources
can be broadly characterized as follows:

• Architecture as on iconic, picturesque evocation of

symbolic identity;

• Architecture as determined by climate, material, or

function;

• Architecture as the embodiment of experiential,

emotional, spiritual and sensory qualities.
ICONIC PICTURESQUE EVOCATION OF SYMBOLIC
IDENTITY
 

Architects whose work is an iconic and picturesque evocation of

symbolic identity often share assumptions with folklorists and
preservationists who view the vernacular in terms of regional
archetypes. These archetypes are considered to be timeless and
locally rooted, to express an authentic local identity and to express
the character and soul of the people who produced it. These
archetypes are seen as pure and wholesome and are contrasted
with imported architectures, which are thought as unsuited to local
needs, conditions or identity.
The focus of research based on these assumptions is to discover

locally derived pure forms, without the impurities of distant

influences.

Building design derived from picturesque interpretations of

vernacular architecture is revivalist. Iconic images based on

scholarly investigations try to recapture a past presumed to be

timeless and expressive of the identity of a region and its people.

This approach generates neo vernacular architecture parallel to

neoclassical architecture.
 Diagram of the plan, most common
features of the elevation, decorative
details or shape of openings

Picturesque
archetype of
vernacular

Details which act as symbols when

reproduced and which lend authenticity
to the new architecture.
Picturesque evocation of the vernacular is thought best achieved

with traditional materials and building methods, in order to lend

to authenticity to new buildings.

 

The creation of local identity through the architectural evocation of

the vernacular has at times served a variety of social goals.

Regional architectural typologies were constructed in the belief

that vernacular architecture reflects the character and soul of a

group people.
In 1930’s in N. America and in 1970’s in places like Bali, Indonesia
and the Greek Islands during rapid modernization, the picturesque
recreation of the vernacular was legislated into building codes.
Government regulations, which attempt to preserve or create local
character most often, rely on picturesque conceptions of the
vernacular. Restrictions on materials, and specification of
certain exterior features such as roofs, windows, balconies and
surface decorations, are included in building code regulations to
preserve what is considered to be the local style.
In 1940’s Hassan Fathy undertook a bold experiment in design,
mud-brick construction and community planning for the Egyptian
village of New Gourna. Turning to local materials and traditional
forms and building techniques, he created an alternative aesthetic
in ‘Arab style’ to the modern movement.
 

In the last decades of the 20th century, picturesque interpretation of

the vernacular has occurred in many parts of the world. In India,
traditionalism in otherwise modern freestanding suburban
houses is restricted to such iconic elements as decorative arches
and filigree. *
CLIMATIC, MATERIAL AND FUNCTIONAL
DETERMINISM
 

Until the early 20th century, western architecture was dominated by

revivals of historical styles. Modernist architects with modernist

theories emphasize the rational aspects of architectural design,

believing it should reflect rational responses to building methods

and materials, to climatic and topographic site conditions and to

human activities. For modernist architects, vernacular architecture

affirms these tenets of modern ideology by being both aesthetically

and functionally successful.

Modernist architects approach to vernacular architecture focused
on the aspects such as response to locally available materials,
climate and requirements of use which supported their ideological
positions. They conceived vernacular architecture as:
 

• Severely utilitarian in its use of materials and technology

• Functional in its adaptation to climate, accommodation of
activities and utilization of site.
• Beautiful in its sculptural expressions of mass and
volume as a result of manipulating the plan and section to
accommodate users needs.
In 1913 Adolph Loos wrote that the lesson to be learned from the

architecture of peasants was not necessarily its forms but the way

in which form was a direct response to function.

F. L. Wright expressed the opinion that vernacular buildings

were superior to self-conscious academic attempts to use a

historical style in generating architecture.

Le Corbusier considered vernacular architecture as having

attained perfection in serving human needs and harmonizing

with the environment. He attributed moral qualities to the

absence of embellishments: “Whitewash is extremely moral”.

His travel sketch books are full of vernacular examples where

simplicity of materials employed with simplicity of methods result

in the clear primary masses and spaces that inspired his most

powerful, work such as the chapel of Notre Damed’haut,

Ronchamp.
The sketches in the archives of Alvar Aalto and Louis Kahn
celebrate the sculptural plasticity of Mediterranean vernacular. Alvar
Aalto’s sculptural use of balconies can be traced to his familiarity
with Mediterranean vernacular architecture. Likewise, Louis kahn
used balconies both at the Salk Institute in La Jolla, California, and at
the College dormitories at Bryn Mawr to articulate the mass of the
buildings as well as to provide scenic view. Both Aalto and Kahn
explored the surface qualities of various materials and composed
wall surfaces which echo the textural contrasts found in vernacular
architecture. Their work moderates the rigors of rationalist
design with sensual qualities derived from the vernacular.
EMBODIMENT OF EMOTIONAL, SPIRITUAL AND
SENSORY QUALITIES.

For Rudofsky the purpose of studying vernacular architecture was to

‘enrich architecture in the industrial countries and help with their
architectural plight’.

Rudofsky sought to identify and present the qualities of regional

vernacular architectures that conveyed a sense of well being. These
qualities included human scale, great views and visual richness.
They also included features which heighten social interaction, such
as places for small groups to gather or for chance encounters to
occur.
In studying vernacular architecture in many parts of the world,

modernist architects focused on the similarities in form between

areas, presumably generated by rational responses to similar climatic

conditions and other considerations. They sought to codify a set of

principles governing the production of similar vernacular forms in

geographically diverse areas.

These principles restricted the modernist vocabulary to a limited

number of forms such as flat roofs, orthogonal geometries, primary

colours or, more frequently, pure white interiors and exteriors, and

the use of uniform building materials. They wanted to create an

experientially interesting architecture, to shape buildings that

would engage people’s feelings. They believed they could enrich

the expressive possibilities of architecture by vastly expanding its

formal vocabulary to include the full range of vernacular forms,

materials, colour sensibilities and design principles.

While modern architects looked for and found simplicity of form in

vernacular architecture, the experiential approach focused on the

complexity of hybrid forms that occur in spite of the constraints of

similar materials and climate. The experiential approach

emphasizes the great diversity of form found in vernacular

architecture, and draws on this diversity to recreate the experiential

qualities of the vernacular.

The experiential approach to the vernacular retains many qualities

and design principles of modernist architecture, such as the open-

plan, non-symmetrical compositions, complex spatial articulation in

plan and section, and the use of modern materials and construction

methods. Modern materials are used for their structural and formal

capabilities, never as substitutes for traditional materials.

The goal of the experiential approach is to enhance the quality of

habitation, to create places where inhabitants will feel at home.

The qualities that enhance the act of dwelling can be learned from

vernacular architecture without mimicking vernacular prototypes .

Charles Moore, Robert Venturi and Christopher Alexander

explored the expressive possibilities of a great variety of vernacular

sources.
Their writings advocate an architecture that evokes experiential
qualities of the vernacular of the recent as well as of the ancient
past, combined to meet current needs and providing a sense of
continuity with their surrounds.

In 1980’s a number of architects in several countries with rich

vernacular architecture produced architecture reflecting the
experiential recreation of that vernacular. Charles correa in the
design of housing for a new district in Bombay evoked the
experiential qualities of traditional Indian townscapes through site
planning, use of materials and qualities of space.
Architects’ Contribution to the Study of Vernacular
Architecture.
  

All Architects researching the vernacular use the graphic methods

of architecture to represent vernacular architecture. Perspective and
scaled plans, sections, elevations and axonometric, as well as the
use of models, have enabled architects to represent and
communicate architectural qualities which are not or cannot be
represented by verbal accounts.
 

Beyond detailed graphic illustrations architects precise and

document buildings in relation to their physical context, whether
natural or human made. 
Finally, because of their training and experience, architects bring to
the study of vernacular architecture a special ability to understand
and assess the building components complex interrelationships, its
resulting qualities and the relation to sun orientation allow an
architect to estimate the amount of light, sound and wind that will
enter a certain room at a particular time of the year. Furthermore,
the architect, can decipher from the drawings alone whether there is
enough illumination, quietness and climatic comfort for a particular
activity to take place there. This ability to evaluate the surface
qualities of architecture in a complex way and to establish fit
between form and function is the most invaluable contribution of
architects to the study of vernacular architecture.
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