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Ecological Mediation: Dialectics of Inside and Outside

Master of Architecture Thesis Graduate School of the University of Cincinnati School of Architecture and Interior Design College Design Art Architecture and Planning

Brian Barker Bachelor of Science Management Brigham Young University December 2005

Rebecca Williamson, PhD, AIA Aarati Kanekar, PhD

June 2010

ABSTRACT

This thesis examines the relationship of humans to their surrounding environment by investigating architecture’s ability to mediate between the extremes of outside and inside. Poetic and functional responsibilities of architecture are emphasized in a brief chronology of how the role of the tectonic building elements, which evolved from a need to protect the hearth, changed to being used to contain a manufactured environment. A design process that emphasizes a reliance on natural processes is used to test the assertion that architectural richness and environmental diversity in the human experience can be captured through the implementation of transitional spaces that exist in an expanded border between the extremes of inside and outside.

iii

CONTENTS

abstract

THESIS 1 function & poetry inside & outside the manufactured environment

illustrations 14

PROJECT 29 site observations programmatic needs design process sequence of spaces

bibliography

iv

THESIS Mediation can be seen as a process of reconciling mutually interdependent, opposed forces—or finding a mean between extremes. Seeking to understand and define the extremes helps to reveal the spectrum of possibilities that exists between them.

Buildings play a key role in delineating and mediating between outside and inside and their poetic and functional characteristics. Raw observations may even conclude that there is no inside without the use of building elements; however, the metaphysical subtext of inside and outside tends to extend the definition of inside beyond being simply contained from the outside.

In his book The Poetics of Space, French philosopher Gaston Bachelard explored the ontological derivatives of outside and inside. He emphasized that “outside and inside form a dialectic of division.”1 They are opposing forces that have the ability to represent both physical and metaphysical concepts. “Philosophers, when confronted with outside and inside, think in terms of being and non-being.”2

In examining excerpts from Les Cahiers by Rainer Maria Rilke, Gaston Bachelard emphasizes the existential nature of these two forces.

Often it is from the very fact of concentration in the most restricted intimate space that the dialectics of inside and outside draws its strength. One feels this elasticity in the following passage by Rilke: “And there is no space here; and you feel almost calm at the thought that it is impossible for anything very large to hold in this narrowness.” There is consolation in knowing that one is in an atmosphere of calm, in a narrow space where everything is commensurate with inner being. Then in the next sentence, the text continues dialectically: “But outside, everything is immeasurable. And when the level rises outside, it also rises in you, not in the vessels that are partially controlled by you, or in the phlegm of your most unimpressionable organs: but it grows in the capillary veins, drawn upward into the furthermost branches of your infinitely ramified existence.”… Inside and outside are not abandoned to their geometrical opposition. 3

1

Juhani Pallasmaa explains the metaphysical need that human existence has for shelter from the outside condition. "Architecture is our primary instrument in relating us with space and time, and giving these dimensions a human measure. It domesticates limitless space and endless time to be tolerated, inhabited and understood by humankind."4

FUNCTION & POETRY

Accepting that a discussion of inside and outside includes both physical and metaphysical realms, places a larger responsibility on architectural works than merely providing protection from the elements. This responsibility can be referred to in terms of the opposing forces of function and poetry in architecture. Fulfilling both functional and poetic needs has always been an indispensable charge of architecture—the art and science of designing buildings and other physical structures. Achieving a balance between the two is not an easy task. Juhani Pallasmaa explains this responsibility as follows: “The task of architecture lies as much in the need for metaphysical grounding for human thought and experience as the provision of shelter from a raging storm.”5

When the architecture fails to mediate between function and poetry, discontent and criticism abound. For example, multiple authors and architects have lamented an overemphasis on functional issues in modern architecture. The architectural design process took on positivist or scientific approach—pursuing the process itself as if it could lead to answers and new truth in a similar way that hard sciences were improving their understanding of the world around them. This denial of poetic authorship in favor of positivist process pretends that a resulting design ‘solution’ is somehow a foregone conclusion because of the use of precedent, program, and site studies as ‘evidence.’ Feeling that architectural theory and practice has taken an overly functional role, Alberto Perez-Gomez states in his book Architecture and the Crisis of Modern Science, that architecture often fails to provide all of the metaphysical demands that are placed upon it. "Once it adopted the ideals of a positivistic science, architecture was forced to reject its traditional role as one of the fine arts. Deprived of a legitimate poetic content, architecture was reduced to either a prosaic technological process or mere decoration"6

2

This desire for poetic content in architecture, however, must always be checked by the functional needs. The demands placed on architectural projects never allow architecture to be fully immersed as a poetic or purely representational art form. Louis Kahn expressed why it is that architecture must always be somewhat apart from other fine arts. “A painter can paint square wheels on a cannon to express the futility of war. A sculptor can carve the same square wheels. But an architect must use round wheels.”7 The needs for function can never really be ignored in a thorough architectural design process. Juhani Pallasmaa echoed this sentiment; “the architect works with form and mass just as the sculptor does, and like the painter he works with color. But alone of the three, his is a functional art. It solves practical problems. It creates tools or implements for human being and utility plays a decisive role.”8

This balance between function and poetry in architecture was adequately achieved for centuries due to the requisite relationship between building form and function. Poetic expressions in architecture were coupled with real functional needs. For example, ornamentation often served functional roles in structure or weathering while simultaneously providing cultural and aesthetic references. Architecture was seen as the art and science of building making. The building provided the mediation between the environment and the occupant—a relationship that never allowed architecture to stray too far from its functional responsibilities. The orientation, proportions, and materials were all selected to ameliorate the extreme forces of the outside environment.

Function and poetry in architecture were balanced as a natural result of the way people used to build. This equilibrium has caused traditional building practices to be a subject of study among architects who wish to achieve a better balance between environmental necessity and existential desire. Hassan Fathay related the following tale to illustrate this idea:

When man is handling raw material, natural material like stone, what is he doing? When he is dressing stone he is removing what is superficial and preserving what is essential. So he is spiritualizing himself and spiritualizing the stone. There is a story of a man passing three men who are dressing stone. He asked them, “What are you doing?” the first said, “I am making a living.” The second said, “I am dressing stone.” And the third

3 said, “I am building a cathedral.” Only the last had a sense of his task in the context of man’s desires and the material’s capabilities together, and saw beyond merely his own purposes or the technical problem of working with the stone.9

The physical building and its environmental mediation became a representation of function while the purpose of the building and the existential connection with it became the link to the metaphysical poetry in architecture.

INSIDE & OUTSIDE

Tracing a history of how building elements have mediated between inside and outside helps to reveal some of the physical and metaphysical characteristics of inside and outside. It also exhibits existential aspects of how the human relationship with its environment has dramatically changed in recent times. German architect Gottfried Semper suggests the origins of architecture through the lens of anthropology in his book The Four Elements of Architecture:

The first sign of human settlement and rest after the hunt, the battle, and wandering in the desert is today, as when the first men lost paradise, the setting up of the fireplace the lighting of the reviving, warming, and food-preparing flame. Around the hearth the first groups assembled; around it the first alliances formed; around it the first rude religious concepts were put into the customs of cult.10

The comforting fire of the hearth radiates heat and light in a way that allows for increased control and stability from the vicissitudes of the natural world. Control and stability are characteristics of inside—the hearth can be seen as the primary architectural element of inside.

Gottfried Semper continues his narrative by identifying how the other architectural elements were introduced to protect the hearth.

Throughout all phases of society the hearth formed the sacred focus around which the whole took order and shape. It is the first and most important, the moral element of

4 architecture. Around it were grouped the three other elements; the roof, the enclosure, and the mound, the protecting negations or defenders of the hearth’s flame against three hostile elements of nature.11

The addition of these other ‘defenders’ allowed for greater control over the comfort that the hearth could produce and essentially expanded the range of inside by stretching the size of the intermediary zones between inside and outside. Perhaps the most influential control that these ‘protecting negations’ allowed was the control of airflow.

Air is a medium through which heat, light, and sound can be transmitted. Heat transfer can occur through three basic modes: conduction, convection, and radiation—all of which can be facilitated through the medium of air. Air also enables the easy transmission of the oscillating or fluctuating magnetic and electric disturbances that are perceived as light. Sound can be characterized as pressure-driven convection and can move through any medium that has a compressible component and although it can be propagated through much denser materials, the final transmission to the human ear is typically through air.12 Thus a control of air affords control over heat flow, light, and sound as well.

Control and manipulation of air can be seen as a characteristic of inside. Although outside has more contributing attributes than simply allowing air to flow unimpeded, utilizing airflow as an indicator of outside begins to delineate its boundaries. With this simple definition, aspects of inside can be stretched to encompass natural environments as well such as caves or groves of trees—places where airflow is mitigated and thus the sense of outside is somewhat weakened.

Mediation between humans and their environment through control of airflow was more important in more severe climates, but present in most regionally adapted uses of the tectonic building elements. Gottfried Semper acknowledges that regional adaptations of the tectonic building elements were necessitated due to the wide range of climates that humans began to occupy.

According to how different human societies developed under the varied influences of climate, natural surroundings, social relations, and different racial dispositions, the

5 combinations in which the four elements of architecture were arranged also had to change, with some elements becoming more developed while others receded into the background. At the same time the different technical skills of man became organized according to these elements: ceramics and afterwards metal works around the hearth, water and masonry works around the mound, carpentry around the roof and its accessories. But what primitive technique evolved from the enclosure? None other than the art of the wall fitter (Wandbereiter), that is, the weaver of mats and carpets.13

The tectonic elements of architecture served important functional roles as environmental mediators. Pressure, humidity, and temperature fluctuations differ widely across the globe and different strategies were employed to exercise control over the air that transmits these fluctuations. Egyptian architect Hassan Fathy described this regional tendency. “For example, in architecture, the element of heat would, as a force, create a different form than would the element of cold. We would not expect an Arab in the desert to have a Swiss chalet with a gabled roof to run off rain and snow, because he has no rain or snow; he sleeps on the roof.”14 Each element of architecture; hearth, roof, enclosure, and mound; became important functionally and poetically in defining the architectural style of a region.

Although all forms of regional adaptation placed the architectural elements as mediators between the inside and the outside, a certain amount of the outside was always allowed in. Of necessity, outside airflow was harnessed for cooling and smoke removal. Due to this reliance on outside airflow, the extreme inside condition remained relatively small, while the surrounding transitional spaces—spaces neither inside nor outside—became the primary mode of exploration and poetic expression in architecture.

André Potvin wrote about the potential of transitional spaces such as courts, passages, arcades, and atria, to facilitate poetic expression and environmental diversity in architecture.

Whereas environmental determinism creates uniformity, environmental diversity increases the morphological possibilities of architecture and urban form. A rich environmental diversity can therefore be achieved within the variables of architecture by subtle articulations between interior and exterior environments. Transitional spaces

6 such as passages, courtyards, and especially arcades, have proved to be efficient means of providing this continuous diversity by favoring environmental diversity and progressive adaptation of the body to avoid any discomfort that may arise through abrupt environmental transients.15

These transitional spaces carry with them a certain tension. This is expressed in the following quote from Gaston Bachelard:

Outside and inside are both intimate—they are always ready to be reversed, to exchange their hostility. If there exists a borderline surface between such an inside and outside, this surface is painful on both sides… The center of ‘being-there’ wavers and trembles. Intimate space loses its clarity; while exterior space loses its void, void being the raw material of possibility of being. We are banished from the realm of possibility. 16

The description of the borderline as being a surface is perhaps better applied to the metaphysical separation between inside and outside. The physical separation can be more aptly expressed as a gradient of transitional spaces that combine aspects of both inside and outside. These transitional spaces delicately capture that poetic tension of the delineating surface and expand it into inhabitable space.

Traditional Japanese architecture is an example of how these transitional spaces were incorporated into the regional adaptation of architectural elements. The shinden style has long been praised for its poetic elegance and a strong connection to nature. This style became accepted for aristocratic mansions sometime around the eleventh century. This style utilized large reticulated shutters (shitomido) that were composed of upper and lower parts that could swing up or be moved away. Full height blinds made by threading together thin strips of bamboo (misu) were used as a second barrier allowing flexibility in how much of the outside was allowed in. “When the shutters were opened and blinds rolled up, a continuum between interior and exterior space was created. When it snowed, for example, the white garden landscape could be enjoyed from within the house.”17

This traditional architecture can be seen as providing a balance between functional environmental mediation and poetic expression. However, as Lisa Heschong points out

7 in her book Thermal Delight in Architecture, these building methods did not attempt to provide complete control over environmental conditions nor did they attempt to be the sole providers of human comfort.

The Japanese have notoriously unheatable houses. They traditionally preferred to design their houses to be cool and airy in the summer and then to get by in the winter with localized ways to heat the body. Smallest of all means is the kairo, a little case carried around in pockets or between layers of clothes that contains a warm charcoal ember. The habachi is a small pot of charcoal that is carried around from room to room to warm the hands. The kotatsu is a foot heater that can be shared by a number of feet… Perhaps the most important as a social center for the Japanese are the hot baths.18

Traditional Japanese building methods placed architectural elements as mediators that stabilized and allowed for selective control over outside forces, but the extreme sense of inside was achieved through thermal means that had no requisite relationship with those architectural elements. This reliance on means outside of the building itself for providing necessary comfort freed traditional Japanese architecture and other traditional architectural styles from the unrealistic burden of acting alone as the determiner of interior environmental comfort, allowing it to achieve a better balance between function and poetry.

This related-but-not-reliant relationship between inside and the tectonic building elements is important to remember as the history of building elements and the attitudes that surround them continues to unfold.

THE MANUFACTURED ENVIRONMENT

Open fireplaces were the predominant form of inside control for most of human history. Lisa Heschong describes how the inefficiency of these open hearths kept thermal control and the extreme inside relatively small in most cultures.

In Europe, as late as the middle ages it was still common practice to have an open fire in the center of a room with the smoke escaping out a hole in the roof gable. Such

8 fireplaces were enormously inefficient, causing as many heating problems as they solved. Flames were more valued than embers, but the large open fires consumed great quantities of oxygen, pulling the cold outside air in through the cracks of the building as quickly as the heated air escaped up the chimney hole.19

These open fires were also ineffective in removing smoke, which limited their use for heating and predominantly relegated them to a means of cooking. Early chimneys began to appear regularly in the twelfth century but also did little to reduce interior smoke problems. It was only near the end of the eighteenth century that significant improvements were made in fireplace design with Benjamin Franklin’s Pennsylvania Fireplace with its ability to heat an unsealed room and Count Rumford’s introduction of a smoke shelf to the open fireplace. 20

New understandings of thermodynamics began to inspire the development of convection-driven ventilation. By the early nineteenth century incorrect notions of how diseases like tuberculosis were spread, and the industrial revolution’s harnessing of steam and then electric powered ventilation systems, had lead to widespread reliance on mechanical ventilation in order to seal off the inside from the outside. Heating and ventilating could be combined into a single system by the late nineteenth century.21 With the addition of large-scale electrical air conditioning in the early twentieth century, the ability to control the airflow that contributes to thermal comfort had dramatically changed in a relatively short period of time.

One of the perceived advantages of these new technologies was the ability to spread this thermal comfort through inertial air control to larger and larger spaces. In a physical sense, the inside expanded. In a metaphysical sense, the inside lost its traditional intimacy. The hearth element was no longer a physically necessary part of architectural building elements. The elements of roof, enclosure, and mound, that Gottfried Semper identified as evolving from a need to protect the hearth were now being used to contain a manufactured environment created by technology that had no tectonic language and no real relationship with the other building elements. As Michelle Addington identifies, “the mechanical and electrical systems that provided heat, light and air or removed excess heat, humidity and odors were comprised of discrete components that had no requisite relationship with the building structure.”22

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Tracing this important change in architectural history, Michelle Addington writes, “the development of environmental technologies, particularly HVAC, during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries is widely credited with introducing comfort while simultaneously freeing the building from its role as environmental mediator.”23 The role of the architectural building elements changed from keeping the outside out to keeping the inside in.

However, maintaining this new manufactured environment brought with it several negative side effects. A positivist approach to the application of these technologies in architecture led to the assumption that ‘ideal’ comfort should be provided at all times. André Potvin reflected on the repercussions of this assumption. “The process of mechanization of architecture and movement, which began with the Industrial Revolution, has reduced the degree of environmental diversity in architecture and urban environments. The quest for internal/external continuity is at the centre of urban history and, in particular, the problem of public versus private spaces.”24

Since the introduction of the manufactured environment, this internal/external continuity has often been addressed in a purely visual manner through the use of building materials that came into widespread use in during the same industrial revolution that devised the manufactured environment. Steel could replace the carpentry of the roof and frame, and glass could replace the woven mat of the enclosure. All at once the human experience included spaces that could see the outside through large panes of glass supported by thin steel structures while simultaneously benefiting from some airflow and thermal control traditionally found only near the hearth of a building. However, to maintain the expanded inside, this continuity was of necessity only visual. Air did not flow from the outside to the inside. Outside sounds were silenced, replaced only by the vibrations of the electrical world.

In his book The Eyes of the Skin, Juhani Pallasmaa grieves the silencing of the human senses in modern western architectural practice. "Modernist design at large has housed the intellect and the eye, but it has left the body and the others senses, as well as our memories, imagination and dreams, homeless."25

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Nicolas Michelin echoes similar sentiments in speaking of the increasing amounts of acoustic and thermal insulation that is assumed to be in pursuit of human comfort, but in fact can isolate and alienate the individual from their society.

Why such enthusiasm, such effort, and such expense to perfectly insulate the individual from his neighbor, from the street; from the weather outside, indeed from all exterior life? Of course, hearing too much from one’s neighbor can be unpleasant, but not hearing anything at all, not even the sounds of the city, leads to an aloneness that is arguably worse. In the same way, not being able to see if it is clear or cloudy because of the fixed, tinted windows and the air conditioning in one’s office is a form of brutal isolation.26

The perceived ability to manufacture the human comfort has led to an expectation that good architecture maintains what is essentially a neutral environment. Speaking specifically of the thermal effects of this regulated environment, Lisa Heschong argues that seeking the ‘unnoticeable’ deprives occupants of thermal variety that can enrich the human experience.

There is an underlying assumption that the best thermal environment never needs to be noticed and that once an objectively ‘comfortable’ thermal environment has been provided, all of our thermal needs will have been met. A parallel might be drawn to the provision of our nutritional needs. Food is as basic to our survival as is our thermal environment. Just as thermal needs have been studied, so scientists have also studied the basic nutritional requirements of human beings. Our level of understanding makes it theoretically possible to provide for all of our nutritional needs with a few pills and injections. However, while eating is a basic physiological necessity, no one would overlook the fact that it also plays a profound role in the cultural life of a people. A few tubes of an astronaut’s nutritious goop are no substitute for a gourmet meal.27

Variety has also been threatened in regional architectural styles as the manufactured environment has allowed the concept of universal architecture to spread across all climate zones. When the purpose was protecting, the architectural elements varied depending on environmental forces. When the purpose changed to containing, external environmental forces were not influential in shaping how the tectonic elements came

11 together. Typical office buildings, hospitals, schools, and even homes that rely on the manufactured environment rarely differ stylistically from region to region and when they do it can often be dismissed as sentimental loyalty to what has become mere decoration as opposed to environmental necessity.

Even some of the initial benefits derived from the manufactured environment disappeared over time. The energy crisis of the 1970s and the ensuing switch from large volumes and constant delivery rates to smaller volumes and variable rates diminished the health benefits and comfort of the manufactured environment. Describing this shift in mechanical systems, Michelle Addington explains, “The inability of the contemporary HVAC systems to maintain neutrality is often blamed on inadequate control systems or on poorly designed envelopes. Indeed, the variably of the conditions on the interior is more likely than not greater than those of the exterior.”28 Despite the reduction of the intended benefits, a relentless dedication to the idea of containing the inside continues to drive an obsession with the building envelope.

There are some architects who seek to achieve a better balance between inside and outside and the poetry that is contained within each extreme. Exploration of the transitional spaces is an indication of this pursuit.

French architects Anne Lacaton and Jean-Philippe Vassal are among a number of current practitioners who seek to achieve this balance by way of decoupling architecture with complete environmental control. In an article about a house in Keremma that features layers of removable protections from the elements, it is mentioned that, “to Lacaton, these very particular qualities of nature are never entirely benign, and architecture is the discipline that adapts them to human use. Whether on the edge of desert or ocean, architecture starts by using what shelter occurs naturally and adding whatever is necessary to tame, but not exclude, the elements.”29

Echoing this attitude, Juhani Pallasmaa suggests that this balance can be achieved through looking to design paradigms that do not rely on mechanical manufacturing of a neutral environment.

12 The inevitable and overdue ecological perspective, a conscious and controlled interaction of nature’s systems and human lifestyles and constructions also calls for strategies that have been essential ingredients of landscape architecture. The nature- architecture relationship must by necessity be expanded beyond aesthetic considerations to acknowledge the reality of physical and biological processes.30

The manufactured inside may need to recede in favor of more transitional spaces in order to allow architecture to better mediate the relationship between inside and outside, reintroducing some of the poetic and metaphysical aspects of human interaction with the surrounding environment.

13 ILLUSTRATIONS

14 OUTSIDE INSIDE

FIRST SIGN OF HUMAN SETTLEMENT

INTRODUCTION SEMPERIAN TECTONIC ELEMENTS

REGIONAL ADAPTATION OF TECTONIC ELEMENTS

THE MANUFACTURED ENVIRONMENT

15 OUTSIDE INSIDE

FIRST SIGN OF HUMAN SETTLEMENT

OUTSIDE INSIDE

INTRODUCTION SEMPERIAN TECTONIC ELEMENTS & REGIONAL ADAPTATION OF TECTONIC ELEMENTS

OUTSIDE INSIDE

THE MANUFACTURED ENVIRONMENT

The above spectrums are meant to represent the mix of inside and outside that ‘buildings’ made available for humans during each stage in the chronology of architectural practice. The claim of this thesis is that environmental variety and diversity in the human experience was depleted by the introduction of the manufactured environment.

16 a

This diagram is meant to illustrate the inside/outside zoning of a traditional Japanese house. A reliance on outside ventilation and the use of expanded thresholds to mitigate against extreme conditions allowed for a strong connection between inside and outside. Environmental diversity in the human experience was high as the inside condition remained relatively small.

17 b

18 c

19 d

The regional adaptation found in Moorish architecture of Alhambra provides another example of high environmental diversity in an older architectural heritage. The use of water and tall spaces in combination with thick stone walls allowed occupants to find comfort by moving throughout the complex of buildings and gardens to find optimal conditions depending on the time of day and the season of the year.

20 e

Holkham provides a good example of the use of microclimates within a building. The control and manipulation of air differs throughout the building with some spaces achieving a much more ‘inside’ feel than others. Although the interior air quality may have been much lower due to the use of fire, environmental diversity could be achieved without even leaving the building due to the selective heating afforded by pre-industrial revolution technologies.

21 f

22 g

23 h

Didier Faustino visited the University of Cincinnati on 27 May 2009. Near the end of his lecture, he presented a teahouse project entitled Sky is the Limit that was built in 2008 on the border between North and South Korea.

Paraphrasing his remarks, he mentioned that one of the lessons they learned in this project was that things are not always as they appear. The design intent was to make one of the two volumes feel dangerous and the other more secure and safe. The intended ‘dangerous’ box is open on all sides that is suspended twenty meters above the ground. The intended ‘safe’ box was right next to it and had the exact same dimensions but enclosed the occupants in wood and glass. He said that after it was built it was clear that the ‘dangerous’ box was much more welcoming than the ‘safe’ box. Didier implied that this is because the ‘dangerous’ side gave you control while the ‘safe’ side cut you off and controlled you.

This precedent is an interesting study in human reaction and lends itself well to this thesis’s desire to understanding what architecture does to the human experience as it attempts to protect the inside from the natural world.

24 i

This project by Shigeru Ban, like many others in his portfolio, exhibit an attitude that tends to reject the standard implementation of the manufactured environment. The poetic attitude of this project demonstrates an inclusive relationship with the outside environment. The environmental diversity is not only diverse but also variable as the entire lower floor can be opened to the outside world.

25 j

26 k

27 l

Herz Jesu Kirche in Munich, designed by Allmann Sattler Wapner Architects, features large doors that are opened on holy days. A structurally separate glass cube surrounds inner cube of pale maple lamella. Glass panels are transparent near the large doors and become increasingly opaque as they near the altar at the back of the church. Continuous skylights allow glass panels to be backlit. Glass wall is suspended from roof frame by steel rods and wind-braced with glass buttressing. All of these elements combine to create a more versatile dialogue between inside and outside.

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PROJECT

The assertion of this thesis is that poetic and functional needs can be captured and balanced through the use of transitional spaces. These transitional spaces rely on the interplay between inside and outside and increase environmental diversity in the human experience. In order to test this hypothesis, a design process can be implemented that emphasizes implications of the thesis argument. The following are several design implications of this thesis:

• Transitional Spaces—a range of spaces and extended threshold conditions that explore the inside/outside border • Variable airflow control—airflow (heat transfer, light, sound) can be used as a tool to delineate between inside and outside • Centrality—some sense of hearth to examine poetic implications of architectural traditions before the introduction of the manufactured environment • Passive climate control—by utilizing passive design principles, the project is potentially allowed more morphological options and environmental diversity • Acoustic creativity—some sense of play seems to be implied as opposed to sealing off the negative and positive outside sounds • Seeking the site’s natural strengths—adapting human use to the particular qualities of the site • Emphasis on sensory experience—in order to explore the poetic potential of the project, some sense of phenomenology should be used to highlight the inside and outside existential conditions

Many of these design implications include the following basic concept: allowing more of the outside in. The inclusion of more outside becomes a challenge in sites that present negative outside conditions. The Fairview Park site in Cincinnati was chosen because of its positive relationship with a vegetative world, good views of the city, and a challenging

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acoustic situation. The I-75 corridor, queen city viaduct, and freight yards below combine to create an abnormally high amount of noise pollution.

A nature center as a program type also presents a challenge in this strong acoustic situation as a desire to push visitors out into the vegetative environment is balanced with a need for spaces where instruction can be comfortably heard.

SITE OBSERVATIONS

Fairview Park is located northwest from Downtown Cincinnati and southwest from the University of Cincinnati. It is surrounded by typical Cincinnati ‘urban suburbs’—a somewhat uneasy mix of homes in various stages of upkeep ranging from quite nice to abandoned. The park is a curved piece of land (resembling a backwards “j”) with a one- way road that curves from the northwest to the southeast. On the southeast corner there is a small public pool, basketball court, and playing field. The entire park is a steep hill and not at all ideal for a building. This could be a contributing factor to why the park was created. Judging by the shape and size of the park, it seems to be more of a preserved ‘leftover’ than a planned intervention.

The name of the park becomes quite obvious as visitors walk along the sidewalk that runs next to the road. Small trees and bushes are cut back near the southeast entrance to the park revealing a distant view of Downtown Cincinnati. This southeast viewing area seems to be more popular and would generally be considered much more pleasant than the southwest viewing area due to a more direct view of the city and much less acoustic interference.

As visitors continue to walk along the sidewalk, the trees and undergrowth mostly obscure their view. Determined visitors see the Cincinnati Museum Center and river during the cold months of the year when the leaves have fallen. Downhill from the road, most of the trees are smaller with thick undergrowth. Older-growth trees are concentrated uphill from the road. This area uphill from the road is also much steeper with loose rock and small cliffs.

30

There is an area just below the road in the southwest corner of the park where the trees and bushes have been cleared to reveal a view of the Queen City Viaduct, the I-75 corridor, freight yards, industrial buildings, and the mill creek. This viewing area provides a good view of some industrial aspects of the city but does not have a view of the downtown area because of the scraggly trees to the south. It is also the location of the ‘hinge’ between the western facing hill and the southern facing hill. The most distinctive feature of this viewing area is the cacophony of noise created by cars and trains that assaults visitors.

Another distinctive feature of this site is a long staircase on the western facing hill that connects the park to the residential area below. It provides a good opportunity to experience the lower hill and to reveal that it is uniformly covered with thicker undergrowth and smaller trees. The staircase used to connect to the upper residential area as well, but that portion of the staircase has not been maintained. The park acts as a border area between the two neighborhoods as opposed to an insertion in the middle of one community.

It is vital to note that although this area has been set aside as a park and a few areas of narrow turf are maintained next to the sidewalk, the majority of the parkland is left alone as far as apparent upkeep goes. There are some beautiful trees on the uphill side of the road but those trees are few and far between. The trees that are ‘between’ tend could be described as scraggly and small. Few if any of the trees on the downhill side of the road would be considered impressive for Cincinnati that has no shortage of large beautiful trees. The trees and bushes that are cut back to reveal the views are done so in a relatively crude manner and litter can be seen throughout the undergrowth. The vegetative environment of Fairview Park could thus be considered to have potential as an inspiring location for a nature center as opposed to being an already existing wonder of the Cincinnati park system.

The climate of Cincinnati is also important to note in view of some of the passive comfort control design implications of this thesis. Cincinnati is in what is identified by Norbert Lechner in Heating Cooling Lighting as zone three. This means that proper heating and cooling are both recommended with more heating degree days than cooling

31

degree days. The ‘comfortable period’ is identified as being only 14% of the time. Relative humidity is high throughout the year with relatively low wind speeds.31 This would tend to suggest that a typical approach to providing comfort would allow for natural ventilation methods to be accompanied by air-conditioning for at least part of the year. Heating of some sort would be necessary if the building is expected to be occupied year-round.

PROGRAMMATIC NEEDS

Functionally, this program is envisioned to operate within the same context as the Trailside Nature Center located in Burnet Woods in Cincinnati. This nature center and others like it operate as educational locations for school children and other organizations to visit. The demands on the space are low but they provide a destination for visiting school groups and offer opportunity for education.

Given the site location and conditions offering a mix of a potentially interesting vegetative ecosystem combined the with the views and sounds of the urban world, it seems that an emphasis on how humans interact with the natural world would be a good focus for the educational programs that visit. By featuring innovative and less- common passive climate control techniques in combination with transitional spaces and micro-climates, the building itself could serve as didactic architecture.

Most of the transitional spaces that the thesis idea demands could thus be tailored to fulfill some sort of instructional role. These spaces will receive more attention as the design process continues to reveal the nature of each space and how they relate to one anther.

DESIGN PROCESS

In an effort to curtail the heavy formal leanings of the designer, this project has been envisioned as a sequence of spaces. The intent is to design one space at a time and to limit attempts to create an overall scheme first as this tends to lead to a formal solution

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that is superfluous to the intents of the thesis design implications. With this concentration on spaces, the incorporation of passive climate control strategies can also be more easily implemented as opposed to having to try to tack them onto the pre- existing constraints of scheme devised at the site level and then detailed at progressively smaller scales.

It was, however, necessary to place the project somewhere on the site and to take an attitude about the general level of intervention that would be necessary. To this end, the following constraints and site observations were used to determine the location of the first space: • To utilize passive solar principles, large portions of the building should be south facing. • The majority of the noise pollution comes from the west in the direction of the Queen City Viaduct. • Views of downtown are to the southeast at approximately 30° east of south. • A desire to build needs to be balanced with impact on the existing and future vegetation—in considering where to build, realities of the building process should be taken into consideration. • Ideally the building will not encroach upon the surrounding residences— so much of the south facing hill is less desirable because of the proximity of the homes below and the hill above the road is less desirable because any building might impede the view of the homes above. • While much of the building could conceivably ‘float’ above the landscape, some bit of it should probably burrow into the hillside in order to experiment with how that affects the sensation of inside.

With these criteria in mind, the first space was placed just east of the ‘hinge’ that joins the west facing and south facing hills. It is dug into the south facing hill just below the road adjacent to the existing southwest viewing area.

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SEQUENCE OF SPACES

Whether approaching from the north or the east, visitors to this building will already be exposed to one of the more interesting aspects of the site: acoustic bombardment. The walk approaching the building from either direction gradually but noticeably increases the volume of noise that filters up from the automotive world below. Due to the massing of the building being placed downhill from the sidewalk in combination with the curve of the road and veil of trees, much of the building will not be visible until visitors are right on top of it.

Although a narrow staircase along the western side of the building exists, the primary access route to the main portions of the building is along a path that originates to the north of the existing view area about 120 feet from the north corner of the building. Proceeding north and then doubling back and curving with the bend of the hill to mitigate the steepness of the topography, this path becomes an accessible introduction to the vegetative ambiance of the site. Instruction and observation could conceivably begin along this path before the nature center is even visible.

As the path curves to the east, the building becomes visible. A small grove of planted trees representing a cross-section of native and non-native trees found in Cincinnati defines the western edge of a terraced courtyard. The courtyard focuses on a water fountain that draws water from the surrounding area and maximizes its effects on atmosphere and acoustics by splashing down several terraced pools that follow the natural topography of the site. The splashing water creates mist and noise, revealing the environmental manipulation possibilities that water has when it is included in the design of a building. Due to a desire to keep the nature center somewhat passive in nature, it is assumed that this water fountain may not be able to flow year-round unless a nearby source of groundwater is located.

Continuing through this courtyard, the entrance to the building is found and access into the ‘comfort controlled’ or most inside portions of the building is obtained. Two tall parallel walls buttressed by a large support beam are surrounded by an atrium of glass. Glass facing the east, west, south, and sky work in combination with a thick concrete floor with large stone aggregate to create a passive solar climate control system. The

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floor’s heat exchange is much slower than most materials and acts as a thermal mass. This tried and proven method of capturing heat from the sun and slowly radiating it out during the night to be ready to cool the space during the day allows the interior space to be more thermally regulated. The large glass enclosure allows the sun’s rays to enter without allowing the thermal mass to be cooled through convection.

Exterior louvers on all sides are positioned to block the summer sun and allow the lower angle of the winter sun. Louvers suspended above the sloping glass ceiling filter the sun’s rays, washing the interior space with the even northern light year round.

A narrow passageway with a glass ceiling leads to the most inside of the spaces in the nature center. This passageway thus maintains an interesting interplay between inside and outside as tall walls cut off views to the outside but the position of the sun and disposition of the weather are still impressed upon those in the space.

The most inside space is located in the most northern part of the building where the walls are surrounded by the natural berm of the existing hillside. It is purposefully smaller than other spaces to play with the sense of being safe and secure. Tall walls on the east, west, and north, limit views from this space. A low ceiling covers half of the space with the other half extending up to allow for a large north clerestory window. The south delineator is the focus of this space. In traditional architectural lineages this space would contain the hearth element. In an attempt to combine traditional solutions with technological advances and the potential negative effects that an open fire can have on indoor air quality, the life-better understandings of indoor air quality, the “reviving, warming, and food-preparing flame” has been replaces with another climate controlling element—the ceramic monolith.

The Center for Environmental and Energy Research at Alfred University is currently working with a materials research program aimed at the development of passive humidity-control. This research initiative lead by Dr. William Carty has sought to control the pore size and volume of ceramic monoliths. They offer the following explanation on their website:

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Ceramic monoliths offer a unique opportunity as a passive humidity control material provided the pore size and pore structure can be engineered. The objective of this study is to determine the feasibility of generating ceramic monoliths with controlled pore size in the range appropriate for the condensation of water at a specific humidity level. It is also necessary that the pore volume in the sample be sufficient to contain a reasonable volume of condensed water. A unique approach to porosity control in ceramic materials is proposed that exploits the phase separation observed when two or more incompatible polymeric additives are used in a ceramic particle suspension.

It is proposed to exploit polymer-polymer incompatibility (phase separation) to construct the desired pore structure. The introduction of a non-compatible polymer to a polyelectrolyte dispersed ceramic particle suspension provides an opportunity for phase separation. It is proposed that the pore size can be controlled by the molecular weight of the added polymer and that the pore connectivity can be controlled by the polymer concentration.

It is expected that the generation of ceramic monoliths with controlled pore size and sufficient pore volume will serve as passive humidity control materials. Passive humidity control materials offer the potential for significant savings in both heating and cooling costs, of which cooling cost reduction is more obvious.

Although this research trajectory is still in progress, the idea alone is enough for the purposes of this design process. This idea being that a climate control object that is approachable and can be placed as a central element in an architectural composition. The flames of the past were replaced with the mechanical and electrical climate controllers of the manufactured environment. These new technologies are often housed in basements or outside not only for their own efficiency, but also because their vibrations are foreign and unappealing. They have no requisite relationship with the architectural building elements. The ceramic monolith can be approached and easily incorporated with architectural building elements because it is of a similar ‘non- mechanical’ and solid nature.

Lighting for this inside space comes from the large clerestory window on the north, allowing cool blue northern light to wash along the face of the monolith. This inside space is given a narrow feeling proportion by two tall walls that surround the space on

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the east and the west. These walls continue past the monolith without touching it to allow reflected southern light from the adjacent space to wash along them as it enters this inside space—highlighting the monolith as a separate entity from the building structure. Benches are set up in this space to allow for instruction and observation.

Benches are also set up in the space defined by two tall walls and surrounding glass. This space is the largest sound-mitigated room and would probably be the most utilized for instruction and activities. Due to the height of this space and the variable protection from the sun provided by the walls and exterior louvers, it is conceivable that microclimates would be readily observable within this space. Views from this space are primarily of the vegetative environment with limited views of the freight yards and surrounding urban industrial buildings during the winter months when the leaves have fallen.

The external louvers on the south are separated from the south glass wall so as to create a passageway between the glass and the louvers. This space can be seen as an arcade as it is partially protected from the direct rays of the sun but still left open to the natural changes in temperature, pressure, and humidity. This arcade continues to the west ending in a pier that thrusts visitors out into nature. The arcade and pier are wide enough to allow for benches and small groups to gather for further instruction. The arcade and pier define the southern edge of the courtyard area.

Continuing east through the arcade, visitors end up beneath a cantilevered structure that is meant to experiment with multiple aspects of being outside. Entering this floating structure via a near the end of the arcade or via the accessible ramp that begins near the road above, visitors find that not only are walls and ceiling removed at times to allow in the outside, but also the floor.

Similar to Didier Faustino’s Sky is the Limit project, the far end of this floating structure features structural grating on all sides including up and down. By restricting airflow as little as possible and floating the space above the treetops, an extreme feeling of outside can be achieved. This structure is thirty degrees east of south in order to point directly at the view of downtown Cincinnati.

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Within this cantilevered structure there is also a glass box meant to contrast the variable of airflow control in experiencing outside. This glass box is not protected by louvers and will thus be somewhat uncomfortable on most sunny days, but its purpose is for observation and experimentation as opposed to long-term occupation. The back end of this box has some exterior coverings in order to allow visitors to contrast the sensation of feeling more enclosed to the feeling of being out at the edge of the box where only the cage surrounds the body.

CONCLUSIONS

Many of the physical and metaphysical aspects of inside an outside would probably be better explored in a built project. Although the nature of inside and outside may not have been fully revealed, applying design implications derived from the thesis research has successfully introduced environmental diversity into the experience of the proposed project. Seeking to include a variety of inside/outside mixes has allowed the project to find poetic expression as well as satisfying functional environmental control requirements.

Reliance on natural systems to mediate against outside forces as opposed to the continued containment of the manufactured environment represents a positive way to uphold sustainable ideals while in pursuit poetic expression in architecture.

1 Gaston Bachelard, The Poetics of Space. Translated by Maria Jolas (Boston: Beacon Press, 1964), 211. 2 Gaston Bachelard, The Poetics of Space. Translated by Maria Jolas (Boston: Beacon Press, 1964), 212. 3 Gaston Bachelard, The Poetics of Space. Translated by Maria Jolas (Boston: Beacon Press, 1964), 229. 4 Juhani Pallasmaa, The Eyes of the Skin: Architecture and the Senses, 2nd ed. (Academy Press, 2005), 17. 5 Juhani Pallasmaa, “New Architectural Horizons,” Architectural Design 77, no. 2, (2007): 21. 6 Alberto Pérez-Gómez, Architecture and the Crisis of Modern Science (Cambridge: the MIT Press, 1983), 11. 7 Louis Kahn, “Form and Design” (1960) in Louis I Kahn and Alessandro Latour, Writings, Lectures, Interviews (New York: Rizzoli,1991), 116. 8 Steen Eiler Rasmussen, Experiencing Architecture (Cambridge: the MIT Press, 1959), 9.

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9 Hassan Fathy quoted in Hassan Fathy by J.M. Richards, Ismail Serageldin, and Darl Rasofer (London: Concept Media Pte Ltd, 1985), 148. 10 Gottfried Semper, The Four Elements of Architecture and Other Writings. Translated by Harry Francis Mallgrave and Wolfgang Herrmann (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989), 102. 11 Gottfried Semper, The Four Elements of Architecture and Other Writings. Translated by Harry Francis Mallgrave and Wolfgang Herrmann (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989), 102. 12 Michelle Addington and Daniel Schodek, Smart Materials and Technologies: for the Architecture and Design Professionals (New York: Architectural Press, 2005), 54. 13 Gottfried Semper, The Four Elements of Architecture and Other Writings. Translated by Harry Francis Mallgrave and Wolfgang Herrmann (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989), 103. 14 Hassan Fathy from remarks recorded by the Aga Khan Award for Architecture at Aiglemont, France, April 1978 quoted in Hassan Fathy by J.M. Richards, Ismail Serageldin, and Darl Rasofer (London: Concept Media Pte Ltd, 1985), 149. 15 André Potvin “Intermediate Environments” in Environmental Diversity in Architecture edited by Koen Steemers and Mary Ann (New York: Taylor & Francis, 2004), 121. 16 Gaston Bachelard, The Poetics of Space. Translated by Maria Jolas (Boston: Beacon Press, 1964), 218. 17 Michio Fujioka, Japanese Residences and Gardens: A Tradition of Integration. Translated by H. Mack Horton (New York: Kodansha International LTD, 1982), 33. 18 Lisa Heschong, Thermal Delight in Architecture (Cambridge: the MIT Press, 1979), 47. 19 Lisa Heschong, Thermal Delight in Architecture (Cambridge: the MIT Press, 1979), 12. 20Michelle Addington, “The History and Future of Ventilation” Indoor Air Quality Handbook (New York : McGraw-Hill, 2001), 2.4-2.7. “Contingent Behaviours,” Architectural Design 79, no. 3 (2009): 13. 21Michelle Addington, “The History and Future of Ventilation” Indoor Air Quality Handbook (New York : McGraw-Hill, 2001), 2.4-2.7. “Contingent Behaviours,” Architectural Design 79, no. 3 (2009): 13. 22 Michelle Addington, “Contingent Behaviours,” Architectural Design 79, no. 3 (2009): 13. 23 Michelle Addington, “Contingent Behaviours,” Architectural Design 79, no. 3 (2009): 13. 24 André Potvin “Intermediate Environments” in Environmental Diversity in Architecture edited by Koen Steemers and Mary Ann (New York: Taylor & Francis, 2004), 121. 25 Juhani Pallasmaa, The Eyes of the Skin: Architecture and the Senses, 2nd ed. (Academy Press, 2005), 19. 26 Nicolas Michelin, Nouveaux Paris La Ville Et Ses Possibles (Editions du Pavillon de l’Arsenal. 2005), 20-22. 27 Lisa Heschong, Thermal Delight in Architecture (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1979), 17. 28 Michelle Addington, “Contingent Behaviours,” Architectural Design 79, no. 3 (2009): 14. 29 Jeremy Melvin, “House in Keremma,” Architectural Design 76, no. 4 (2006): 118-121. 30 Juhani Pallasmaa, “New Architectural Horizons,” Architectural Design 77, no. 2, (2007): 23. 31 Norbert Lechner, Heating, Cooling, Lighting: Design Methods for Architects. 2nd edition (New York: John Wiley & Sons, Inc. 2001), 86-87.

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ILLUSTRATIONS a Diagram created from sectional drawing found in: Teiji Itoh and Yukio Futagawa, Traditional Japanese Houses (New York: Rizzoli, 1980) 239. b Photographs from: Teiji Itoh and Yukio Futagawa, Traditional Japanese Houses (New York: Rizzoli, 1980) 120, 169, 290. c Photographs from: Michael Jacobs, Alhambra (New York: Rizzoli, 2000) 14, 36, 53. d Diagram created from sectional drawing found in: Michael Jacobs, Alhambra (New York: Rizzoli, 2000) 317. e Diagram created from sectional drawing found in: Leo Schmidt, Christian Keller and Polly Feversham, eds. Holkham (New York: Prestel, 2005) 140. f Photographs from: Leo Schmidt, Christian Keller and Polly Feversham, eds. Holkham (New York: Prestel, 2005) 23, 104, 188. g Photographs from: sky is the limit, www.mesarchitecture.org. h Diagram derived from photographs from: sky is the limit, www.mesarchitecture.org. i Diagram created from sectional drawing found in: Matilda McQuaid, Shigeru Ban (London: Phaidon. 2003) j Photographs from: Matilda McQuaid, Shigeru Ban (London: Phaidon. 2003) k Photographs from: “Herz-Jesu-Kirche in Munchen” Detail v. 41 no. 2 (March 2001) 264-271. l Diagram created from sectional drawing found in: “Herz-Jesu-Kirche in Munchen” Detail v. 41 no. 2 (March 2001) 264-271.

40 46 47 NOISY TRAINS NOISY

NICE VIEW

NOISY CARS NOISY

AR S

48 THE SITE

49 THE SITE

50 51 52 53 54 LONG STAIRCASE

STRONG ACOUSTIC VACANT AWARENESS LOTS OLDER GROWTH TREES STEEP & ROCKY ER

STEEPER HILL TOO CLOSE TO LOWERLO C LO HOMES

VIEWIEWW OFO DOWNTOWNDOOW

The above shows a few of the considerations that played a part in the placement of the project within the Fairview Park area. These considerations were derived from site observations collected through several site visits which included all surrounding streets above and below the park.

The working site model opposite was created to test out site strategy ideas.

55 56 The following were used as initial criteria for evaluation of these site strategies:

Opportunity for use of transitional spaces

Impact on the landscape

Harmony with landscape

Connection with nature

Reaction to acoustic environment

Utilization of views

Ultimately most of these strategies seemed to lean too heavily on formal or morphological solutions. The sequence of spaces strategy was selected to better respond to the environmental diversity aspirations of the thesis argument.

57 58 This model was developed to express some early ideas of creating a diverse environmental experience.

59 60 61 A series of plans and sections were created to get a better feel for how some of the spaces might relate to one another.

62 63 64 This model was created as the final model. It is this model that is described in the ‘project’ part of this document.

65 66 67 68 69 70 1/4” = 1’-0”

71 72 73 74 75 76

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Addington, Michelle, and Daniel Schodek. Smart Materials and Technologies: for the Architecture and Design Professionals. New York: Architectural Press. 2005.

Addington, Michelle. “The History and Future of Ventilation.” Indoor Air Quality Handbook. New York : McGraw-Hill, 2001.

Addington, Michelle. “Contingent Behaviours,” Architectural Design 79, no. 3 (2009): 12- 17.

Addington, Michelle. “Functionality Rather than Good Intentions in Design.” Architectural Design. v. 76 no. 1 (2006). p. 64-5.

Addington, Michelle. “No Building is an Island: a Look at the Different Scales of Energy.” Harvard Design Magazine. no. 26 (Spring-Summer 2007) p. 38-45.

Bachelard, Gaston. The Poetics of Space. Translated by Maria Jolas. Boston: Beacon Press. 1964.

Ban, Shigeru. Shigeru Ban. New York: Princeton Architectural Press. 2001.

Banham, Reyner. The Architecture of the Well-Tempered Environment. second edition. Chicago: the University of Chicago Press,1984.

Fernández-Puertas, Antonio. The Alhambra I: From the Ninth Century to Ysuf I (1354), London: Saqi Books, 1997.

Fitch, J.M. American Building 2: The Environmental Forces that Shape It. New York: Schocken Books, 1972. Fujioka, Michio. Japanese Residences and Gardens: A Tradition of Integration. Translated by H. Mack Horton. New York: Kodansha International LTD. 1982.

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Heschong, Lisa. Thermal Delight in Architecture. Cambridge: the MIT Press. 1979.

Itoh, Teiji, and Yukio Futagawa. Traditional Japanese Houses. New York: Rizzoli, 1980.

Jacobs, Michael. Alhambra, New York: Rizzoli, 2000.

Leatherbarrow, David, and Mohsen Mostafavi. On Weathering. Cambridge: the MIT Press, 1993.

Leatherbarrow, David, and Mohsen Mostafavi. Surface Architecture. Cambridge: the MIT Press 2002.

Lechner, Norbert. Heating, Cooling, Lighting: Design Methods for Architects. 2nd edition. New York: John Wiley & Sons, Inc. 2001.

McQuaid, Matilda. Shigeru Ban. London: Phaidon. 2003

Melvin, Jeremy. “House in Keremma,” Architectural Design 76, no. 4 (2006): 118-121.

Michelin, Nicolas. “The Entropic Label.” Athens 2002 Absolute Realism. SADAS-PEA (Association of Greek Architects) & the Commissioners. 2002. pp. 180-7.

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Rasmussen, Steen Eiler. Experiencing Architecture, Cambridge: the MIT Press. 1959.

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Semper, Gottfried. The Four Elements of Architecture and Other Writings. Translated by Harry Francis Mallgrave and Wolfgang Herrmann. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989.

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