5 Steps for Rebuilding the Profession of Architecture

by Alex Gilliam, May 2008

In 1976, a major earthquake devastated much of Guatemala. Fred Cuny, an American
disaster relief
expert, tried something novel in the world of disaster relief: instead of buildi
ng new houses for and
giving them to displaced Guatemalans, he and his staff trained them to build the
ir own. They trained the
Guatemalans to build earthquake‐resistant houses and then helped these new master
builders train
others in villages throughout the region. After this humanitarian crisis had pas
sed, much to the horror of
Fred Cuny and his team, these master builders were murdered or forced to leave G
uatemala by the
government. These master builders were seen as community leaders and a threat to
the dictatorial
power structure because not only were they seen as leaders for helping build hom
es, but they
possessed valuable knowledge and by sharing their knowledge they were helping bu
ild stronger
communities. The carpenters were invaluable to the displaced of Guatemala.
Save for people such as Sambo Mockbee, Maurice Cox, or Brian Bell can we say the
same of architects?
It is an interesting if not macabre exercise to speculate if American architects
might ‘fall’ in such a
totalitarian regime. And if such speculation is cross‐referenced with the reality
that only two percent of
the homes built every year in this country are designed by architects, it sugges
ts that perhaps architects
are exceptionally more irrelevant in our society than we may be willing to belie
ve or accept. Some in the
profession are not exactly blind to the situation. A number of prominent archite
cts such as Stephen
Kieran believe, ‘Architects are now little more than stylists.’ (Kieran). The journa
l, Architectural
Design suggests that we are on the verge of becoming sub‐contractors (Buntrock 47)
. A comprehensive
study conducted by the English government revealed that to a majority of the pop
ulation, ‘architects are
perceived as arrogant, uninterested in the values and requirements of their clie
nts and users and poor
at teamworking.’ (Fisher 138). In terms of influence, in 2004 the AIA’s ranked 891st
in political
contributions, over $80,000 behind the Sheet Metal and Air Conditioning Contract
ors’ Political Action
Committee (Raymond). Throw in the fact that Richard N. Swett is the only archite
ct in the twentieth
century to have been a member of Congress and it is clear that our value to and
impact on society is a
far cry from the days of Filippo Brunelleschi, Henry Yevele or Pierre de Montreu
il.
The current condition of our society is not much better‐ a report by the U.S. Depa
rtment of Housing and
Urban Development stated that 5.1 million American households face ‘worst‐case housi
ng needs’, one is
six people worldwide are squatters; a study by the National Center for Education
Statistics found that
3.5 million students in this country attend school in buildings that are in poor
condition or need to be
entirely rebuilt (Lewis 9); according to the Centers for Disease Control, 63% of
 adult Americans are
obese and childhood obesity has tripled in the last 20 years; the building secto
r accounts for over 50
percent of the greenhouse gases emitted each year; 10‐40% of the waste that goes i
nto our landfills
each year is from buildings; we continue to bleed jobs in the manufacturing sect
or and were the list to
continue, it might include issues such as water shortage or the challenge of car
ing for an aging
population.
As distressing as all of this may seem, these and other issues are the flying bu
ttresses or the Duomos of
the 21st century, and they present a tremendous opportunity for architects to mo
ve beyond the
occasional ‘styling’ of a building and help solve some of the most pressing issues o
f our time; hopefully
reinvigorating the profession and creating better architecture along the way. Th
is is not going to be easy
as it is going to require substantial shifts within the profession, challenging
hundreds of years of theory,
practice and education; many of the very things that have led us to our current
situation.
In Filippo Brunelleschi, William of Sens, Henry Yevele and their Gothic contempo
raries, we have models
of architects who were at once inventors, administrators, material scientists, e
ngineers, product
designers, builders and architects; the full collection of skills needed for the
tasks at hand. They also
were quintessential modernists, acknowledging the realities of the materials, pe
ople and ideas they
were working with, but relentlessly adopting or inventing new technologies, meth
ods of production and
formal approaches. Today we face a similar challenge of working in a world that
requires us to
acknowledge often age‐old conditions yet at the same time exist in a society that
is changing at here‐tofore
unknown speeds, presenting both incredible opportunities and monumental challeng
es. Thus,
Filippo Brunelleschi and the Gothic era offer (at least) five lessons as to how
we might adapt to and be
more successful within our current condition, how we might prove at least as use
ful to society as Fred
Cluny’s Guatemalan carpenters were to their own.
A short history of the death of architecture
Before delving into how Filippo Brunelleschi and the Gothic architects can serve
as models for the
reformation of the profession of architecture, it is necessary to briefly trace
how we’ve arrived at our
current state of affairs.
Even with fairly incomplete resources it is easy to discern the beginnings of th
e professionalization of
architecture as far back as the 12th and 13th centuries, and therefore the disti
nct separation between
designing and making. With the rapid growth of cities; the development of higher
education; increasing
ease of transportation; multiple bouts of the Black Plague; simple yet impactful
changes in technology
and modes of production; and international networks of trade and banking (among
other things), the
people of Northern Europe were undergoing massive social change. In particular,
dramatic increases in
the scale of construction and demand for new buildings, as well as new means of
representation and
new building technologies demanded that different, possibly more efficient socia
l orders/ norms be
developed. Franklin Toker characterizes this period as a time during which there
was a general ‘drive to
specialization and the codification of corporate knowledge.’ (Toker 87). Demand fo
r design services
encouraged architects such as Henry Yevele to give up the chisel, requiring inst
ead that they spend more
time in the office, traveling or at a drafting table. The further development of
the guilds, the redistribution
of tasks formerly held by the architect and thus the creation of new job positio
ns, such as
the appareilleur supported this transformation. Likewise the increased availabil
ity and decreasing cost
of parchment; the use of templates; and the codification of building theory, eit
her through theological
or lodge treatises gave architects (and patrons) confidence that they could be a
bsent from the site, still
able to communicate their intentions, trusting that the builders would know how
to proceed. This
wasn’t a uniform or whole scale transformation, an architect’s involvement in the ac
tual building
process varied given the project or architect. William of Sens, in many ways a p
roto‐Brunelleschi, carved
stones, designed new building machines and intimately worked on a daily basis wi
th his craftsman on
the building of Cantebury Cathedral. So involved and integral was William to the
design/ building
process that when he was injured by a fall while working on the Cathedral, he wa
s forced to resign his
commission because his infirmity kept him too far from his workmen (Toker 69). O
n a smaller scale of
involvement, it was quite common for an architect to be intermittently involved
directly in the
construction process by personally designing and fabricating templates or even c
arving special details
for a building.
Nevertheless, the wheels of change were thoroughly in motion. Demand for drawing
s was increasing‐
Siena had one of Europe’s first detailed urban plans in the early 13th century (To
ker 85). The arrival of
Gutenberg’s printing press in 1439; Brunelleschi’s invention of the perspective in 1
415; and the
publishing of texts on architectural graphics, such as Francesco di Giorgio Mart
ini’s Trattato di
Architettura in 1475 made it easier and easier for architects to communicate thr
ough drawings. An
increasing reliance on drawing as a (or better yet, the) tool for architectural
communication was
solidified with the Regensburg Ordinance of 1459 in which it was suggested that
as part of their
mastership training, masons should spend two years learning how to draft (Harvey
31). The invention of
the printing press further encouraged a distancing from learning by doing, allow
ing for the publication
and mass distribution of books such as Agostino Ramelli’s illustrated guide to mac
hines in 1588 or Leon
Battista Alberti’s De Re Aedifcatoria, first available in 1485. In 1751, architect
ure’s abandonment of its
craft‐based roots was finalized when d’Alembert and Diderot classify architecture as
an art in
the Encyclopedie (Hill 23). Simultaneously, due to incredible demand for new bui
ldings in the
18th century and the disengagement of architects from building, not only did car
penters and other
craftspeople step in to fill a design void but their skill sets expanded tremend
ously as they now had the
opportunity to work directly with trades people of other backgrounds from whom t
hey had been
formerly isolated. They also were now required to fulfill managerial roles as we
ll, necessitating the
learning of accounting, surveying, material acquisition, etc. (Hill 10). In effe
ct, they were consuming the
roles and duties formerly held by architects, not to mention the definition of w
hat it meant to be an
architect (inevitably blurring our tole in the public’s eye). This created a marke
t demand for books that
gave them a ‘virtual’ architectural education. It is important to note, however, tha
t these books were
not of the same variety as the architectural pattern books with which we are qui
te familiar. In fact,
books such as Isaac Ware’s A Complete Body of Architecture published in 1756 follo
wed the integrated
Gothic approach to design, marrying such things theory, mathematics, composition
and construction
management (Hill 10). These also typically ran the gamut in size, cost and bread
th. Some books such as
William Pain’s The Builder’s Pocket‐Treasure (1763) could easily accompany a carpenter
or builder to the
job site, in effect a book standing in for the architect. Thus, as the professio
n of architecture was
becoming more rarified, market forces encouraged the creation of a substantial c
lass of builderarchitects,
who became the new master builders, furthering the emasculation and isolation of
the
architect. It is interesting to note
While market and technological forces did encourage much of this change, those w
ithin the profession
are largely to blame, one example being Leon Battista Alberti. It is an unfortun
ate irony that as the
printing press allowed for a tremendous spread of architectural knowledge throug
h the relative
affordability (or at least accessibility) of treatises by Alberti and others, th
eir dissemination indirectly
propagated the marginalization of architects. On the most basic level they encou
raged the idea that
architecture is a cerebral exercise, to be learned through books and study, not
by doing. Alberti is
especially to blame for our current situation as his theories clearly define the
role of the builder and the
architect, codifying the architect as artist and going to great lengths to disco
urage the architect from
being involved in any aspect of the construction of his building. Furthermore, h
e firmly establishes
drawings as the architect’s primary tool for controlling a project while simultane
ously providing for the
necessary physical and metaphorical distance from the actual construction, build
er, etc.; self‐sufficient
drawings give the architect control while not ‘being personally drawn into it.’ (Tok
er 73). Not only did
the diffusion of Alberti’s ideas entirely redefine the role of an architect, but t
hey implanted new
definition in patron and burgeoning architect alike, recalibrating attitudes and
expectations all around.
In fact he is almost codifying the adversarial relationship of architect, builde
r and client, with which we
are all now quite familiar. With these theoretical underpinnings of the modern d
efinition of the architect
established in the 15th century, the two of the final proverbial straws, the cre
ation of architectural
professional organizations and schools of architecture, were mere formalities.
What emerges as unexpected from this investigation is that architecture by remot
e control is a mixed
blessing, since the distance it creates between architect and builder is a profe
ssional risk as well as an
advantage. The Gothic masters seem to have regarded the working drawing much as
Alberti did, as a
bridge to unite the brainwork and the handwork (Ruskin’s terms) of architecture. T
hrough most of its
history, however, the working drawing has served not as bridge but as barrier. B
y isolating themselves
from building, architects opened themselves to the dangers of irrelevant formali
sm, technological
rigidity, and the take‐over of the whole profession by neighboring fields such as
engineering. With each
step away from the Gothic cathedrals it has become less and less clear what it i
s that an architect does,
until he or she now seems to be only a sociologist with graphic skills (Toker 89
).
5 steps for rebuilding the profession of architecture
‐courtesy of Filippo Brunelleschi and the Gothic architects
1‐ Learn how to use a hammer.
Moreover, Gaudi had a great advantage over other architects. As a child he was t
rained to be an
ironsmith in the forge of an uncle in Reus. After that, in the workshop of Eudal
do Punti in
Barcelona, he became familiar with carpentry, iron casting, and modeling in plas
ter. This training
enabled him later to direct his workmen in logical ways that were easily underst
ood. He always
relied on the same workmen, and when they grew old and retired he trained others
.
While increasingly architects of the mid to late Gothic era and the Renaissance
spent less and less time
engaged in the actual fabrication of their buildings, a majority, like Gaudi, ha
d substantial training as
carpenters, masons/ sculptors, cabinetmakers, goldsmiths. They learned by doing,
they were trained to
manipulate materials and from the outset they learned to translate theory into f
orm through the actions
of their hands. Brunelleschi, alone, was capable of working in stone, wood, vari
ous metals and even
making clocks. This training allowed people such as Brunelleschi to not only be
able to ‘converse
logically’ with his craftsmen but seamlessly merge structure, theory and function,
acting as both
architect, builder, product engineer, materials scientist, inventor and administ
rator. Hermann
Muthesius, Kenneth Frampton, Eladio Dieste and even more recent designers such a
s Office dA have
continually re‐asserted the value of this connection between understanding a mater
ial’s qualities, the
mind‐hand relationship and architectural invention:
[Baukunst] In acknowledging the qualities of materials and the traditional uses
of them in
building, craft provides a linkage between mind and hand as well as between gene
rations.
(Nyborg 131)
For architecture to be truly constructed, the materials must be used with profou
nd respect for
their essence and possibilities; only thus can ‘cosmic economy’ be achieved… in agreem
ent with
the profound order of the world; only then can have that authority that so astou
nds us in the
great works of the past. It is not enough to use brick because we like its textu
re or because it is a
material full of reminiscences. Because, although these qualities are not worthy
of our rejection,
the material possesses many more, and the risks of these kinds of reductions are
greater today
than ever before. (Dieste 27)
We now know that this is not mere architectural conjecture, the work of developm
ental psychologists
such as Jean Piaget and others have repeatedly shown that we learn about a mater
ial or object by
physically interacting with it. Although more developed, these were not new idea
s, in 1709 in his New
Theory of Vision, George Berkeley posited a similar idea, that we come to unders
tand two dimensional
things or ideas by touching three dimensional things (Hill 62). Over time we mov
e beyond something’s
basic material qualities, layering on both cultural and our own relevant values.
Perhaps then it comes as
little surprise that with the general death in the Renaissance of material and c
rafts‐based training for
architects, that there is a distinct absence, in the historical record of buildi
ngs from the middle of the
Renaissance until the mid‐19th century, of any buildings possessing technological
or structural advances,
not to mention a strikingly different aesthetic. The impact of this training in
crafts extended beyond
invention to self‐conception as well. It is interesting to note that despite incre
asing specialization and
division within the production of buildings, architects largely saw themselves a
s engineers and viceversa;
‘Still in the 16th and 17th centuries authors of books on machines like Salomon de
Caus, Giovanni
Branca, Georg Bockler explicitly mentioned on the title pages of their works tha
t they represented both
professions.’ (Knobloch 4). This conception of the duties of the architect extends
back to the very roots
of architecture through the writings of Vitruvius and others. In turn it meant t
hat because of their
training, architects such as Brunelleschi and Francesco di Giorgio were able to
extend their utility to
society beyond simply making buildings; designing fortifications, unfortunate me
thods of conveyance (Il
Badalone) and the waterworks of various cities.
The function of this breadth of skills and duties allowed for a number of key th
ings to occur: there was
no disjunction between making, design, engineering and theory; this range of ski
lls increased the utility
of architects in society, placing them in greater positions of power and influen
ce; and allowed the
architect to exert greater control over the design and building process. Perhaps
less tangibly but equally
important, remaining deeply connected to and knowledgeable of the process of bui
lding afforded the
architect greater respect, and therefore, clout with everyone involved in the ma
king of the buildingpotentially
improving production, quality, innovation, lowering costs or even allowing for m
uch more
daring designs to be executed. Conversely, as soon as the architect began to sep
arate himself from craft,
elements of society reacted negatively. For a modern observer, the ferocity of t
he seemingly
instantaneous reaction to this shifting condition is somewhat startling. Whether
it be the sermons of the
13th century Dominican preacher, Nicholas Biard or passing ‘water cooler’ talk among
st masons of the
time, the elevation of the architect (via pay and distinction) above the other m
asons and the general
replacement of his chisel and hammer with words and parchment, was not well rece
ived in some parts
of society. Much of this reaction can be attributed to what is now a particularl
y American approach to
reward, achievement and to a degree, intellectualism. That is, unless you win th
e lottery or some sort of
lucky/clever simulacrum, money or reward should be obtained through hard (physic
ally) work.
Otherwise, Biard and others were reacting to the dramatic social restructuring t
hat was occurring in the
Gothic era, positions that have since largely solidified and we are now accustom
ed to, although few,
workers or architects seemed to be especially pleased with the many results.
At various points (and through various guises) over the past 150 years, many the
orists and practitioners
such as John Ruskin, Hermann Muthesius, Walter Groupius and Sambo Mockbee have c
alled for
architects to re‐engage the process of building and making. Indeed, there is a gro
wing trend within the
profession and academia of design‐build, and this can only be a beneficial improve
ment. Within
academia alone, many of the buildings at the Rural Studio are pushing the bounda
ries of form, structure
and meaning; Eco‐Mod is making similar strides in sustainability; and Studio 804 i
s addressing massproduction.
However, Stephen Kieran has made a critical observation, that unless one is work
ing at a
smaller scale, it is simply not possible today to fully cast oneself as Filippo
Brunelleschi or William of
Sens. He believes that they were able to simultaneously take on the role of arch
itect, builder, material
scientist, engineer, administrator, product designer and inventor, not to mentio
n, seamlessly merge
function, form and meaning into an inseparable whole is that the systems associa
ted with building in the
12th, 13th and 14th centuries were relatively simple. While I think Kieran fails
to fully recognize the full
complexity of Brunelleschi’s Dome (especially given the complexity of Florentian s
ociety and the tools/
systems that Filippo had at his disposal), it is perhaps unrealistic to expect t
hat everyone can follow in
his footsteps. Nevertheless, Filippo Brunelleschi, William of Sens and their con
temporaries demonstrate
the pressing need for the architectural profession and academia to fully reconne
ct with materials,
building, and making, to return to the full embodiment of the definition of the
word
architect: architectus (Latin) ‐ master builder, architect, inventor, deviser, aut
hor. The benefits are
numerous, not the least of which is laying the foundation for architects to be t
he inventors,
technologists and leaders that society will gravely need in the coming years.
2‐ Relentlessly seek out new ideas and influences
Both the magnificent dome of this famous church and many other devices, invented
by Filippo the
architect, bare witness to his superb skill…
In the epitaph from Filippo Brunelleschi’s tomb in Santa Maria della Fiore, we can
see that the
Florentines valued Brunelleschi as much if not more for his inventions (the scaf
folding, his hoists, the
Dome, etc.) as they did his aesthetic and spatial developments. Today, we have f
ew formal/ structural
challenges in the same order of Florence’s Dome. Sustainability, affordability, re
source conservation and
the well being of our population may very well be the Domes of the 21st century.
Brunelleschi’s success
in solving the problem of the Dome was partially the result of his training but
it is doubtful that he would
have ultimately been successful had he not relentlessly sought out new ideas and
solutions, ones that
were well outside of the bounds of his everyday culture.
The boldness of Brunelleschi’s decision to travel to France in search of aesthetic
and structural
inspiration cannot be over‐rated. Of course after Brunelleschi, Florence would est
ablish laws to
encourage the infusion of outside artisans, but even with such encouragement, Fl
orence and much of
the Italian peninsula (save perhaps Venice) would remain focused on its Latin an
d Greek traditions.
Without perhaps visiting Amiens and other Gothic building sites it is questionab
le whether Brunelleschi
would have developed his particular aesthetic, solved the problem Santa Maria de
lla Fiore’s dome or
devised the machines/ methods necessary to build the Dome. The engineering, buil
ding and design
innovations that Brunelleschi borrowed from the Gothic cathedrals and employed i
n the Duomo are
relatively easy to trace. Whether it be the ribbed vaults, the projected designe
d of the dome, the
complex use of masonry or the integrated scaffolding, these can fairly easily be
traced to the Gothic
cathedrals of France. Unfortunately, due to the less enduring nature of wooden s
tructures,
Brunelleschi’s predilection towards secrecy, the general discarding of his inventi
ons by Florentian
society and a difficult history of medieval mechanics, and machines, it is more
challenging to connect his
machines with those of the builders of Gothic cathedrals.
Aside from some basic written descriptions and a few surviving treadwheels lofte
d in cathedral towers,
there is little documentation of the machines that architects such Henry Yevele
used to build their
cathedrals. We know that William of Sens was widely respected for the devices an
d machines that he
invented for work on Cantebury but currently there are no available useful descr
iptions of the actual
nature of said machines. The treadwheel and basic hoists are quite commonly repr
esented in paintings
of the time but this may also be because they are both fairly simple to represen
t graphically. Likewise,
Andrea Matthies points out that often artists had to contend with ‘closed’ building
sites and much of the
time the machines were actually located within the walls of the cathedrals as op
posed to the outside, as
they are usually represented in the paintings of the day. Thus, it is difficult
to place faith in the accuracy
of any of the visual representations of medieval machines.
Nevertheless, I think it is a fair guess that the machines he saw and the ideas
he was exposed to during
his travels clearly influenced the creation of his hoists, etc.. While it is pos
sible that he could have seen
some precedents for these machines at major ports (where they might be used for
offloading ships),
Gothic cathedrals were the only buildings contemporary to Brunelleschi of simila
r complexity in
construction to his Duomo, requiring similar technological advances. His visits
to northern Europe might
have also exposed him to tangential technologies that may have otherwise been sl
ow to reach Italy at
that time. Many of these things, such as advanced clock making and the re‐birth of
Archimedes screw
came about because of the infusion of Muslim texts and knowledge into the cathed
ral schools. These
two influences in particular could have allowed Brunelleschi to create two of hi
s more radical
‘inventions’, the reversibly geared lifting device and the positioning hoist. In som
e respects, specialized
historians on the subject such as Frank Prager support this theory in their gene
ral belief that
Brunelleschi could have only created these devices through direct observation of
and improvement
upon existing machines‐ they just can’t figure out where one is to find said machine
s being that thus far
they have not been able to attribute them to either Roman or local sources. The
particular respect
afforded Brunelleschi by the Florentines at the time of his death and when award
ed a prize for one of
his machines by the Opera in 1421 also indirectly supports the theory of a Gothi
c or foreign design
influence,
‘a new device or hoist constructed constructed for pulling and moving stones, bloc
k, and other
requirements……newly invented by him [Filippo], whereof the Opera has more useful tha
n from
that previously use.’ (Prager 89)
The numerous sketches made by Leonardo DaVinci, Lorenzo Ghiberti, Mariano Taccol
a and others, as
well as the subsequent prints further indicates the complete novelty of Brunelle
schi’s creations.
Of course traveling in the service of design education is not without precedent.
The wandefuhr or
wander years, (part traveling apprenticeship, part observation based study) were
at least in plan an
integral part of a master mason’s training and there are records indicating that a
s early as 1026, patrons
such as the Bishop of Arezzo saw merit in appropriating money to send their arch
itects abroad for study
(Klotz 381). Slightly more recently, the Grand Tour became are required part of
the education of the
gentleman architect. Today the Grand Tour has been replaced by broad searches in
to other fields for
architectural inspiration yet they are conjoined in that, unlike the Gothic arch
itects and Brunelleschi,
these travels/ searches are related to form, space and theory, rarely structure
or other technical issues.
Some current designers, such as Hernan Diaz Alonso, Greg Lynn and Ali Rahim are
looking well beyond
the boundaries of the practice, at the most basic elements of life through the n
otion of emergence for
inspiration. But as evidenced by the disastrous durability of Alonso’s rather smal
l architectural
installation at PS 1 in New York in the summer of 2005, they are currently only
able to merge theory and
form, but not structure into a whole.
If we are to be valuable, active leaders in the tackling of today’s most important
technical and cultural
challenges, we must be prepared, as Brunelleschi was, to look far and wide for i
nspiration, and
solutions. Yet we must also follow Filippo and his Gothic counterparts’, moving be
yond a professional
tradition of looking primarily at aesthetics, form, space and theory. Because of
the tremendous
complexity of some of these problems, we will be required to not only look to ot
her professions for best
practices, but also collaborate with them to develop new ones. There are a few c
urrent examples that
offer inspiration: William McDonough’s partnering with the chemist Michael Braunga
rt to develop
sustainable materials and practices, and Kieran Timberlakes’ restructuring of thei
r practice to embrace
the design, fabrication and communication methods of modern industry, as evidenc
ed in their Loblolly
House.
3‐ Make it local
definition: technology‐ the application of scientific knowledge for practical purp
oses
Knowledge is extended outside the laboratory not by generalization to universal
laws instantiable
elsewhere, but by the adaptation of locally situated practice to new local conte
xts (Rouse 125).
The challenge of an architect who heeds the call to design a solution of equival
ent value to society as
the flying buttress will probably not be the creation of the idea itself. This e
nd of the solution may come
about through much individual research and experimentation or through collaborat
ion with experts in
the appropriate fields. Either way, it is useless and as the definition implies,
it is not a new technology or
even a viable solution until it is adapted to the particular problem, culture, p
lace or people.
For an architect to move beyond being a mere stylist, he or she must take into c
onsideration (embrace)
the materials, building skills and cultural knowledge inherent in a place when d
eveloping, and applying
new ideas, technologies or building methodologies for it to be executed well, ad
opted or useful. In doing
so, you also advance the evolution of the idea into a technology. Outside of the
design profession, this
might be described more simply as the transformation of a concept or hypothesis
into a solution. In
science or the business world for instance, a solution doesn’t occur or isn’t known
until it’s actually been
tested or applied. But this is not the way most architects today approach innova
tion, design or building.
The professionalization of architecture and hence the over reliance on drawings
as the surefire method
for insuring positive results completely detaches the designer from the material
s that compromise the
design, the people for whom he is designing and the people who will build the de
sign. The assumption is
that if it is drawn, it will be built…. just as it is drawn. The drawings become a
placebo, as soon a detail is
drawn, our responsibilities end. Although new computer programs allow for incred
ible collaboration,
precision, specificity, testing and representation of reality, only the very sma
llest portion of the
construction industry is poised to use these tools and thus in many cases these
new technologies only
increase the false sense of ‘solution’ and detachment from reality.
Filippo Brunelleschi, although perhaps being overly secretive over the details o
f his designs, is a perfect
counter example to this problem. Clearly the Gothic cathedrals of France provide
d structural, aesthetic,
formal and technological inspiration, but somehow he had to make these ideas app
ropriate for Florence,
convince the Opera of their efficacy and likewise translate them so that they mi
ght be build‐able by
Florentine craftsmen. He accomplished this in a number of ways: instead of impor
ting the Gothic style,
he appropriated Gothic methods for designing a building, such as projective geom
etry and a reliance on
the module; he employed local materials, such as brick, that both helped create
an architecture that was
appropriate for Florence and meant that his builders were quite familiar with th
e materials necessary to
accomplish his daring feat; and he used every means necessary from large scale m
ock‐ups to carving
construction details from turnips to convey his intentions to the builders, not
to mention the patrons.
Strangely, his desire to protect his intellectual capital by compartmentalizing
many aspects of the design
may have resulted in Brunelleschi being much more attuned to the capabilities of
his builders, and the
need to make adjustments to his design based on this information. Quite simply,
he had to be
consistently engaged with systems of production in Florence and his builders oth
erwise the dome simply
wouldn’t get built. Although Manetti devotes considerable time to explaining Brune
lleschi’s engagement
with the workers and the construction of the Dome, the efficacy of his efforts,
his translation of French
Gothic knowledge to an appropriate and buildable Florentian architecture can be
best proven by the
fact that to this day scholars (except for you Danilo) are at a loss to explain
every aspect of its origins, its
construction and the tools used to build it. A quote from Ed Ford in his book, T
he Details of Modern
Architecture, helps explain how the sources of Brunelleschi’s designs have been so
confounding to
historians all the way back to Manetti and Vasari,
The role of the architect, therefore, is a form of cultural leadership—finding a p
rogressive balance
between explicit and implicit making, between specification and craft and in so
doing, creating shifts in
culture systems that address new problems or ideas. To have a voice, architectur
e must challenge
a value matrix, but it must do this without causing alienation between the syste
m of communication and
individuals or populations that inhabit it. (Ford)
Brunelleschi has largely been so confounding because he created shifts but did n
ot cause alienation.
Gothic architects, especially because of their sometimes itinerant nature and th
e large number of
projects they often managed at once, were required to act in a similar fashion.
I appreciate Ed’s quote,
although for the issues we’re facing in the 21st century and to facilitate a more
accurate comparison with
Brunelleschi and the Gothic architects, I think techno‐cultural leadership is more
appropriate. And by
adding ‘techno’ we can change strengthen ‘address’ to, ‘tackle’ or ‘solve’. In adapting his
vations to
Florence for the Duomo, Brunelleschi also demonstrates that techno‐cultural leader
ship can result in
contagious innovation, higher standards of craft and tremendous community growth
.
The primacy of Florence in this story of the rise of the modern artist is a comm
ent on a society that
somehow changed its view of men who traditionally had been considered lowly ‘mecha
nical’ craftsmen.
Did this not happen because Florentines began to look at the production of these
craftsmen through
different eyes, and was not this new way of seeing things being conditioned by c
raftsmen themselves?
(Goldthwaite 409)
It would be ridiculous to assert that Brunelleschi and the construction of the d
ome for Santa Maria della
Fiore solely caused the tremendous growth in the prowess of craftsmen in Florenc
e, their innovation,
Florentine pride or the economic health of the city. That being said, it is poss
ible to document the
tremendous growth of the building trades at this time and we do know that predom
inantly local
materials were used for the job. However, Brunelleschi, through the daring desig
n of the Duomo and its
constituent parts; his close engagement with and use of the local building trade
s, and materials; and as
exemplar himself showed Florence what was possible. His machines, the rising Dom
e and Brunelleschi
himself, could not have been more visible examples for the Florentines of new po
ssibilities. This total
redefinition of the Florentine sense of possibility, in terms of craft, design a
nd career undoubtedly
contributed to the creation of a culture, and economy of innovation, of continua
l improvement. A
society in which each new innovation fuels another and demand follows commensura
tely; ‘new
knowledge, new inventions and new fashions created a general artistic atmosphere
that in itself aroused
demand.’ (Goldthwaite 408). A modern analog of Florence’s culture of innovation is t
he creative city as
espoused by Richard Florida in his book, Cities and the Creative Class. Florence
, at this time meets each
of Florida’s three criteria for such a city, talent, tolerance and technology. It
should be noted that
Florence’s relatively weak guild system established part of the foundation for a c
ulture of invention and
reinvention by encouraging Brunelleschi’s and his contemporaries to experiment in
different mediums,
endeavors and roles; again increasing innovation and productivity (Goldthwaite 4
13).
So while the modernist ideal of design (aesthetics, form and space) changing peo
ple’s lives has largely
been rejected, can Brunelleschi offer a model for how the local application of d
esign and technical
innovation can help create stronger, more economically healthy and vibrant commu
nities? One’s that
are better able to weather the storm of globalization, becoming net exporters li
ke Florence?
4‐ Establish places of learning and experimentation
…it should be remembered that church building represented the major technological
achievement
of the times, and the construction sites of the great cathedrals were effectivel
y the engineering
institutes of the Middle Ages (Klotz 53).
In order to make new ideas, technical solutions and theories, ‘local’, thus transfor
ming them into new
technologies, architects need places where this translation can occur; a place w
here the skills and
methods of the workers can be merged with the technical innovations of the archi
tect, the local site
conditions, the given materials and programmatic intentions. Today, most jobsite
s are merely places of
building, assemblage and execution of the architect’s intentions, in which the cha
llenge is ‘fitting’ or
applying the solution to the site. On the other hand, David Turnbull suggests th
at Gothic building sites
were messy laboratories, hotbeds of experimentation, active learning, synthesiza
tion and thus
innovation:
How the cathedrals were built becomes understandable if we recognize that the ca
thedrals were
comparable to modem laboratories in three important ways. First, their very cons
truction constituted a
series of full‐scale experiments. Close observation of the drying mortar enabled t
he builders to
detect areas of stress in the fabric and to take appropriate remedial measures t
hrough the placement of
buttresses, pinnacles, or reinforcement.’ (Intuitively, it may seem that one needs
laboratories to
perform experiments rather than the other way around. However, laboratories are
not simply built by
architects; they are constituted through the performance of experiments.) Second
, laboratories are the
spaces in which the local, the tacit, and the messy knowledge and practices of g
roups of practitioners
are transformed through collective work into a coherent tradition. Third, cathed
rals, just like 20thcentury
laboratories, are powerful loci of social transformation, absorbing large amount
s of capital and
concentrating resources, skills, and labor. Through this process of heterogeneou
s engineering,
machinery, instruments, skill, techniques, theory, raw materials, and social rel
ations are interrelated.
This combination of social and material factors constitutes a manipulable system
, the establishment and
maintenance of which may be considered an essential function of modern laborator
y (Turnbull 321‐
322).
It is important to add that these jobsites were often part of or associated with
cathedral schools, further
enriching them as places of learning and experimentation in the Gothic era; the
process of making
architecture being directly influenced by theory and vice‐versa. Again, a far cry
from the sites of
assemblage and confrontation to which we are accustomed today.
What are the key aspects that allowed for these design laboratories to exist and
be so successful?
 Incomplete architectural drawings allowed for and encouraged on‐site flexibility,
experimentation and adaptation.
 Frequent or constant presence of the architect or a design representative such a
s the
appareileur, including the close proximity or on‐site location of a lodge house.
 Tools for representation that encouraged full scale mocking‐up, making the design
visible and
comprehensible to all: tracing floors, templates, the inscribing of designs in f
ields or on building
floors/ walls.
 A generally skilled workforce that understood the common methods and language of
design.
 A shared awareness of an aesthetic, theoretical and structural agenda, one that
demanded/
encouraged innovation.
 A design and building problem that demanded the associated innovation and invent
ion of
supplementary tools, machines and systems of organization.
 The proximity to or integration with academic and theological centers of learnin
g.
 The transient nature of half of the workforce and discontinuous construction mea
nt new ideas
and skills were constantly filtering through the site.
 The concurrent building boom across much of northern Europe meant that both a co
ndition of
one‐upmanship and general culture of building innovation was prevalent.
 Truly useful mathematical modeling did not yet fully exist and thus experience,
intuition and
trial and error were integral to the design process.
 The building sites were in highly visible locations, naturally focusing attentio
n and interest.
Is this an outdated model of working that has little application today? No. Many
architecture firms such
as Sharples Holden Pasquerelli, Williams and Tsien, Ole Lundberg and FACE have p
hysical workshops as a
part of their offices;
‘In‐house fabrication allows us to quickly see the limitations of a design and the c
omplexities of
its construction.’ ―FACE
‘Our workshop is not just for models and representation, it is a design tool.’ ―SHoP
While workshops allow these architecture firms to better design and detail their
buildings for increased
build‐ability, at the very least, their isolation from the place of production and
application, means that
they fail to embody the full potential of the Gothic building site. More accurat
e parallels can be found if
these workshops are compared to the tracing and template rooms of lodges or Goth
ic architectural
offices. Christopher Alexander’s creation of the Builder’s Yard as a part of his hou
se building in Mexicali,
Mexico offers a much closer analogy to the Gothic building site. Devised as a pl
ace of communication,
gathering, design, experimentation and fabrication, the Builder’s Yard was the cen
ter of the community
and Alexander’s primary design tool. Although weak in regards to David Turnbull’s th
ird point (it’s
isolation and lack of funding prevented it from becoming a true nexus), it was v
ery much a laboratory for
design, building and social innovation. An even better modern day example demons
trating the validity
of the Gothic building ‘works’ as a tool for design and technological innovation is
the Japanese design
and construction industry; in fact, the similarities between the two are strikin
g.
While there is separation between the builder and the architect, the builder is
often involved in the
project before design even begins. This team will often sit down before or durin
g the initial stages of the
design process, establishing technological and aesthetic goals, such as Sendai M
ediatheque’s ‘today’s
technology plus alpha’; clearly demonstrating an interest in complete innovation (
Buntrock 41).
Architectural documentation, like that of their Gothic counterparts, is cursory
by American standards
with design and documentation continuing throughout the building process. This ‘ju
st in time’ method
of design minimizes waste in time, labor and material. Instead of the lodge hous
e or nearby office,
Japanese architects will set up an office on site. Instead of dreading visits to
the field office, architects
such as Fuhihiko Maki often think of the site as a refuge, ‘The field office is no
t only a place for the
liberation of the work of the architect from the world of thought, but also is a
place where many people
participate in the effort towards its crystallization.’(Buntrock 62). Gaps in desi
gn documentation are
filled in by the contractor and sub‐contractors, with coherence maintained amongst
the constituent
parts by the architect who will often set goals with descriptive words. An examp
le of this might be the
architect telling the sub‐contractor that this element should be, ‘thin’ (Buntrock 42)
. The sub‐contractor
will then design a solution and draw the assemblage for review with the architec
t; the weight of
documentation and ownership of the problem is placed on the subcontractor’s should
ers. Dana
Buntrock, author of Japanese Design as a Collaborative Process notes that by pas
sing much of the
documentation onto the shoulders of the experts, not only is this more efficient
but it means that the
architect has more time to manage the overall ‘works’ of the project. This can enabl
e architects to have
the breadth of influence and engagement similar to that of Brunelleschi, in spit
e of the increased
complexity of today’s larger buildings. In this capacity the architect can also fa
cilitate the development
of new technologies, helping corral disparate ideas or innovations and bring the
m together to solve the
local problem at hand,
Companies can provide a lot of knowledge and technology. We meet with them const
antly
throughout the project and learn from experiments. Everybody involved is special
ized in a
particular field. The glass producer has no knowledge of the possibilities in st
eel production, and
vice versa. But the architect is the one who connects the different fields in or
der to come up with
new solutions (Buntrock 57).
Many design problems whether structural, spatial or even systems based, are expl
ored through full scale
on‐site mock‐ups. The extensive use of these mock‐ups encourages proportional design d
ecisions,
especially as they are typically arranged directly adjacent to the growing build
ing (Buntrock 69). While
allowing for comparison and easier visualization, this relationship also present
s the mock‐ups as a public
record of the design language and methods that are integral to the building, for
builder, designer and
the general public. Given the degree of innovation that occurs at many of these
sites, much like their
Gothic building brethren, visitors are frequent during construction with the Sen
dai Mediatheque site
receiving over 3500 people (Buntrock 41).
To be able to best address the most pressing issues of our time it is necessary
to redesign the ‘works’ to
meet these needs. The building sites of the Gothic cathedrals, the Duomo and the
Japanese building
industry demonstrate that more can be had from these spaces than just assemblage
or material storage.
Likewise, they show that our current means of design and production In fact, by
re‐conceiving of our
building sites as laboratories, places for experimentation and the continuation
of the design process,
these precedents indicate that greater innovation, quality and efficiency may be
attained.
5‐ Speak clearly, draw less
In 1350 Agostino di Giovanni drew a design for the Sansedoni family’s new palace i
n Siena. Unlike
today’s construction documents, consisting of four separate sections and as many p
ages, it was only
comprised of one drawing (an elevation) and text. It did have measurements but l
acked window and any
other significant detail (Toker 84‐85). The palace was built to the family’s satisfa
ction and is still standing
today. At Chartres Cathedral, there were nine different architects who worked on
the building for 25‐30
years a piece, working in 30 different building campaigns (Turnbull 318). Today,
Chartres Cathedral is
still standing and is considered one of the finest examples in France of Gothic
architecture. How was it
possible to build these enduring, inventive (Chartres) and cohesive structures w
ith the given
discontinuities, or lack of instruction? As was mentioned in the previous sectio
n, the design of the
works, perhaps summed up by the initial imperative, ‘draw less’, plays an essential
role in the process.
However, it was the embedded cultural knowledge of design and the employment of
a variety of means
of communicating intent that ensured these buildings were successes. How is it t
hat we produce so
many drawings for a building and yet so often are frustrated by the results?
These, especially the role of embedded cultural knowledge, are problematic as le
ssons or precedents for
the present day. Unlike the Gothic builders, we don’t live in a culture that under
stands building. We lack
figures like Suger, lesser clergy or even a unifying theory such as neo‐platonism
that provide a vivid
image, structural/ theoretical framework and process of construction for the bui
ldings that we are to
build; permeating much of the continent’s society. Finding such singular voices an
d ideas in our
heterogeneous and secular society today is probably unrealistic. However, the cu
ltural transformation of
Florence around the Duomo and other buildings show that a well designed, locally
focused ‘works’ (a
site of innovation) and a prominent project can positively transform the workfor
ce, and the consumer.
We also don’t live in an era in which there is a commonly held method of design an
d construction. The
module, proportioning as a design process and projective geometry have largely d
isappeared, to be
replaced by engineered lumber and measurements for construction such as 15” OC (on
center) that
relates only to safety, the machine that made it or the vehicle that brought it
to the site; space or theory
are no longer part of the equation. Resurrecting the Gothic modular system may n
ot be appropriate but
establishing an underlying framework within a design of proportion or parts to w
hole may be
worthwhile as it is a common language in design, crossing disciplinary boundarie
s and stylistic
movements; Chippendale furniture, stringed instruments and the current trend of
emergent systems in
architecture. It’s durability as a design and construction tool may be related to
the most basic way we
perceive things and assemble knowledge, comparing one thing to another. At the c
ore of finding
replacements for the design and construction methods of the Gothic architects is
 that these devices
need to explain why and how. Due to the embedded methods of design and construct
ion within building
culture as presented by Roriczer or Shuttermeyer’s books, there is a common langua
ge within which
both designers and builders might make a decision. And of course it extended acr
oss disciplines,
allowing the various crafts associated with the making of a building to communic
ate. Stephen Kieran
likened this method of design to ‘quilting’ in a which at the outset a general patte
rn or theme, aesthetic
or method based, that allows fellow quilters to work individually on a project t
hat when the constituent
parts are combined, a cohesive whole is still possible. Others have suggested th
e comparison between a
conducted orchestral piece of classical music and jazz or early music in which t
hemes at a variety of
scales might be employed instead of exact musical notation. A specific example o
f this is the neume, a
system of musical notation used to describe the general characteristic of a rhyt
hm or note, but not
exactly how it should sound. An analogous example of this in architecture is the
Japanese architect
describing to a subcontractor that a wall should be, ‘thin’ or at a different scale
the designers and
builders of the Sendai Mediatheque jointly establishing an initial project goal
that the building should be
‘today’s technology plus alpha.’. The later development of neumatic notation in the Mi
ddle Ages
established a methodology of assembling neumes according to something akin to pr
oportional
relationships. Creating such frameworks allows the various people involved in th
e building and design
process to do what they do best, to innovate, to streamline workflows, gives the
m greater ownership
(and thus often better quality) while maintaining a cohesive whole, even over ex
tended periods of time;
This illustrates the general principle that the modular starting point was based
on convenience or
practicality ‐for instance, in a large architectural project completed over many d
ecades, the
modular unit provided the continuity between successive generations of workers.
(Birket 258)
Nevertheless, language and even communicating within this framework remains a hu
rdle to creating
good, innovative architecture.
It is striking that even in 1567 the language we use to describe our work was de
emed unintelligible and
it was recognized that we like to talk more than listen,
“The bad architect is depicted without eyes, hands, ears and nose, to show that he
cannot
perceive truth, execute nothing, cannot listen to the advice of others and canno
t even sense what
is good. He does have a mouth, however, ‘with which he can babble and speak evil.’’ (H
ill 54)
Creating innovative architecture and innovative solutions to many of our most pr
essing design related
problems will require us to approach communication as we approach the creation o
f new technologies,
“In other words, the problem, in both science and technology, is not one of puttin
g theory into
practice but one of the transmission of practices. It is small social and techni
cal variations
in effecting that transmission that account for differences in knowledge systems
.”(Turnbull 327).
In other words, communication must be site and problem specific as well. Local d
ifferences in
communication may either be a wellspring of new ideas or a hurdle but it is a pa
ramount task of
architects to recognize these differences at the outset of project or collaborat
ion. For instance, Wendy
Milroy identified how Liberian carpenters created language systems that are part
icular to the problem,
the tools they have at hand and the physical environment in which they are worki
ng to facilitate
decision‐making (Milroy 5). Again, many of these employ the senses rather than too
ls and are
proportion or comparison based, such as a ‘trouser’s worth of material’ (Milroy 5). Mi
lroy found that the
results were optimal and often more accurate than stricter, measurement based sy
stems. Obviously
creating or recognizing such modes of communication can be a challenge. Regardle
ss, it clearly requires
that the architect be patient but relentless when working to establish modes of
communication for a
project.
Developing a cadre of builders and subcontractors to work with consistently over
time eliminates many
of these problems but this is often impossible. After the fiasco at the Innocent
i, Filippo Brunelleschi
endeavored to use every tool at his disposal‐ spoken word, carved turnips, small m
odels, hand
gesturing, large mock‐ups, demonstration, drawings, written words‐ to communicate hi
s intent to his
builders. He was in effect searching for the correct technology, attempting to i
nvent the appropriate
device for communicating with his workers on a particular problem at a particula
r time, and clearly the
needs varied. If we are to become the innovators, the leaders, the builders of t
he 21st century we must
embody the relentless energy, innovation and practicality of Filippo Brunellschi
and his turnips.
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