Would You Rather: Floor Plans or Elevations?

 

It’s easy to dismiss the idea of only focusing on exterior, and even think of this conflict of out-of-the-blue. In reality, it’s a prevalent issue in media and practice. In Ayn Rand’s novel The Fountainhead, architect Howard Roark literally blows up his building under construction because the powers-that-be altered the façade. When I first read that, I was really intrigued by the idea that the trimmings on a window are so intrinsically important to the building that if they are wrong, the rest of the building is wrong. Personally, I knew that my thought process always began with plans and sections, and the facades were almost always secondary, informed by the resolved interior. So why should I care if a developer wants Ionic columns enveloping the outside?

And yet: in practice, this distinction is being emphasized. I am not sure if this has long been a part of practice, but in multiple internships I have experienced the split of architectural scope: one design firm does the exterior, and another does the interior. I have only been a part of the firm doing the façade: a firm typically brought in after initial designs of the façade were found lacking. I always felt bad for the original firm: so they are good at designing floor plans but don’t have the vision for the façade? To me, this really shows how important façade has become in our culture. Whereas Howard Roark was willing to destroy his building if the façade didn’t align with his vision, nowadays architects are only asked to design one or the other in the first place. Of course, I blame this largely on social media. It is easy to see how important façade has become when advertising and exposure is so reliant on renderings and photo ops. Image has become vital to a firm’s marketing techniques: it does not matter if a person will ever go inside. I think it’s also an interesting question to ask if a firm would rather be contacted to design just the façade or just the floor plans: from what I have observed it looks to be the former. What are going to be the consequences of this?

I was so excited to see that one of the required readings for this week is Peter Zumthor’s Atmospheres. I had asked for that book for Christmas because I truly love it so much. The quote that is now at the beginning of my portfolio:

“And perhaps one of the buildings will come back to them 25 years later, and they’ll remember a corner, a street, a square… Just the idea of these things still being there… which have touched me, moved me, given me a sense of relief or helped me in some way… That is the first transcendent level in my work: the attempt to conceive of architecture as a human environment.”

What makes a human environment? Is it the floor plans or elevation? You don’t have to step inside a building to experience it, to be moved by it. In Rome, my friends and I were trying to get to a bar and had gotten lost when it started pouring rain. I vividly remember finding a little nook with an overhang and stone step that we took shelter under, laughing and just having the best time. I have no idea what that building was, who it was originally designed for. But I remember the rough, warm stone of the wall and the sense of shelter it provided in that serendipitous moment.

The built environment is going to make an impact regardless of whether it is interior or exterior. I cannot put an emphasis on any particular element, because I think as designers we can create ‘atmosphere’ with any combination or singular one. So, floor plans or elevations? I’d simply say I’ll take whatever I can get.