This thesis examines the architectural magazine's contribution to the writing of modern architectural history using the magazine Architectural Design (AD) as a case study. There are four main narratives to this research, one "grand" and three "micro"; The overarching grand narrative (or meta-narrative) is the proposal to replace the existing art historical formulation of architectural history with a more holistic understanding of history based on power struggles in the field of architecture. This strategy is derived from an application of Pierre Bourdieu's theoretical framework to the field of architectural cultural production. The position of the architectural magazine as an institution in the construction of the architectural profession, and the ever-changing definition of architecture is one underlying micro-narrative. The introduction discusses the role that the architectural magazine played in the emergence of the modern architectural profession, alongside other institutions, specifically the academy and professional bodies. The central, and largest, micro-narrative is a critical history of the magazine Architectural Design from 1954 to 1972. Brief biographies of its editors and a background to the magazine from its inception in 1930 up to 1953 precede this by way of contextualisation. This history of AD discusses the content and context of the magazine and traces its shift from a professional architectural magazine to an autonomous. "little" magazine, focussing on several key structural themes that underpin the magazine. Throughout, the role that AD played in the promotion of the post-war neo-avant-garde, in particular the New Brutalists and Archigram, is documented and the relationships between the small circle of people privileged to produce and contribute to the magazine, and AD's rivalry with the Architectural Review are highlighted. The final micro-narrative is a reading of post-war modem architectural history from 1954 to 1972 through the pages of AD, tracing the rise and demise of modem architecture in terms of three defining shifts from the period evident in the magazine: "high to low"; "building to architecture"; and "hard to soft". This period also coincides exactly with the life of the Pruitt Igoe housing blocks in SI. Louis whose demolition, according to Jencks, represented the death of modern architecture. A growing post-modern sensibility in architecture is manifest in the magazine through an increasing resistance to modernist thinking. This study consciously employs post-modern methodologies to a period of modern architecture in an attempt to disturb modernist mythologies that have ossified into history.

This thesis is an attempt to recover the temporality of architecture. Although many contemporary architects argue their ways of dealing with time in their architecture, their idea of time is confined within narrow-mined assumptions of science, and their methods are locked in the intrinsic limitation of architectural representation. This thesis criticises the idea of time with only successive instants for its incompetence of accommodating our exuberant experience of architecture, and finds the origin of the problem at the conventional architectural representation which cannot show what we are together with, but just what we can confront. As a "research by design", this thesis is led by a desigri experiment, which is simply to represent my office. The experiment tries to catch the time of my office with various strategies, and the theory follows it while weaving a story by analysing and evaluating it. Theoretical arguments, which have been initiated mainly from Deleuze, grope for their way in the dialogue with drawings. The strategy of drawing experiment is to approve material and conceptual substantiality of drawing so that it can 'work' in time. Concerning the material substantiality, physical size, shape, texture and frame of paper, and various qualities of lines and touches are examined. For the conceptual substantiality, metamorphosis of meaning, isolated figures, vibrating picture ground, and forces in drawing are explored. Ironically, the drawing can manifest my office-ness when it is truly itself. Although the experiment may not be executed in a systematic order, I hope that its audience will generate with the drawings his/her own meanings and sensations, which may 'evolve' into his/her architecture.

At the beginning of the 21st century. the challenge of Mexican contemporary architecture is that it requires a different conceptualisation which is not reliant on Western design approaches. It is argued that the resources. values. capacities and priorities of the Global South are very different from those of . the developed Global North. and yet many of the concepts of architecture and sustainability have been uncritically taken from one context to another. The result is that issues of sustainability in the architecture of countries such as Mexico remain under-theorised. The context of scarcity -in natural. human and economic resources of the majority of the population. multicultural diversity. rapid growth and change. and 'chaotic' organisation highlights the very different conditions that exist in the Global South and which demand a new architectonic and urban development based on an alternative model of sustainable design. This thesis proposes that this tension should be addressed in a way that is relevant to these unique local conditions. By defining an Architecture of Scarcity. this thesis aims to develop a potential methodological approach that attempts to address economic. social. environmental and technical issues in a sustainable way based on the idea of scarcity. Architecture of Scarcity is defined as architecture created by the idea of not having sufficient resources to fulfil basic needs. In other words rather than consider architecture from the perspective of commodity and abundant control of resources to produce a 'perfect' product. the thesis recognises the value of the features of production of architecture in a condition of limited in resources and open to 'imperfection'. The thesis first investigates three typical conditions of scarcity production within the Mexican context: the Vernacular. Informal Modernism and Semi-Informal Modernism. In the section Issues of Scarcity it is considered the development of design principles suited to an alternative view of Sustainability which differs from Western concepts. Next these principles are amalgamated as a set of possible Design Tactics and tools to support a revised architectural design process and revised role for the architect. Finally the dynamic nature of the process is captured through the development of a speculative Architecture of Scarcity Game whose aim is to reveal and to make sense of rich possibilities inherent in this design method.

No description available.

Popular ideas advocated in architectural texts often cause terminological and conceptual confusions for architects and mislead them through their polemical language. In this thesis a current architectural theory concerned with Regionalism that has gained strength from the dissatisfaction with the international nature of contemporary architecture is subjected to a critical examination in order to evaluate its status and validity in the field of architecture. The thesis attempts to analyse a variety of concepts embraced by the broad notion of Regionalism and further explore related items such as <I>Regionality</I> and <I>Universality</I> in works of architecture, not with a view to justify the theory of Regionalism, but rather to demystify and evaluate critically their meanings and significance in architecture at a fundamental level that transcends usual discussions of them. Through an examination of this theory, from both a historical and contemporary perpective, regionalism, in architecture, can be regarded as a <I>specious</I> theory where diverse ideologies and theories, are grouped under a convenient name in an attempt to achieve legitimacy. It consists of imaginary areas of conflicts, resulting from false oppositions between, for example, Regional and Universal and the solutions which are being proposed - to overcome these conflicts - are consequently superficial. It is posited, however, as a critical, dialectical, cultural theory; as such it hinders even when it seems to contribute to the architectural discourse. Despite its sophistry, the problem of Regionalism is epistemological relating to some misunderstandings that obscure fundamental issues in reading and understanding of cultural works, i.e. architecture, where <I>ideas</I> (regional), or the <I>purpose</I> and <I>means</I>, of architecture are confused due to formalist thinking and a restrictive perception of culture.

In analysing architectural environments, several approaches can be used. In this thesis, a religious viewpoint is adopted to interpret Taiwanese architecture and settlements, and the relationships between religious beliefs and the built environment are therefore mainly emphasised. Three important Chinese traditional life notions, feng-shui (geomancy), the supernatural, and ethics have been applied to interpret those relationships throughout the thesis. The thesis is composed of two main parts covering, first, vernacular Taiwanese houses, and, second, settlements. A distinction is also made between static and dynamic aspects. Statically, it is shown how the Taiwanese people, by means of the three traditional notions of feng-shui, the supernatural and ethics, arrange their architectural spaces and spatial elements and engage the whole construction process in building their vernacular houses and settlements in order to maintain a harmonious relationship between gods, ancestral spirits and ghosts. But, an analysis is also made of various religious activities which are intimately related to vernacular houses and settlements to show how they have been applied to further improve the harmonious relationship dynamically. The historical, social, religious and architectural background to the development of Taiwan are described first of all. The two stages of the process of the construction of Taiwanese architecture, first the selection, by virtue of the concepts of feng-shui, of an auspicious site for a building and its spatial elements, and, second, the holding of a series of ceremonies which seek to unite man and nature, and man and supernature, are then outlined. The concepts of feng-shui, the supernatural and ethics are used to interpret the meanings of the main spaces of vernacular houses and the relationships between those spaces and many rituals of Taiwanese life. It is shown how the early immigrant society of Taiwan, as a result of social and economic factors, was transformed into an indigenous society, in which different groups lived together in settlements. A relationship between the layout of these settlements and the cosmos was developed by the use of yasheng objects and rituals along with Chinese concepts of the cosmos.

The conventional view of the development of the traditional Chinese house is that the architecture, as expressed through the planning, the construction and the utilisation of space is dominated by the male. Deference to the role of the father figure and the concept of lineage which he represented has been seen to be the expense of both the physiological and psychological needs of female members of the household. Whilst accepting that, at a superficial level, provision for female needs within the home was inadequate when compared to the male, this study challenges the view that Chinese domestic architecture was uninfluenced by either the practical or cultural roles of women within the home where they spent almost the whole of their time and were almost solely responsible for the control of domestic affairs. The study is set in the context of Taiwan in the 19<SUP>th</SUP> century at a time when the traditional values of mainland China were being strongly re-asserted by the island's immigrant community. During this period the house was re-established as the primary focus of social order and values and discrimination - as we would view it today - against women was at its most extreme. The study examines Taiwanese domestic architecture of the period from a female perspective and argues that male attitudes and reactions towards the female - especially in relation to chastity - which manifested itself in the spatial organisation of the house were so strong that the influence of the female was evident "in the negative", but was still real and potent.

This thesis presents a study of what is required for a computer system to support human creative collaborative design activity. The field of design study is targeted on architecture. Design is seen essentially as an activity of modelling complex objects with or without computers. 'Teamwork in architectural modelling' is, therefore, the realm of inquiry, with the goal of identifying the representation and communication requirements for computer support. A phenomenon of collaborative design to be explained is how the distribution of design work among multiple participating expertise is related to the integration of individual design contributions into products with architectural unity. Several historical cases of building design projects are studied. We examine the design expressions produced by members of the design team in each case. Based on the results of case studies, we put forward two distinct teamwork patterns in collaborative design: metaphorist and structuralist. The teamwork patterns are subsequently treated with more elaborate analyses and simulations. Prior to the presentation of the requirement studies, a survey of the current state of the art in building collaborative drawing and design support systems is provided. The survey shows that our concern of supporting collaborative design modelling remains a subject largely unexplored by the current system designs. For each teamwork pattern identified, a situation-theoretical framework is adopted for carrying out a more elaborate analysis.

The legacy of Scots in Canada is well documented, but there has never been a study of Scottish architects in Canada. This thesis examines the careers of five architects from Scotland, assessing their contribution to the development of Canadian architecture at the dawn of the twentieth century. The links that were consequently created between Scottish and Canadian architecture are also analysed. The main focus of the thesis falls on five architects: Andrew Thomas Taylor, Robert Findlay, James Robert Rhind, John Smith Archibald and Stewart Henbest Capper. The architects varied in age, background, and training and their work also differed considerably. In spite of this diversity, however, their careers are linked by common threads that can be traced back to their Scottish training. All five were very progressive architects who made significant contributions to Canadian architecture and helped to shape the development of the architectural profession in Canada. Four of them were acquainted prior to their arrival in Canada, either through friendship, family or professional contacts, which may explain why some of them chose to move to Montreal. The bonds between the architects and friends and colleagues still in Scotland were equally important. From 1900 an increasing number of architects emigrated to Montreal from Scotland, and specifically From Glasgow. This flow from Glasgow to Montreal seems to be connected with the five architects named above. The transfer was not only in one direction, however, as some Scots returned to Glasgow from Montreal, opening a new chapter in the history of both Scottish and Canadian architecture.

A comparison is made of two types of classical architecture, Classical Western Architecture (CWA) and Classical Chinese Architecture (CCA). Two major buildings, the Parthenon (built 447 - 432 BC) on the Acropolis at Athens and the Taihe Dian in the Forbidden City (built 1407 - 1421) at Beijing are used as examplars. The study reveals many similarities in the development and treatment of the two types of classical architecture, in spite of the very different cultural worlds from which they emerged. After examining the major characteristics of the two examples, the enquiry concentrates on the question of the origins and meanings of architectural treatment in both CWA and CCA, through a detailed study of the Parthenon and the Taihe Dian. It is argued that the treatment of space, form and decoration in both buildings has its origins in cosmic symbolism; that the notion of a Centre is expressed by their high and central location, axial symmetry, and centripetal theme; that the notion of a Sacred Space is expressed by an enclosed and ordered space; that qualities attributed to the dedicatee (Athena in the Parthenon and the Chinese emperor in the Taihe Dian) are expressed by the exterior form of the buildings; and that the inclinations, curvatures and proportions in the treatment of the exterior form have to do with the expression of the certain qualities represented by the dedicatee, as do their refinements. Finally that myths, legends, sacrifies and ceremonial processions illustrated by the static decoration, architectural sculptures, reliefs, paintings and ornaments are examined. Through comparisons between the two examples, an exploration is made of why and how such remarkable spaces, forms and decorations were created in both CWA and CCA.