MATERIALS FOR ARCHITECTS AND BUILDERS

PREFACE

Materials for Architects and Builders is written as an introductory text to inform students at undergraduate degree and national diploma level of the relevant visual and physical properties of a wide range of building materials.The third edition has been significantly enhanced by the incorporation of full colour images throughout, illustrating the materials and in many cases their use in buildings of architectural merit. The text includes the broad environmental debate with sections on energy saving and recycled materials. There are seventeen chapters covering the wide range of materials under standard headings. Each chapter describes the manufacture,salient properties and typical uses of the various materials, with the aim of ensuring their appropriate application within an awareness of their ecological impact. 

European Standards are taking over from the previous British Standards, and for most key materials the European Norms have now been published. Generally, this has led to an increase in the number of relevant standards for building materials. However, in many cases, both the British and European Standards are current and are therefore included in the text and references. 

New and rediscovered old materials, where they are becoming well integrated into standard building processes are described; other materials no longer in use are generally disregarded, except where increased concern for environmental issues has created renewed interest. The use of chemical terminology is kept to the minimum required to understand each subject area, and is only significantly used within the context of the structure of plastics. Tabulated data is restricted to an informative level appropriate to student use. An extensive bibliography and listed sources of technical information are provided at the end of each chapter to facilitate direct reference where necessary. 

The text is well illustrated with over 250 line drawings and colour photographs,showing the production, appearance and appropriate use of materials, but it is not intended to describe construction details as these are well illustrated in the standard texts on building construction. Environmental concerns including energy-conscious design, and the effects of fire, are automatically considered as part of the broader understanding of the various key materials. 

The text is essential reading for honours and foundation degree, BTEC and advanced GNVQ students of architecture, building, surveying and construction, and those studying within the broad range of built environment subjects, who wish to understand the principles relating to the appropriate use of construction materials. Read More Or Download Ebook

Architectural Knowledge

Preface

To the social historian the record of the professions in the twentieth century has been one of continuous and indeed accelerating success. My own experience as president of the Royal Institute of British Architects for two years in the mid-1990s felt very different. From this particular perspective, whatever collective successes the architectural profession may or may not have achieved over the last few decades seemed totally unimportant to individual members. Why was this? Could it be because, as so many architects made a point of telling me, they felt bitter personal disappointment that the expectations stimulated by a long and arduous training had never been fulfilled? How can this contradiction be explained? Is the sense of individual failure and alleged collective success peculiar to architects? Are the criteria for individual and professional success inherently different? Is there, indeed, any relation between the two? 

The difficulties so many individual architects face have made them demand that their professional institute should be doing much more for them—generating new work, advertising architectural services to an ever-widening public, making a compact with the government, neutralizing or, even better, annihilating the competition. Underlying this question are deeper and more general ones: what should a professional body be trying to do for its members? What is a profession actually for? 

As we approach what promises to be a golden age of professionalism—an information-rich period in which access to specialized knowledge will be valued more highly than ever before— answers to these questions are critically important, and not just for architects. The papers in this collection were written hurriedly over three decades and to mark many occasions. Despite this scattered provenance, the contribution they make to this debate is oddly consistent. This is the argument, repeated and developed in many ways, that it is not so much the possession of knowledge that justifies the existence of the professions but rather the degree of success with which professionals have found better ways to develop their own particular kinds of knowledge. Professionalism flourishes to the extent that professionals work openly together in the context of action to augment and develop the bodies of knowledge peculiar to their own disciplines. Conversely, if professionals squirrel knowledge away for themselves or fail to share what they know, in order to gain some temporary and illusory advantage for themselves as individuals or as groups, then professionalism decays. Free access to knowledge, transparency in its application, sharing, developing and handing on knowledge in an open-ended way—these are the essential means of making professionalism work. It is these qualities, only fully comprehensible in the course of continuously having to exercise fine judgement in generally quite stressful circumstances, that keep professionals straight, intellectually as well as ethically. And for the architect—as I combatively argued in the pages of Building Design in 1992—that knowledge is based on design and unites, in the context of action “past and future, science and art, demand and supply, decision making and reflection. Consequently the husbanding of that body of knowledge, its continual improvement, and its passing on through education to future generations are the essential functions of the architectural profession— our raison d’etre, our responsibility, our collective destiny.” 

The classical hallmarks of professionalism—restricted entry, standardized and visible qualifications, fixed fees, the publishing and policing of codes of conduct —are more concerned with keeping things as they are than with developing an intellectual programme. It is, unfortunately, still true that many, if not most, professionals continue to define professionalism defensively, in terms of “keeping standards up”, usually through procedures that tend to promote exclusivity and encourage boundary maintenance. The consumers of professional services tend to see things in a reciprocal but very different way— and, certainly, without the same warm self-regard. Clients stand outside the professional barricades looking in. How they interpret professional behaviour and professional institutions is less as a struggle against the forces of evil than a conspiracy against the public interest.

BACKWARD GLANCE 

The papers collected in the three parts of this book are a record of the growth of an idea about the nature of professionalism and also a record of major shifts in British society that fundamentally changed the position of the professions within that society. The realization of the development of knowledge as both the basis and guarantee of professionalism came to me gradually—which justifies, I hope, the perhaps over-emphasis on my own professional field in this selection of essays, and legitimizes the reprinting in part of three pieces previously collected in a 1992 work of mine, The Changing Workplace, looking at the impact of ideas on the design of the workplace. The gradual unfolding of this idea of professionalism is reflected both in the tripartite structure of this book and in the selection of entries—which, with a single exception, record my witness to events chronologically and contemporaneously: this is what I felt and saw at the time. 

The first set of papers describe the development in the 1960s and 1970s of my own professional knowledge base: learning how to use office design for the benefit of international corporations and their employees. What is striking, in retrospect, is how quick those commercial corporations were to exploit for their own purposes research and programming methods, many which had been originally developed in the planned economy of the British Welfare State, where user research, brief writing, planning and design were, in theory at least, highly integrated for the benefit of all. This was the period in which I and my colleagues at DEGW were learning not only how to conduct design-based research in the context of practice but also, more importantly, discovering that research-based design was certain to become increasingly important to knowledge-based enterprises. The essays reflect a residual belief in the importance of design to a society based on centralized planning. For architects, this belief was not only ideological but financial, since at the beginning of the 1970s over half of the profession was employed directly or indirectly by government. Although at that time I was largely working for international corporate organizations, there is little of what I wrote that would not have been equally applicable had I been working for the state. Indeed, the underlying assumptions in DEGW’s work were formed in that era of centralist planning: all architectural problems can be solved by better user research and better programming. 

The essays in Part Two reflect the violent swing in the 1980s towards a totally different basis for government policy—that planning was unnecessary because market forces could always be relied upon, if not to pick up the pieces, at least to make sure that the fittest survived. While this new policy was fundamentally against the interests of all professions—no group should have a special place in society— architects were particularly vulnerable. Unlike doctors, they had not negotiated in the 1940s a politically unbreakable contract with the government. Unlike lawyers, they were not smart enough to make vast amounts of money both from victims and survivors of the new policy. Unlike accountants, they were not able to take advantage of the globalization of business. Instead, architects were numbered among the chief victims and did not have the collective wit to understand that many things they had idealistically taken for granted as the basis of their professional self-esteem were being washed away. The most successful architects in this period—and there was plenty of talent— began to rely increasingly on their own individual design skill rather than on collective action as members of a united profession. A handful of supremely talented, and spectacularly unclubbable, individuals became part of the growing star system. Others in the commercial sector were too busy to look over their shoulder until the mid-1980s property boom began to collapse in 1989, revealing the full weakness of their individual positions. Many, including the unhappy people I referred to earlier, simply could not understand why no one seemed willing to use their hard-won skills any more. 

This group of papers shows a growing confidence in making generalizations on the practice of architecture based on the experience gained as DEGW developed, in the Thatcherite 1980s, into a large, specialized firm with a network of European offices. By this stage, DEGW’s very particular and original attitude to the relationship between consulting and design had matured. We had wide experience of the changing nature of architectural practice in several countries. It did not seem likely to us that sophisticated clients would tolerate for much longer the individualistic, craft-based and unreflective kind of service that most of our fellow professionals at that time seemed increasingly content to deliver. Something altogether more imaginative, responsive and predictive was required. 

The papers from the 1980s record what sometimes seemed at the time to be a deeply unfashionable position. It was obvious that the old regime of centralized planning would never return. The over-simplifications, even scientism, that had propped up the modern movement in architecture had been exposed. Nevertheless, it was clear to us in DEGW that architecture needed a more sophisticated intellectual basis, one that would not deny the importance of design invention—far from it—nor of cultural relativism but which would be robust enough to allow the majority of non-star architects to resist what was so clearly destroying their work: severe short-term pressure from under-informed clients to build ever more cheaply. Research about what design was for, and what value design could add, seemed to be the obvious answer. The course we in DEGW chose, as will be apparent from these papers, was to affirm the relation of design to user research, including user feedback, so that the benefits of design invention could be demonstrated to clients and users, in the hope of eventually allowing architects to regain the influence so many of them had lost on the processes of procuring and constructing buildings. 

The final papers—Part Three, written in the 1990s—are very much the product of my presidential period at the RIBA. To come to terms with a scale of problem that I had not been able to comprehend before, I was driven to think not just about how architectural services could be reconstituted to meet the needs of the changing clients whom I had learned to understand but to explain in the most practical and fundamental terms how the whole range of professional architectural services could be justified throughout the whole of the society that had been irreversibly, if not totally, shaped by Margaret Thatcher’s government. The task faced was no less than to help practising architects discover, define and overcome the limits of the efficacy of the market economy. 

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ARCHITECTURE: COMFORT AND ENERGY

Energy and architecture form a natural marriage if indoor comfort and respect for environment are secured. The role of energy within buildings varies from country to country, climate to climate; from 30% in OECD countries, 50% in non-OECD Europe to 70% in developing countries. Population growth and demand for housing have forced poUticians to embark on massive housing schemes without consideration of comfort, energy demand and environmental issues. In this book we are seeking to understand how previous generations lived in harsh climates and without abundant sources of energy, yet managed to design and build appropriate dwelUngs providing both comfort and harmony with the environment. We have only to look at the Vernacular architecture which existed in the areas of extreme climate such as India, Africa and Scandinavia where indigenous materials were utilised to construct attractive and comfortable homes.

Modern technology has provided us with excellent new materials such as "switchable'' material', light but strong structural materials and a variety of insulations. It is now commonly accepted by architects and builders that due consideration must be given to energy conservation; the use of natural Hghting and use of solar energy for both heating and cooling; as well as enhanced natural ventilation and minimal impact on the environment.

In this book we seek to approach the architecture-energy combination and its relationship to the environment. There are chapters on thermal comfort, low energy architecture deaUng with various criterion for comfort in different parts of the World. For example in the State of Qatar 50% of the energy used in that country can be saved by using low energy buildings with several measures such as shading, evaporative cooHng, the use of appropriate thermal mass and natural ventilation coupled with radiative cooUng. Contemporary architecture, in some cases, ignores most of these elements and concentrates on using excessive energy to cool or heat buildings. In the Gulf Region, 70% of the electricity generated is used for cooling the buildings. 

Other chapters state the principles of thermal comfort, how the thermal exchange takes place between man and the various parts of the building elements. Some authors developed their own models to evaluate such exchange. The bioclimatic concept in Vernacular Architecture was addressed thoroughly in one chapter starting a good comparison between Vernacular and contemporary architecture, then addressing the impact of climate on the building forms. The climate which plays a major role at different locations and how this dictates the shape and form of the buildings and save some energy. The igloo of the Inuit and the open courtyard houses of the Mediterranean are good examples of typologies depending on the climate. 

Another chapter is devoted to the importance of micro-climate and its various elements and usage to obtain comfort such as the air movement, the Sun effect, the thermal mass, the vegetation, shading devices and the use of water and moisture in improving Hving conditions in a dry climate. 

One of the most important energy saving elements in buildings is the use of daylighting to conserve and reduce heat gain into buildings. It explains the various conditions of the sky, the basic physical principle of lighting, the physiology of vision, and goes to the use of daylighting in architecture to improve the building design and accesses this use effectively.

Ventilation and its importance in buildings was presented in another chapter where the indoor pollutants, ventilation strategies, the air flow principles, air leakage in buildings, natural and solar induced ventilation and mechanical ventilation were explained and their usage was demonstrated. 

The last chapter outHnes in depth the technology for modern architecture. The elements and concepts such as ventilated roofs, active curtain walls, the use of greenhouses, movable shading devices, hght ducts, integrated ventilation, cooHng elements and the use of outdoor spaces are all researched and their uses have been illustrated in this chapter.

We hope the book will be of use to architectural students; building technologists; energy experts and urban and town planners. It will be equally interesting to all those who are concerned about the environment and advocate the use of appropriate technologies to reduce energy consumption. 

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Designing with Light

Preface

Perhaps more than any other design discipline, lighting design is a combination of art, science, and technology. Lighting designers need to understand a wide range of architectural and interior design styles, so that our work supports the aesthetic goals of the owner and the design team. We need to know how light affects vision and perception, and understand the interplay between light and materials so we can extend and reinforce the viewer’s response to a space. We need to understand the lamp technologies, lighting hardware, and control systems that will bring our vision of a project to fruition. It sounds like a lot, and it is. The wonderful thing about lighting design is that there is a wide range of projects with room for many types of designers. Some practitioners have a science, math, and numbers orientation. Some lean toward art, aesthetics, and intuition. Most designers fall somewhere in the middle. If you’re bright, talented, and have a discerning eye there’s a good chance you can have a career as in lighting design. I hope that encourages you.

I came to the practice of architectural lighting design after two decades as a theatrical lighting designer. As a result my design approach, and the emphasis of this book, focuses on aesthetics and design. I outline several approaches to the process of working through a design and present case studies of my own work, walking you through the design from start to finish so you can see how it was done. However, one cannot practice lighting design without a firm grasp of the technical side of the profession. That fact is becoming truer every year. After several decades of relative stagnation, so much of the lighting industry is changing that it’s sometimes hard to keep up. New energy legislation, phasing out of old technology, introduction of new technology, and expansion of the body of knowledge that a designer must master are keeping all of us on our toes these days. I’ve devoted chapters to all of these issues, from lamps and luminaires to controls and codes.

Most books are a reflection of the author, and this one is no different. First, I love history, and I always want to know how things were discovered, not just the outcome of the discovery. As a result, you’ll see that I often start with some history on the scientists and researchers responsible for important discoveries to give you some background on the concepts that are covered here. Second, I’m fascinated by science, and try to present some of the dryer material with a sense of excitement and wonder. I hope that comes through. Finally, I love this profession and I have fun at work (almost) every day. I take this material very seriously, and I strive for perfection in my work, but I’m not dour about it. I hope my joy for design and my excitement at solving design challenges comes through, and I hope that encourages you, too.Read more or Download

This book would not have made the journey from idea to manuscript to published work without the support and assistance of many wonderful people. My good friends Paul Bartlett and Ed McCarthy generously provided photographs and assistance. Lenore Doxsee gave me thoughtful feedback that clarified the text, and Sabra Zacharias and Lisa Cohen were sources of unfailing support and encouragement. I also want to thank Paul Drougas at Wiley for believing that there was room in the world for another book on lighting design, and that this should be the one

Architects and manufacturers I’ve had the pleasure of working with over the years supplied many of the drawings and photographs. I want to especially thank David Rudzensky and John Ruiz of R2Architects, Frank Moya of Matthews Moya Architects, Emma Price of Edison Price, Michael Hewitt and Carolyn Kerr of Philips, and Wendy Luedtke of Rosco Laboratories.

Finally, I want to thank my students whose questions and engagement in class have made teaching both a challenge and a joy, and who have helped me to clarify my own ideas about light, design, and education.

Architecture In Latin America

Paradoxically, thanks to this book, we can begin to think that discussions like the one included herein on architecture in Latin America will gradually cease to exist. I’m not suggesting with this statement that the book has reached a type of summae scientiam on the subject—something that the authors themselves have ruled out. What I mean is that a book like this brings us closer to the end of the narratives about “architecture in Latin America.”

To begin, we must note that Carranza and Lara’s text is entitled Modern Architecture in Latin America, and not Latin American Modern Architecture. In this way, it separates itself from the line that links HenryRussell Hitchcock’s book (Latin American Architecture since 1945) with Francisco Bullrich’s (New Directions in Latin American Architecture) and with the more recent “Latin American Architecture Seminars.” The difference is that Latin America is not presented here as an attribute but as a geographical support. The use of the word as an adjective assumes that the attribute is an essential category and that it is able to permeate the entire production that can be identified with it. In this sense, “Latin American” work is not just a building in that region of the world but rather a building that expresses this region.

By pointing out this difference, I am not asking the reader to get lost in the sophisticated subtleties of language that might be somewhat insignificant. Rather, the issue is of greater importance: “Latin Americanists” argue that the culture produced in the region is radically different from that which is generated in other parts of the world. They think that there is a constitutive, constant, and shared core that generates a dynamic sense of “ownership” or “critique” with regard to what happens outside the region. Moreover, in the last instance, they think that there is a sort of indivisible “I” that belongs to the region (perhaps a soul?) that expresses itself in clearly identifiable traits and that makes it react in unison against any external stimuli. I do not rule out that there might be those who think this form of reasoning may seem anachronistic. The nation-state and, with it, the notion of “the people” that upholds and justifies it, has long been questioned, and a statement of its coherence is no longer part of any important intellectual discussion. There have even been proposals to replace the very idea of an essentialist notion of “the people” with a more contemporary notion of “the multitude” as an articulation of its changing uniquenesses.

The use of the term “Latin America” as a noun is crucial, and it is what determines the structure chosen for this book, which is clearly articulated in the introduction. The book is constructed as a quilt: composed of different parts, each joined together by a formal structure. The parallelogram that determines the shape of the quilt is itself constructed by the very book itself. Although different from each other, the parts that make up the book, like the individuals in a crowd or the pieces of a quilt, do not end up dispersed but rather are articulated together by a fortuitous purpose. The narrative does not lead to a conclusion with ideological claims but relies on a chronological structure. We should not be deceived, however, because devoid of any teleological impulse, the chronology employed has the same arbitrary unifying structure as does the rectangular shape of the quilt.

However, this is not the most important change in approach through which the book, I believe, enacts a paradigm shift or, if you will, announces the end of a process. I think its main contribution to the knowledge of modern architecture in Latin America lies in its character as a type of compendium. Its chronological structure serves as an arbitrary organizing system, given that its authors did not intend to put forth a single interpretative key to support a conclusion that, by definition, they do not believe in. The chronology also serves as an axis along which, as on a skewer, pieces with very different characteristics are inserted: buildings, artistic movements, events, biographies, social processes, institutions.For more informations click below  

The book is a compendium of those pieces that, in turn, are the result of the steady growth in recent decades of the historiography of modern architecture in Latin America. In contrast to what has happened in previous decades, this field has only partially been organized around strong ideological assumptions (the “Latin Americanists”). For the most part, the studies on the subject have manifested themselves as the result of the increasing proliferation and expansion of scholarship on the subject, both within the region itself as well as in the United States and, to a much lesser extent, in Europe. Of course, this growth is an effect of its appealing issues but also, and perhaps more so, reflects the general growth of the knowledge industries that, in turn, have instituted new structures and demands in recent decades. Through them, the number of master’s and doctoral programs has multiplied in an unprecedented way throughout the region, and, as a consequence, the means of disseminating, exchanging, and legitimating the scholarship in this area have also increased. Thus, as with other branches of academic knowledge, there has been a marked increase in the number of monographs, essays, theses, articles, magazines, and books destined to complete the processes of emergence and consecration of this field.

This is a very different scenario to that within which the pioneering narratives of Hitchcock or Bullrich were constructed. It is also as a part and a consequence of this new context that this book is meant to be read. Its invaluable character as a compendium gives us for the first time, presented in the arbitrary order of a chronology, the most relevant results of this new and vast universe of scholarship that has resulted from the growth to which I referred. To which we must add, and especially considering where this book is being published for the first time, the role of the development of these studies within the U.S. academy. We can also not help noting the fact that this first compendium is not written in Spanish or Portuguese, but in English. Of course, it needs to be highlighted that the use of this lingua franca is what will facilitate the wider dissemination of this knowledge to an international audience. But this is not enough. That this compendium of modern architecture in Latin America has not been written and published in Latin America can be understood as a result of two factors. On the one hand, it should be noted that this is a study of a grouping of twenty-seven countries and dependencies (including the Caribbean) with very different economic and political conditions, covering a total area of 22,000,000 sq. km, with enormous geographical formations that separate them across equally vast distances extending some 14,000 km between the north and the south. It is a grouping that is not bound together through homogeneous or appropriate ground transportation systems, so the only way to cover the vast distances needed to understand it is via airplane. The scholars from this region who propose such a study must overcome these obstacles and with very limited resources, despite, in the best of cases, coming from “developing” countries; this explains the aforementioned conditions. But the obstacles do not end there. It is no accident that the first version of one of the primary studies of modern architecture in the region, Francisco Bullrich’s New Directions, came from a U.S. publisher, or that another survey, América Latina en su arquitectura, edited by Roberto Segre, was sponsored by UNESCO. The diversity of the countries and their political regimes, the specificity of their economies, and the differences in the values of their currencies or import duties make the existence of regional publishing houses extremely difficult. Additionally, the linguistic differences that exist in the subcontinent between the languages of Hispanic or Lusitanian origin work against any sense of cultural unity.
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On the other hand, the growing importance of “Latinos” in the United States has not only increased the presence of students and academics of Hispanic background throughout its academic institutions but has also increased their economic and political clout within the community. This condition is also tied to the major shifts in the approaches of these studies due to the work Edward Said introduced into the American academy, conceived through the adoption of post–Cold War postmodernist positions. The increased interest in the multiplicity of Latin America’s voices is part of a phenomenon of questioning singular narratives and was made possible through the dissolution of the ghosts of communism that lurked behind any pretense of autonomy by Latin Americans of the south from their northern Anglo-Saxon cousins.

I think that these are the new conditions in which this book is written and published. But as I said at the beginning of this brief text, I also believe that as a development of these new conditions, its publication allows us to begin to imagine a near future when these kinds of approaches will no longer be fostered or necessary.

Interior Design Handbook of Professional Practice

PREFACE

Mark Strauss, Publisher, Interior Design Magazine

“This is the era of design.” The mass media proclaimed the above as the new millennium began. Academics and professionals have been holding conferences about it for a while now. Designers themselves have insisted on it all along. But what, exactly, does that statement mean? A proliferation of hip hotels and award-winning potato peelers do not an era make. Because those of us who are part of the design profession are optimists, always on the lookout for how we can make our environment better, we’re eager to claim that the twenty-first century is, at last, the era of design, the time when design—and designers—have come into their own and taken power as a cultural force. But do we agree about what design is? To be sure, each designer has a unique vision and works in a unique way. Yet, we’re all part of one profession, and being a professional of any kind acknowledges that there is a common ground shared by its practitioners. Do designers know the coordinates and parameters of their profession? Do they realize what they must learn if they are to be successful designers in the twenty-first century? More important still, as professionals, do designers know what it means to do design? 

“The New American Professional: Distinctive (towering) competence.” 

In The Circle of Innovation, Tom Peters refers to the New American Professional (NAP) as a “white collar professional . . . whose creativity/organization effectiveness is barely mentioned in the pages of business and management books.” For designers, that phrase should strike a responsive chord. Pick up a best-selling business book and if it does, in fact, contain a reference to the work of designers, the reference is peripheral at best. This, in part, is why this book needed to be written. Whatever specialty designers work in, whether they’re seasoned professionals or relatively new to their careers, they need a single written source of best practices and benchmarks for excellence. The identification of this need was the impetus behind the Interior Design Handbook of Professional Practice, a joint venture between McGraw-Hill and Interior Design magazine.

Traditionally, the question at the forefront of designers’ minds has been “What do clients want?” The Interior Design Handbook of Professional Practice asks—and answers—another question altogether: “What do designers need?” This is a book not only for the present, but also for the future. It is prospective. It assumes that, yes, this is the era of design. And it becomes a tool for designers to be better prepared to sustain the profession of design and carry it forward.

“Work is not where you are. It’s what you do.”

These words, from the manager of the real estate program at a global consulting and technology firm, sum up how business leaders perceive the workplace as the twenty-first century begins. They apply to the designer’s workplace as well. Although the client may be in Copenhagen and the designer in Maine, communication happens, design is implemented, work gets done. Once-narrow professional boundaries have stretched to span the circumference of the globe. In design,as in all slices of life,the globe—and,at the same time,the individual—is the place to be. It’s where things are and where they’ll stay for the foreseeable future. 

Globalization is only one of the challenges grappling the design profession. It is wise to expect and prepare for challenges from all directions, including the economy, the physical and social environment, and academia. Today, design transcends aesthetics. Through access alone, designers are in a position to provide leadership in the realization of the New World. Our daily life reflects an unsettled time. Groups of people, as well as organizations and nations, seek new leaders, with new definitions of leadership. Read More Or Download

Designers must step up and take their places in the front ranks. Individuals and organizations everywhere are in transition, adapting to an economy that looks much different than it did even a decade ago. In the old economy, products were, for the most part, tangible. Now, expectations shift continually. The new economy values new information and new perspectives, an intangible product, that seem and feel very different to us, that require us to experience new levels of perception, that put demands on our sensibilities. Now, and apparently forever, individuals and businesses want higher quality and better, faster performance from their environments, from service providers, from their tools and toys, from anyone, anyplace, or anything that affects the individual. On this competitive stage, high quality is still the goal but speed is gaining on it for first place.

ARE YOU AN UNDISCOVERED INTERIOR DESIGNER? PART 1

Interior design is the art and science of enhancing the interiors, sometimes including the exterior, of a space or building, to achieve a healthier and more aesthetically pleasing environment for the end user. An interior designer is someone who plans, researches, coordinates, and manages such projects.

This series of ebooks describe through text and illustration what’s required when undertaking the profession of Interior Design and the elements of the interior design project. It will help you get started on those renovations that you would love to do but don’t know where to start or if you so desire will educate you on whats involved to undertake a career in interior design. 

The e-books are divided up into specific sections of design elements, tools and rooms. By reading the sections you will gain a very comprehensive insight into the professional world of interior design and decoration.

Each area has introductory text as well as items of instruction and links to allow you to discover the world of interior design and if it’s a subject that you wish to know more about. Even professional designers will be able to use this book as a tool for reference or as a refresher.

It seems that Interior Design is a complex subject that requires a huge amount of skill and knowledge to undertake. Well, guess what? That’s entirely right but with knowledge and direction on where to find that knowledge the professions intricacies are shown to you.

In this ebook from interiordezine we will show you what you need to know to the level that you want to go to. The information and resources contained within is for the novice through to the professional with continual upgrades and improvements. 

If you have the flair to undertake a home makeover then it’s not necessary to be a fully qualified designer.

For the more complex commercial or extensive domestic situations where you are dealing with other people’s aspirations and money and are engaged professionally and in business in this industry then you will need qualification and registration in many states and countries. Read More Or Ebook

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The Handbook of Interior Architecture and Design

General Introduction

Th e Handbook of Interior Architecture and Design outlines an international survey of ideas and current research being undertaken within this discipline. Th is book presents a series of essays in a canon of dynamic and original work, representing current thoughts in a subject that has grown substantially in size and importance in the fi rst part of the twenty-fi rst century. Th e emergence of a signifi cant body of research in this subject can be connected to two factors: the importance of interiors in relation to the enduring themes of contemporary society, and the changing perception of the subject within the hierarchy of creative disciplines. Social engagement in the form of human well-being and various forms of spatial occupation, ecologies of sustainability and the issues surrounding the environment, and the domestic realm and the relationships between public and private spaces in the city are all enduring themes that, along with the histories, theories, and pedagogies of the subject, form the central concerns of this discipline.

Historically the subject of interiors has been perceived as a marginal pursuit, mostly vocational in bias and lacking intellectual gravitas. It has often been misunderstood as a subject that appeared unscholarly and intellectually unsubstantiated. Th is was a view that was propagated mostly in the early twentieth century. It was a position that proliferated during the early stages of modernity when the realm of the interior was professionally integrated into the built environment and was no longer considered a distinct and unique entity. It is an opinion that has endured, quite often because of the alleged unprofessional and unregulated status of the designer in some parts of the world, and has persisted due to misogyny: an issue that, as some authors rightly point out in their chapters in this book, was due to the gender of its early protagonists

a full range of social, economic, and political issues, the practice of the creation of the interior can be considered to be a process that creates a space that is central to all human existence. Th e interior can be understood as the result of a complex weave of values, issues, and spatial formations; these can be both physical and mental structures. Th e interior can be perceived as an entity that is shaped by its use, its politics, its gender, and its history, and by many other real or unreal constructs. Th erefore, the discipline of interior architecture and design can be considered to be substantial and expansive, primarily because of the many areas it can aff ect and engage with. Th is handbook presents texts examining these areas, produced by a range of scholars drawn from the fi elds of education, practice, theory, and journalism. It aims to substantiate the discipline through intellectual inquiry into the various strands of the subject and to demonstrate the relevance and importance of the interior realm not only to its users but also to contemporary social life.

Each chapter in the handbook provides a concise overview of a signifi cant theme related to the interior. Th ey encompass a vast and diverse range of issues in education, research, and practice. Th ey span ideas as complex and diverse as human behavior, anthropology, cultural geography, history, taste, ageing, building reuse, the status of the designer, and technology. Because of its diversity the interior is often used as a vehicle for researchers and practitioners to gain insight into social issues such as patterns of consumption, gender, identity, and politics, much of which is done through the analysis of inhabited space. It is also a multidisciplinary practice that overlaps with architecture, fashion, furniture, exhibition design, graphics, and installation art. Multiplicity is at the heart of the identity of interior architecture and design. Th e chapters within this handbook off er a signifi cant insight into the discipline at this time of its emergence. Th e Handbook of Interior Architecture and Design is a refl ection of the discipline, a summary of its current activities, and a review of the fi eld of research in order to aff ord interested parties a better understanding of its past, its present, and its future trajectories.

STRUCTURE

Th e book has been organized into three main chapters. Each contains subsections that seek to expand on the chapter headings. Whichever topic is being explored and whatever ideas, theories, and exemplars are being utilized, almost all of the chapters contain an emphasis that is about a sense of living and making the inhabitants’ space their own—a fundamental dimension of the understanding of the interior realm.

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The Handbook of Interior Architecture and Design brings together the latest research by leading international scholars and practitioners in the dynamic fields of interior architecture and interior design, while also offering an evolution of the disciplines.

The Handbook of Interior Architecture and Design offers a compelling collection of original essays that seek to examine the shifting role of interior architecture and interior design, and their importance and meaning within the contemporary world.

Interior architecture and interior design are disciplines that span a complexity of ideas, ranging from human behaviour and anthropology to history and the technology of the future. Approaches to designing the interior are in a constant state of flux, reflecting and adapting to the changing systems of history, culture and politics. It is this process that allows interior design to be used as evidence for identifying patterns of consumption, gender, identity and social issues.

The Handbook of Interior Architecture and Design provides a pioneering overview of the ideas and arrangements within the two disciplines that make them such important platforms from which to study the way humans interact with the space around them.

Covering a wide range of thought and research, the book enables the reader to investigate fully the changing face of interior architecture and interior design, while offering questions about their future trajectory. Download

Housing Tower Building DWG

Housing tower building

 A tower block, high-rise, apartment tower, residential tower, apartment block, block of œats, or oøce tower is a tall building or structure used as a residential and/or oøce building. In some areas it may be referred to as an “MDU”, standing for “Multi Dwelling Unit”.In the United States, such a structure is referred to as an apartment building or oøce building, while a group of such buildings is called an apartment complex or oøce complex.

High-rise buildings became possible with the invention of the elevator (lift) and cheaper, more abundant building materials. The materials used for the structural system of high-rise buildings are reinforced concrete and steel. Most North American style skyscrapers have a steel frame, while residential blocks are usually constructed of concrete. There is no clear diúerence between a tower block and a skyscraper, although a building with ıfty or more stories is generally considered a skyscraper.

 High-rise structures pose particular design challenges for structural and geotechnical engineers, particularly if situated in a seismically active region or if the underlying soils have geotechnical risk factors such as high compressibility or bay mud. 

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Staircase Structural Drawing

1. Width of Stair: It should not be less than 1.00m.
2. Length of 䕅ight: The number of steps in a single 䕅ight should not be more than 12.
3. Pitch of the stair: It should be between 25o to 40o
4. Width of landing: It should be 150mm, more than the width of stair.
5. Winders or kite steps: Odd shaped steps should be avoided and incase found necessary. These should be provided at the start of a stair.
6. Han-rails: It should be 750 to 850 mm in height from the top of respective step or landing.
7. Step proportions:
The size of rise and tread in a stair should be kept uniform through out the whole stair. Following proportions are recommended:
(i) Residential buildings-Tread=250 mm Rise=160 mm
(ii) Public buildings – Tread=300 mm Rise=150 mm
(iii) Industrial buildings, Railway station, etc tread=not less then 250 mm =250 to 300 mm Rise=not less then 150 mm =150 to 190 mm
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URBAN DESIGN: STREET AND SQUARE

PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION

My interest in urban design began in the mid 1950s with Professor McCaughan’s history of planning lectures given in the then Department of Civic Design, University of Liverpool. At those lectures ‘Mac’ made it quite clear that he was a follower of Camillo Sitte, a Viennese architect whose main work dated from the last decade of the nineteenth century. After a five-year education in architecture where the heroic dimension of modern architecture was stressed, it came as a refreshing tonic to read the works of a scholar, Sitte, who analysed urban form to distil from it the principles of good design. After Sitte, the writings of Le Corbusier and those of like mind could be seen for what they were – polemical manifestos. This is not meant to denigrate the work of Le Corbusier, he is one of the great architects of this century, nothing can destroy that reputation. However, as a planner and urbanist Le Corbusier, and more particularly followers of lesser stature, are responsible for much environmental damage throughout European cities – vandalism would not be too strong a word for such developments.

The early years of my professional career were spent in developing countries, Singapore, Ghana, Nigeria and the Sudan. Those years living and working with people of diverse life-styles gave a valuable insight into the relationship of built form and culture. Again under the influence of ‘Mac’ I read works in social anthropology and made studies of traditional settlement form and architecture. Walking in Singapore’s China Town or exploring the wonderful mud cities of the Hausa, Nigeria together with readings in anthropology convinced me of the aridity of much contemporary urban design.

From the mid 1960s onwards I worked closely with ‘Mac’, first at Liverpool University, then at the Queen’s University of Belfast and latterly at Nottingham University. During 25 years ‘Mac’ and I collaborated on many European student field trips exploring a rich urban heritage with our students. This book is an introduction to our common European urban design heritage and the reader is advised to visit the places mentioned in the text as the printed word, drawings and photographs are no substitute for the excitement of personal discovery. The following text is a starting point which may help the development of the reader’s own critical faculties and so lead to a greater appreciation of the European street and square.

The need for a book of this type was made apparent to me on my recent visits to universities in the developing world. For example, during a twomonth visit to Nairobi University, where I was teaching the urban studio, I undertook to develop the workshop lectures and seminars into some form of useful publication. Eight years later that task is now complete. Three further volumes on urban design have now been published entitled Urban Design: Ornament and Decoration, Urban Design: Green Dimensions, Urban Design: Method and Techniques. Download

Observational concepts

1. From perception to thought 

How is it that we are able to think about what we perceive? More specifically, how are we able to bring the resources of conceptualized thought to bear on the objects and events that are represented to us in perception? And how much of our capacity for conceptualized thought is undergirded by, or is an extension of, our capacities for perception and action? Addressing these questions requires disentangling some of the more tightly woven strands linking perception, thought, and action. 

While one of the most distinctive things about human concepts is that they extend over indefinitely many types of things that transcend perception, we can also reflect on straightforwardly perceivable objects, and the concepts we have of these objects are often acquired by perceptually encountering and manipulating them. Additionally, how we perceive the world is infused or colored by the conceptual capacities that we possess. We don’t merely see the cat, we see her as a cat, a visual state that depends on conceptualizing her in a certain way. And in virtue of seeing her as a cat, we may come to form perceptual beliefs concerning her presence and qualities. Thus, conceptualized perception enables conceptualized thought.

My aim here is to illuminate what happens at the interface between perception and higher cognition. On the view I develop, observational concepts are the pivot on which this relationship turns. Observational concepts are those that are spontaneously made available at the interface between perception-action systems and the conceptual system. They correspond to the ways we have of conceptually dividing the world based solely on the available perceptual information. We are able to treat what is perceived as evidence for what isn’t directly perceived (or, indeed, perceivable at all). Observational concepts form the evidential basis for these perceptiontranscendent inferences. And ultimately, we acquire ways of thinking about perceived things that are not tied directly to how they are perceived; observational concepts are central to this process insofar as they provide us with an initial way of conceptually tracking categories that we will learn to represent in perception-transcendent ways.

In what follows, I situate observational concepts in the larger architecture of cognition, characterize their role and content, describe how they are learned, and show how they play a key role in learning further concepts. Along the way I distinguish them from related constructs such as recognitional concepts and show that arguments against recognitional concepts fail to work against observational concepts. I conclude by discussing what observational concepts can teach us about the extent to which perceptual systems and representations may shape higher cognition. 

2. Interfaces

Observational concepts are distinguished by their functional role, specifically by the location they occupy in the overall architecture of cognition. Many issues about cognitive architecture remain largely unsettled, but the only architectural assumption employed here is the distinction between input-output systems and central cognitive systems. Central systems include but need not be exhausted by the conceptual system, which is not assumed to be unitary.1   Download

Geometry in Singapore Architecture

1. Introduction

Architecture and geometry are symbiotic in nature, virtually an inseparable pair. Understanding the principles of lines, planes, solids, patterns and surfaces are integral to the architect’s design concept. Regardless of the magnitude of the project, be it the construction of the St. Peter’s Basilica or a nondescript factory plant, the architect’s understanding of geometry is crucial. On the other hand, if geometry is not employed by architects, the understanding of the subject would merely be a scholarly exercise. The knowledge of geometric principles by the architect empowers him to use geometry as an instrument to realize his creativity. A balance of the science and the artistic would result in the erection of many structures of great beauty that would enhance our quality of life. 

The amalgamation of geometry and architectural design is evident throughout history. The angles of inclination of the walls of the Egyptian pyramids were determined 4600 years ago by a geometric construction. Even today, geometry is used to great effect with modern and abstract constructions such as the Guggenheim New York, consisting of a symphony of triangles, circles and arcs.

This project is not one that charts the development of Singapore architecture. Rather, it is a project that explores the different relationships between geometry and architecture in Singapore since 1819. Through the course of this project, we have also discovered an interesting trend towards an increase in the amount of geometry being incorporated into modern buildings, resulting in an interesting blend of the traditional and the avant-garde. 

It is hoped that this project will help make readers be more alert of their surroundings and not merely see buildings as blocks of steel, glass or concrete but think of them as machines that have been put together by many simple elements.

2.1 An introduction to the Primary Solids 2 

Any building, no many how sophisticated the design, is made up of primary shapes that have been cleverly put together. Primary solids are the building blocks of the world. The primary shapes can be extended or rotated to generate volumetric forms or solids which are distinct, regular and easily recognizable. Circles generate spheres and cylinders; triangles generate cones and pyramids,; squares generate cubes. In this context, the term solid does not refer to firmness of substance but rather to a three-dimensional geometric figure. 

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The Cube 

A prismatic solid bounded by 6 equal square sides, the angle between any 2 adjacent faces being a right angle. Because of the equality of its dimensions, the cube is a static form that lacks apparent movement or direction. It is a stable form unless it stands on one of its corners or edges. Even though its angular profile is affected by out point of view, the cube remains a highly recognizable form. 

ARCHITECTURAL LAYOUT DESIGN OPTIMIZATION

1 INTRODUCTION

Spatial configuration is concerned with finding feasible locations and dimensions for a set of interrelated objects that meet all design requirements and maximize design quality in terms of design preferences. Spatial configuration is relevant to all physical design problems, so it is an important area of inquiry. Research on automation of spatial configuration includes component packing [11–13], route path planning [18], process and facilities layout, VLSI design ½16; 17 , and architectural layout [3–10]. Architectural layout is particularly interesting because in addition to common engineering objectives such as cost and performance, architectural design is especially concerned with aesthetic and usability qualities of a layout, which are generally more difficult to describe formally. Also, the components in a building layout (rooms or walls) often do not have pre-defined dimensions, so every component of the layout is resizable.

Reported attempts to automate the process of layout design started over 35 years ago [3]. Researchers have used several problem representations and solution search techniques to describe and solve the problem. One approach to spatial allocation is to define the available space as a set of grid squares and use an algorithm to allocate each square to a particular room or activity [4–7] (see Fig. 1). This problem is inherently discrete and multi-modal. Because of the combinatorial complexity, it cannot be solved exhaustively for reasonably-sized layout problems. Several heuristic strategies have been developed to find solutions without searching the design space exhaustively. Liggett and Mitchell [4] use a constructive placement strategy followed by an iterative improvement strategy. In this method, space is allocated for rooms one at a time based on the best probable design move at each step. Other researchers have used stochastic algorithms for search [5–7].

Another approach to representing the building layout design space is to decompose the problem into two parts: topology and geometry. Topology refers to logical relationships between layout components. Geometry refers to the position and size of each component in the layout. Topological decisions define constraints for the geometric design space. For example, a topological decision that ‘‘room i is adjacent to the north wall of room j’’ restricts the geometric coordinates of room i relative to room j. Researchers have developed decisiontree-based combinatorial representations and used constraint satisfaction programming techniques to enumerate solutions without exhaustive search. Baykan and Fox [8] and Schwarz, Berry, and Saviv [9] developed variations of this model and have been able to enumerate solutions for a studio apartment and for a nine-room building respectively. Medjeoub and Yannou [10] developed a similar model, but they use a technique of first enumerating all topologies that can produce at least one feasible geometry. The designer is then able to review the feasible topological possibilities and select those which s=he wants to explore geometrically. This technique reduces computation dramatically, and they have shown success for up to twenty rooms.

Successful generation of global quality solutions has been achieved for medium-sized problems; however, there is still a need for a strategy that can handle larger problems computationally. It would be useful to take advantage of the speed of gradient-based algorithms on the geometric aspects of the layout, because they involve continuous variables.

This article develops a mathematical model for the geometric decisions in the layout problem that allows efficient solution with gradient-based and hybrid local–global methods. This model is then embedded into another model used for topology decisions that is solved with heuristic global methods. The geometric optimization process allows fast solution of large complex problems that also enables a true interactive design process described in a sequel article [2]. The topology optimization component has had limited success due to the combinatorial nature of the topology decisions. The interactive optimization tool can be downloaded from http:==ode.engin.umich.edu.

2 OPTIMIZATION OF GEOMETRY

The geometric optimization problem is posed as a process of finding the best location and size of a group of interrelated rectangular units. A new decision model is formulated where all objectives and constraints are continuous functions, and all design variables have continuous domains.

A Unit is defined as a rectangular, orthogonal space allocated for a specific architectural function. Examples of architectural functions include living spaces, storage spaces, facilities, and accessibility spaces. For simplicity, this representation assumes that all Units can be represented as rectangles or combinations of orthogonal rectangles. This simple representation can model a large array of architectural layouts, and more complex shapes could be added to the model to expand this array. Figure 2 shows a Unit represented as a point in space ðx; yÞ, and the perpendicular distance from that point to each of the four walls: fN; S; E; and Wg. This model has more variables than necessary to describe the shape; however, it allows an optimization algorithm to change the position of a Unit independently without affecting its size (by changing x or y), and it can change any of the four wall positions independently (by changing N; S; E, or W). Although this model increases the problem dimensionality, it offers a lot of flexibility to make the best design moves at each step of the optimization.

Units are grouped into several categories based on their function: Rooms, Boundaries, Hallways, and Accessways. Rooms are Units used for sustained living activity as determined by the designer. The differentiation between living space vs. non-living space is important only in optimization objectives that maximize the amount of space used for living relative to all other space. A Boundary is a Unit that has other Units constrained inside of it, and it is not considered living space. A Hallway is a Unit with no physical walls that is not a living space. Hallways function as pathways. An Accessway is a Hallway that is constrained to geometrically intersect two Units. Accessways are generally restricted to be small, and they are forced to intersect two other Units. They function to keep the two Units adjacent and connected, and to ensure that there is room for a door or opening between the rooms.

In Figure 3, the external rectangle represents the building Boundary, the living room, bedroom, and bathroom are Rooms, the hall is a Hallway, and the three Units labeled ‘‘A’’ are Accessways that define space for a doorway between Units. Units that are along external walls may also have windows for natural lighting. Window height can be fixed for each Unit, and window width is a variable. oN ; oS ; oE; oW represent the width of the north, south, east and west windows, respectively.
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