Archinology

“Modern building is now so universally conditioned by optimized technology that the possibility of creating significant urban form has become extremely limited.”

The field of architecture today is heavily influenced by technology; not just in the building itself but the way it’s imagined, designed, and drawn. It has allowed us as designers to unlock completely new potentials for methods of design and documentation. But when thinking about the context and culture for a particular project, does technology hinder those aspects? I believe that it does. Technology has allowed the designer to create a pretty picture when speaking to the client in order to wow them and win them over. But this “compensatory façade”, as Frampton said, could hide much of the design and architecture truly is. High class renders create a beautiful picture for the building itself but the context around it are just generic models, when in reality the context is so much more than that. Spatially, its conveyed through this type of imagery but there is so much more contextually and culturally that isn’t shown typically. Technology has the potential to plug in these attributes and really allow for the designer to really understand what the project could do for the site but I don’t believe that the field has gotten there just yet.