Engineers think primarily in mathematical and architects in visual language. The split occurred in the Industrial Revolution when physics was raised to be the basis of technology under the influence of the encyclopedists. Now this split is slowly closing under the influence of what we call the "media." Films and television, CAD, advertising, and international sign language, they all strengthen our visual language capacity. (Will we end up by inventing another vile word, like "visualcy"?) We "read" the world differently from the way our parents read it while our professional "languages" remained conservative. That has to change.
What we see and how we express it are conditioned by our goals and that can easily lead to misunderstanding. An engineer calls a "bowstring truss" a "simple beam." The architect, interested in its formal aspect, calls it an "arch with a tie- rod." Builders of the last century concentrated on the building process and called it a "suspension bridge" because the deck is hung from the arch. Beam, arch, and suspension system - they are all correct interpretations of the object. Each group will base its view on the form of logic specific to that field and era.
Architects are interested in objects. Their fascination is captivated by finished building more than by questions of manufacture or life cycle. That is why architectural journals preferably show new and pristine buildings, and architectural feasibility studies are concerned with what can be built on a specific site. Clearly, under such conditions, architecture will develop design theories but no design method.
Engineers, on the other hand, are primarily process-oriented. Their journals prefer to show sites at work; a mess of machines and men, and an engineering feasibility study will be concerned with how a given design can be realized. Engineering theory serves their method of calculation. It is not what an architect would call "theory" at all, just the development of method.
What I term technological thought is a mixture of scientific and empirical thought. It unifies two contrasting concepts, swings opportunistically between analysis and creation, and manifests characteristics that are invisible in its progenitors. We all know scientific thought from our school years while empirical and creative thinking is underrepresented in our education. Empirical thought operates associatively,Ref.1 creating matrices of thought without hierarchy. We need it to design, in the creative process, and we cannot capture it analytically. More and more people are beginning to recognize the advantages of this horizontally organized thought form. Management consultant are even beginning to counsel their clients to increase productivity by organizing corporate structures horizontally instead of rigidly hierarchically.
A scientific system has to be independent of its user while associative thinking is strongly conditioned by its user. In itself it neither categorizes nor prioritizes, the user does that within the context of a specific culture. It is the user who determines the relationships between the elements. Design uses both the objective-analytical and the subjective creative forms of thought.
The sciences and the arts together form what we normally call "culture." Our schooling stresses them and forgets the interstitial area of technology. If it is celebrated at all, then only in the form of industrial production. For the most part, however, it is counted as the lowly "applied science" or resisted as determinism. The first view is based on the analytical aspect of technology and the second on the directness of problem solving that rarely transcends the object itself. But technology is neither application, nor is it pure determinism. It is the thought mode that drives our times and we cannot wish it away. As building professionals we all experience the conflict between technological thinking and its two parents.
Architects and engineers are concerned with the world of making. They, therefore, speak a language different from that of natural and social scientists. In technology, the very word "system" changes its meaning from "ordering principle" to "functioning object" or "building set." The goal of technical thought is neither knowledge nor insight, but the creation of objects, and its method is the complex activity of real problem- solving. A partial problem can sometimes be more interesting than the whole to which it belongs, and the word "detail" means "small-scale problem" rather than "hierarchically subordinate part" as it does in the sciences. The engineering works of an Eiffel that contributed to the systematization of iron construction, or of a Maillart that researched the formal implications of monolithic structural behavior in reinforced concrete, or of a Leslie Robertson that advance the concept of composite construction in skyscrapers, are all full of examples that demonstrate the importance of detail design. The same is true for the architectural works of a Palladio that created new relationships between layering, form, and space, or of a Schinkel that translated space, geometry, and form in a new way, or of a Frank Gehry that questioned the accepted relationships between material, space and detail.
As building professionals we are hardly interested in the method of knowledge, in so-called "epistemology." Engineers are particularly disturbed that we aren't since they draw their methods of calculation from physics that does. But approximative computation of load-bearing capabilities suffices in the world of building. The proof of the correctness of a technical method lies in the functioning of the object Ref.2 and not in the formulation of a systematic logic. This shift in meaning is rarely recognized by mathematicians and scientists. They consider what engineers do to be a naive misunderstanding of theory. That is why engineers often suffered from a false sense of inferiority in the nineteenth century. They were neither architects, whom they held to be "artists," nor were they scientists. They stood outside the pale of culture and felt themselves to be under pressure to demonstrate their artistic and scientific capabilities. They did the one by applying superfluous decoration to their objects and the second by the pursuit of presumed "truth" in partial problems. The overly exact computation of catenary form and chain cross-section for every conceivable loading condition resulted in a senseless precision and complicated and needlessly expensive suspension bridges.Ref.3
Architects, on the other hand, often try to argue a design decision objectively where they should be using an associative and subjective argument. Both apparent "weaknesses" come from the desire to explain technological thought using scientific criteria instead of accepting its independence.
Architecture includes fields ranging from technology to art. The step is a small one, and architectural theoreticians and practitioners, therefore, lie closer to one another than engineering theoreticians and practitioners where the overlaying of technological, strategic, and scientific thinking leads to internal stresses. This stress is especially noticeable in French and Anglo-Saxon culture where practitioners and theoreticians often cannot understand one another. The practitioners find theoreticians irrelevant and abstract, while theoreticians consider their colleagues to be fuzzy thinkers. There's nothing new in this. One hundred and sixty years ago differences of this nature led to the formation of the "Ecole Centrale" in Paris by a group of disenchanted practitioners Ref.4 who sought to distance themselves from the concepts of the "Ecole polytechnique." Both Gustave Eiffel and William Le Baron Jenney, two of the most influential iron builders of the second half of the nineteenth century, came from this counter- school.
If we consider the aesthetics of an engineering structure, we automatically adopt the standards and criteria of art history. Architectural critics use these standards that relate to the evaluation of objects,Ref.5 and they fit more or less well. If we accept the premise, however, that aesthetic considerations should build at least in part on professional interests, it would make sense to develop an aesthetic of process.Ref.6 This would provide us with novel possibilities: the field would become broader and more fascinating to professionals. And if we construct an aesthetic of building on our own inherent professional mode of thinking, it could develop from a passive means of evaluation into an operative means of design in both fields.
Architects have been seeking ways to make the building process visible in the finished product at least since the 1960s. Beginning with the projects of the "Archigram" group, we can trace this theme in the work of Renzo Piano, Richard Rogers, and Santiago Calatrava to name a few of the most prominent. At the same time engineers are also looking for new criteria for the design of structures. With the advent of "designer steels" and new forms of reinforced concrete with increasingly variable characteristics, traditional material constraints are quickly disappearing as design criteria.Ref.7
On the basis of such questions how could an aesthetics of making be organized? Aesthetics is logical thinking about form. Like statics, it belongs to the realm of the analytical aspect of technological thought, and it defines a visual order.
An object that is structurally complex or difficult to build is not necessarily visually complicated. It can be simple as in the case of the Brooklyn Bridge. The main cables and diagonal ropes are both carried by the towers. While the deck hangs from the main cables on suspenders, it is also directly attached to the diagonal ropes. The first system is easily deformed, while the second is not. The diagonals and the suspenders are connected to form a net by means of clamps: simple formally, but exceedingly complex structurally. The vertical and diagonal components of the net not only flex differently, but the clamps also slip a little when the net is slowly loaded and the net adapts to the load. However, the clamps jam under impact loading and the connections behave almost rigidly. The engineering firm that rehabilitated the structure for its centennial in 1983,Ref.8 worked for years to develop a computer program that described its structural behavior accurately.
We can only categorize a form if we can name it. This is how variations in design behavior come to be preferred in different cultures. In architecture, for instance, all languages had to introduce the "loggia" from the Italian in order to use it formally in design.
In engineering, German differentiates between the "Platte" (a planar, structural surface element that supports out-of-plane loads and is, therefore, primarily subjected to bending stresses) and the "Scheibe" (a similar element that supports in-plane forces and withstands shear forces). Both are described in German by the way they support their loads and not by their spatial position. Folded plate structures can be conceived using such members. We lack this conceptual clarity in English. Both the "slab" and the flat plate" are horizontal elements, one with and one without visible joist support. Our "shear wall," or more abstractly, "shear membrane," is a vertical wall element that deals with shear. Elements of this type are defined by their spatial position. They cannot lie diagonally and we can only describe a diagonal loadbearing surface in a roundabout fashion. That inhibits our conceiving of folded plate structures or of other combined forms such as Maillart's, Christian Menn's, or Calatrava's. Our language and what we design are inseparable.
Light-wood framing uses sticks and plywood sheets that are too thin to support themselves reliably and nails that are poor connectors. But when they are used in large numbers, they form a versatile construction system with surprising novel characteristics. The lack of structural and material quality is compensated for by an increase in the number of components and connections, in the same way that the trade-off of quality for quantity in industrial production is a characteristic of the American lifestyle. The trade-off may not appeal to the European, but Americans consider it to be positive.
American culture prefers pragmatism to conceptual thinking, and the light-wood frame masterfully matches this preference. The intellectual approach is basically different from the European which is conceptual. It is indeed impossible to determine whether the light-wood frame is a frame stiffened by a skin nailed to it, or whether it is a panel system in which the surfaces are stiffened by ribs. Both viewpoints are correct, and both lead to different erection methods and architectural expression. An American contractor has no compunction in treating the two ends of the same building differently and finds it natural to do so. But the European who is accustomed to striving for conceptual clarity, will find this attitude simultaneously confusing and liberating.
What we consider too weak sections and flimsy plywood form apparently poor buildings, but only apparently. The homogeneous spread of weak connections throughout an entire building makes it structurally so redundant that it paradoxically behaves monolithically. This allows such buildings to carry loads in unexpected ways without collapsing, something that traditional heavy timber-framed buildings cannot.
This monolithic behavior is attained through the simplest of means, and it permits an unusual flexibility in the use of such wooden buildings. We can modify them radically before they will collapse. In the mid-nineteenth century contractors applied this characteristic to cast-iron construction. James Bogardus's public relations brochure of 1856 Ref.9 demonstrated an extreme modification of his cast-iron building system by means of an exaggerated illustration. Monolithic structural behavior and the extreme ability to modify a building formed American residential construction and lifestyle. Our "do-it-yourself" mentality is one of its major characteristics.
Only a small step separated quasi-monolithic wood construction from steel framing for bridge and than for high-rise construction. The intellectual threshold that had to be crossed was determined by the shift of stabilizing methods from the applied surfacing material to the stiff frame corner. This transition preoccupied the energies of contractors and theoreticians for half a century from about 1870 to 1920. In high-rise construction, the development of stiffening methods sought to free both plans and installations from structural constraints. Open-space planning, first propagated by European architects such as Ludwig Mies van der Rohe or Le Corbusier in the 1920s, was influenced by the American development as was the separation of structure from building skin that proved so attractive to the modernists. The development also influenced the preoccupation of engineering theoreticians with the monolithic behavior of steel framing systems.
The architectural reports and manifestos of Neutra, Ref.14 Hilbersheimer, Ref.15 Mendelsohn, Ref.16 and Le Corbusier, influenced European construction at least as strongly as the European architecture schools did building in America. The conceptual skyscraper projects of Le Corbusier and Mies in the early 1920s reflected their reactions to American prototypes.
Europe's contribution to the development of light-wood and steel framing in America and the transfer of this knowledge back to Europe is living testimony to mutual cultural exchange and "creative misunderstanding." Ref.17 The examination of the intellectual parameters of this development can help clarify our design and construction thinking. Perhaps they can even influence out future.
Ref.1: The technical terms "vertical" and "horizontal" thinking that I here call "associative" and "hierarchical," were adopted from Edward de Bono: The Use of Lateral Thinking, 1967 London: Cape.
Ref.2: That is why uneducated inventors continue to try to invent the perpetuum mobile, in spite of all proof of its impossibility. They argue, logically from their standpoint, that theoreticians and their theories have been proven wrong before, therefore, why should they not be wrong again!
Ref.3: "The problem of the catenary and its role in engineering research," in T.F. Peters: Transitions in Engineering, 1987 Basel: Birkhaeuser Verlag, pp. 75-76.
Ref.4: The railway engineer Perdonnet led this revolt in 1829. He reacted against the opinion of G.G. de Coriolis, Navier's replacement at the Ecole polytechnique, who abandoned project- oriented teaching, claiming that young engineers should be theoretically educated. His argument was that they would get practical experience later. In fact, the best students were recruited directly from the classroom to the faculty, thereby exasperating their alieniation from generation to generation.
Ref.5: For instance: Friedrich Hartmann: Aesthetik im Brueckenbau unter besonderer Beruecksichtigen der Eisenbruecken. 1928 Leipzig & Vienna: Franz Deuticke; Fritz Leonhardt:Bridges. 1984, Cambridge, MA: MIT Press; David P. Billington: The Tower and the Bridge. 1983 New York: Basic Books.
Ref.6: Tom F. Peters: "Considerations on Bridge Aesthetics" in: Richard Margolis Bridges - Symbols of Progress. 1991 Bethlehem PA: Lehigh University Art Galleries; Tom F. Peters: The Aesthetics of Steel Bridges, report to the American Iron and Steel Institute 1991 (unpublished).
Ref.7: There will be a symposium with international participation, to be held at Lehigh University in 1993, that will examine new methods in the formal design of bridges based on the premise that material constraints have essentially disappeared.
Ref.8: Steinman Boynton Gronquist & Birdsall, New York.
Ref.9: James Bogardus: Cast Iron Buildings: Their Construction and Advantages By J.B., C.E. architect in iron, iron building, corner of Centre and Duane Sts. 1856 New York: J. W. Harrison, printer, 4-16 p., 3 pls. (incl. frontis.)
Ref.10: Carl Ritter von Gehga (1802-1860): Ueber nordamerikanischen Brueckenbau und Berechnung des Tragungsvermoegens der Howe'schen Bruecken mit Tabellen ueber die absolute, relative und rueckwirkende Festigkeit einiger Baumaterialien und zwei Zeichnungstafeln. 1845 Vienna: Kaulfuss Wittwe, Prandel & Compagnie.
Ref.11: Carl Culmann: "Der Bau hoelzerner Bruecken in den Vereingten Staaten von Nordamerika. Ergebnisse einer im Auftrage der koenigl. Bayerischen Regierung in den Jahren 1849 und 1850 unternommenen Reise durch die Vereinigten Staaten," in: Allgemeine Bauzeitung 1851 Vienna, pp. 69-129 w.ills.& pls. 387-397; and: "Der Bau der eisernen Bruecken in England und Amerika," in Ibid, 1852, pp.163-222, w.ills.& pls. 478-487.
Ref.12: P. Ritter von Tunner: Das Eisenhuettenwesen der vereingigten Staaten von Nordamerika. beurtheilt nach einem im Auftrage des k.k. Ackerbau-Ministeriums vergenommenen Besuche der Centennial-Ausstellung in Philaelphia und der vorzueglicheren Eisenhuetten noedlich von New-York. 1877 Vienna: Verlag von Faesy & Frick.
Ref.13: Wilhelm Ritter: Der Brueckenbau in den Vereinigten Staaten Amerikas. Weltausstellung in Chicago, 1893, Berichte der schweizerischen Delegierten. 1894 Berne: Haller'sche Buchdruckerei.
Ref.14: Richard J. Neutra: Wie Baut Amerika?. 1927 Stuttgart: Julius Hoffmann Verlag.
Ref.15: Ludiwg Hilbersheimer: Grozstadt Architektur. 1927 Stuttgart: Julius Hoffmann Verlag.
Ref.16: Erich Mendelsohn: Amerika; Bilderbuch eines architekten. 1926 Berlin: Rudolf Mosse.
Ref.17: The term "creative misunderstanding" first appeared in the 1960s in the works of William J. Gordon and George M. Prince on design methodology, that they called "synectics." This phenomenon, so familiar to artists, was adopted in architecture through Harold Bloom: A Map of Misreading. 1975 New York: Oxford University Press. It has nevertheless been largely ignored by architectural theory.
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