building. dweling. thinking. a critical point of view on history of contemporary architecture by Adriano Caro Florio

building. dweling. thinking.

a critical point of view on history of contemporary architecture

Adriano Caro Florio

MSc Architectural Design and History

Summary The grammar of Ornament

The poetry of reinforced concrete

Steel and glass: the myth of the Glass House

The american Home: from Ludwig Mies van der Rohe to Carlos JimĂŠnez

The House of Memory

Architecture and Landscape: Fogo Island

Modernity and tradition in architecture

Bibliography

Biography

The grammar of Ornament

The grammar of Ornament Louis Sullivan (1892) says that after we have completely refrained from ornamentation, we may have been able to understand to what extent ornament would enhance the beauty of structures, and we would then concentrate on the production of buildings. “Cultural evolution is equivalente to the removal of ornament from articles in daily use” (Loos 1908). The criticisms of ornamentation in architecture projects have been increasing with the development of the Modern Movement in Europe and the process of mechanization in the manufacture of objects.

“Today decorative objects flood the shelves of the Department Stores (…) If they sell cheaply, it is because they are badly made and because decoration hides faults in their manufacture and the poor quality of their materials: decoration and disguise” (Le Corbusier 1925, 16).

However, it is possible to think how architecture adapted itself to the issue of ornament. “Why then, should we use ornament? Is not a noble and simple dignity sufficient? Why should we ask more?” (Sullivan 1892).

First part | Frank Lloyd Wright Illinois Frank Lloyd Wright was born in 1867, Wisconsin, USA. With regard to organic architecture, it is the main name and reference. Much influenced by Louis Sullivan - the main diffuser of the idea that “form follows function” Wright takes this idea for himself and designs organically so that in every part of the building his function in the whole is understood.

He has as north, the integration of the building with nature, as if it were part of that place, using local materials, bricks, wood, stone. But always trying to use the machine to make it

to its function. It is possible to identify the volume of the reception and the library, in the other façade it is possible to define well the place of entrance and in the back façade the dining room and the volume that stands out of the windows of the children’s room.

possible. The way wood was used to make the furniture, the fine pillars, the finish of the furniture, etc., Wright used the machine for that. The use of materials was not thought of as post-design, such as the classic use of ornaments. Ornament is the continuity of building design is organic to design. In this way he does not think of the ornament as a decoration, but as part of the architecture. In the Home and Studio project in Oak Park, Illinois - 1889, Wright manages to employ the concept that every part of the home can be related

Frank Lloyd Wright - Home and Studio, Oak Park, Illinois - 1889. Drawing of the Kid’s Room.

By being a pre-style, it can be considered a moment of experimentation by Wright. In the Winslow House project in River Forest, Illinois - 1893, the symmetry of the street façade is counterposed to the back façade with its volumes and asymmetry. In another project, Heurtley House, Oak Park, Illinois - 1902, the use of bricks in different colors causes these horizontal lines to be created and leaves the façade with this set of colors, a way of creating with the building object itself feature for the house design.

Frank Lloyd Wright - Heurtley House, Oak Park, Illinois - 1902. Drawing of the use of bricks in different colors.

In the Susan Lawrence Dana House project, Springfield, Illinois 1904, there is a clearer and more typical grammar present in his designs, the lines: roof, brick and grass. Characteristic of the houses of this first phase, of the American suburbs. “Decoration is dangerous unless you understand it thoroughly and are satisfied that it means something good in the scheme as a whole, for the present you are usually better off without it. Merely that it “looks rich” is no justification for the use of ornament.” (Wright 1908).

Frank Lloyd Wright - Susan Lawrence Dana House, Springfield, Illinois - 1904. Drawing of the lines.

Frank Lloyd Wright - Robie House, Chicago, Illinois - 1908. Drawing of the lines.

California

But it is when he moves to California that his work advances on the issue of integration with nature and this becomes a new style, new trend, using a new technology. The use of the machine in favor of architectural work is clear. “Our modern materials are these old materials in more plastic guise, rendered so by the Machine, itself creating the very quality needed in material to satisfy its own art equation.” (Wright 1901)

And finally, with the Kaufmann House project, Mill Run, Pennsylvania - 1943-37, he achieves the full integration between nature and architecture. And not for the simple fact of being located in a waterfall, but the relation between one and the other surpasses. The house grows organically in this territory, as if it were already part of it. The shape of the straight yellow concrete slabs does not stand out from the rest of the project, it seems to be part of the whole.

He begins to decorate concrete, in the projects “La Miniatura”, Pasadena, California - 1923; and Ennis-Brown House, Los Angeles - 1923. Breaking away from his suburbian style houses and beginning with the textile blocks.

Drawing of the textile blocks from Ennis Brown House, Los Angeles, California - 1923; and “La Miniatura” , Pasadena, Chicago - 1923.

Frank Lloyd Wright - Kaufmann House, Mill Run, Penssylvania - 1943-47. Section of the house.

Frank Lloyd Wright - Kaufmann House, Mill Run, Penssylvania - 1943-47. Drawing of the fireplace.

Second part | The European answer “If I want to eat a piece of gingerbread I choose one that is quite smooth and not a piece representing a heart or a baby or a rider, which is covered all over with ornaments.” (Loos 1908).

Also according to Sullivan (1892), “We shall have learned, however, that ornament is mentally a luxury, not a necessary, for we shall have discerned the limitations as well as the great value of unadorned masses.” (Sullivan 1892). Even from the late nineteenth century, this thought that ornamentation is lust goes against the response of the European architects of the Modern Movement. The Adolf Loos project, Müller House, in Prague - 1928-30, shows us this thought of “simplicity” of plastic form and that ornamentation is a crime. The crime of ornamentation left Europe and went to Brazil, where a few years before the construction of Müller House, the architect Gregori Warchavchik (1896-1972) designed the Casa Modernista da Rua Santa Cruz - 1927-28, considered the first modern work in Brazil. For this, the architect had to falsify the project, putting adornments and ornamentation on the façade so that the project was approved in the city hall of the city of São Paulo, the city where it was built. Without any type of ornament and with a white volume the work could only be finished after the architect said that he lacked money to finish the facade.

Gregori Warchavchik - Casa Modernista da Rua Santa Cruz, São Paulo - 1927-28. Drawing of the white volume.

Adolf Loos - Müller House, Praghe - 1928-30. Drawing of the white volume.

However we can see other shapes that could be considered ornamentation in a building. As Henry-Russell Hitchcock and Philip Johnson write: 3

“The failure of revivalism probably lay quite as much in the inability to recreate the conditions of craftsmanship which once made applied ornament aesthetically valid, as in the impossibility of adapting the spirit of old styles to new methods of construction.” (Hitchcock; Johnson 1932).

That is to say, the new spirit of the men of that time, sought a new form for such. It would no longer be with the craftsman, but he would have to adapt to the new methods of construction. And for Franco Albini, the solution would no longer be in the plastic solution, but in the spatial solution. “It is my opinion that what must be constructed are precisely the voids, because air and light are construction materials. The atmosphere should not be still and stagnant, but vibrant, and the audience should feel immersed and stimulated, without noticing what is happening.” (Albini 1954).

Alberto Campo Baeza - Casa Guerrero, Vejer de la Frontera - 2005. Drawing of the courtyard.

The grammar of ornamentation changed over time, very different from the ornamentation of classical, gothic, baroque, etc. buildings. Many may be the forms of ornamentation in contemporary architecture. The use of colors on walls, murals, furniture. The furniture itself as decoration pieces and therefore composing the space. The use of plaques on the facades against excessive illumination joins the tool factor against the sun’s rays and the various forms of composition they can give to the facade of the building.

Le Corbusier - Notre Dame du Haut, Ronchamp - 1950-55. Drawing.

Examples of the use of the spatial solution are the Villa Planchart by Gio Ponti, in Caracas - 1953-57; the Notre Dame du Haut de Le Corbusier, in Ronchamp - 1950-55; the Casa Guerrero by Alberto Campo Baeza in Vejer de la Frontera, Spain - 2005, in this project the atmosphere is vibrant, light and shade make the house constantly changing, always depending on the position of the Sun. Gio Ponti - Villa Planchart, Caracas - 1953-57. Drawing.

The poetry of reinforced concrete

The poetry of reinforced concrete For Le Corbusier, the use of reinforced concrete gives architects a new way of designing a freer form. . “Thus the architect has at his disposal a box of building units. His architectural talent can operate freely”. (Le Corbuiser 1926). Thus, in 1914, he designs a Domestic House, an experimental structural system that enables a free plant. Already in 1926 he writes about the “five points towards a new architecture” - the use of pilotis; roof gardens; ground plan free; horizontal cuts to the windows; and free facade.

Unifying all his ideas of ideal structural system and the five points, he designs urbanistic plans for several cities of the world, joining the use of reinforced concrete and the new city for men. And finally, between 1945 and 1955, he creates a project of society with the human body, a new form of measurement, a new interpretation of proportions. The poetry of reinforced concreteis the poetry that allows the architect to create forms, cut walls, create big spaces, elevate from the floor, etc.

The best 5 buildings of the lesson . Luigi Carlo Danero, Forte di Quezzi, Genoa, Italy | 1956-58 The project of Luigi Carlo Danero shows us his learning with Le Corbusier, the construction of a city-building. Using the design concept that the city could be inside the building, it creates large corridors in the middle for the distribution of apartments. In the same way as Le Corbusier’s projects for the “Unitè D’Habitation”, from 1947-52 in Marseille. Similarly, the architect Affonso Eduardo Reidy (1909-1964) and the engineer Carmem Portinho (19022002) in the 1940s designed the “Pe-

dregulho” building, located in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. The similarities are from the understanding of the territory as the starting point of the project, to the solution of the shape of the building, like a serpentine. But unlike “Pedregulho”, which is only 1 building, Casa Forte di Quezzi is a project with 5 strips around the Colle della Calcinara. All this shows how the reinforced concrete and the teachings of Le Corbusier can free the architect to think, not only with the function of the building, but with its shape.

Scheme for the implementation of Forte di Quezzi.

Drawing comparing the 3 buildings. “Pedregulho”, Forte di Quezzi and Unitè D’Habitation

Scheme for the implementation of “Pedregulho”.

. Andrew Berman, Watermill House, Watermill, New York, USA | 2012 With this project, the use of reinforced concrete shows us the possibilities of working with other materials inside the house. In this case, the use of wood. The lesson of the Maison Dom-ino, that the structure can be independent of the internal walls, is present in this project. There are several ways to work with concrete. In this project was chosen the board formed and polished concrete, which consists of shaping the concrete in place. Allowing the project and the architect certain ribs in the concrete. The choice to use this method is marked on the construction. Instead of a prefabricated concrete, with pre-established measures, the architect manages to show the various forms that concrete can be.

In addition, when we look at the facade and realize the volume of the house, we can see how the material adds an aesthetic to the construction. The detail to turn horizontally and vertically mold the concrete adds certain poetry to architecture.

Andrew Berman - Watermill House, Watermill, New York, USA - 2012. Drawing of the façade.

. Paulo Mendes da Rocha, Mario Masetti House, São Paulo, Brazil | 1968 Mendes da Rocha works with the reinforced concrete in a plastic form, in a way that the interior of the residence is thought within the use of reinforced concrete. He creates a big box of reinforced concrete and thinks the interior with free forms. The architect manages to achieve a level of precision of the work with its spaces constructed of reinforced concrete. A large concrete box piled

on pillars at the ends favoring large continuous openings, great transparency in a large concrete house. There is some integration between all the rooms with this form of the project. The walls around them form a space to arrange the rooms and so they, in a certain way and with a certain scale, are integrated with each other.

Paulo Mendes da Rocha - Mario Masetti House, São Paulo, Brazil | 1968. Drawing of the plan.

. MK27, Reduk House, Bragança Paulista São Paulo, Brazil | 2013 In this project the use of reinforced concrete makes it possible to create a single roof for the whole house. Just like the roof, the floor is replicated and raised from the ground, it seems that the project floats on the ground.

It resembles the modern concept proposed by Mies van der Rohe for the German Pavilion. Two planes - floor and roof - one on the other by the support of pillars and walls, create spaces and leave some areas free.

These two horizontal planes that are created, separated by the internal pillars in one part of the house and in the other by structural walls, create a free space of some form and delimited spaces.

In addition, this two-story concept makes it possible to use glass and wood to play the role of house closures, creating independent volumes that sometimes touch the roof, sometimes lower.

MK27 - Reduk House, Bragança Paulista - São Paulo, Brazil - 2013. Drawing.

. Jean Renaudie and Renée Gailhoustet, Social Housing Project, Ivry-sur-Seine, France | 1969-75 With all the references of modern projects, this is one of those that run away from some modern notions. In a way, the various points that make up the design make it possible for the façade to be perceived as if it were several concrete slabs placed at different angles. This gives the building an image of several houses stacked one on top of the other, resembling some representations of the tower of Babel.

With the use of reinforced concrete it is possible to make horizontal openings, as Le Corbusier defended. In this project, some openings are shaped like polygons, sometimes with glass closures, sometimes simply open. Due to the shape of the façade openings, it seems to function like the beams that were used by the Brazilian architect João Filgueiras Lima in some of his projects - vierendeel beams that were used as part of the facade of the building.

Drawing comparing the Social Housing Project and the Minister’s House project by João Filgueiras Lima.

Steel and glass the myth of the Glass House

Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, Philip Johnson, Lina Bo Bardi: 3 Glass Houses Besides these three houses has been built with a very short time between then and actually almost simultaneously, the Glass Houses of these three architects’ presents a lot of similarity and differences in the shape, the constructive elements and the materials used. Ludwig Mies van der Rohe (1886 – 1969), was one of the biggest names of the modern architecture. Born in German, he was forced to immigrate and went to the USA because of the Nazi’s regime. There his first project was the Farnsworth House, in the suburbs of Chicago, to Edith Farnsworth. With two platforms elevated from the land, the first one is an entrance to the house with 68 x 7 meters, and the second one has 73 x 8 meters. He doesn’t use his famous form for the structure, the cruciform columns. In this project he uses pillars with the H profile and located outside the box that the glass forms. The interior of the house and the exterior becomes one. The nature can be seen inside and outside of the house, the vision transgresses the house. As a result of the structure, the house is an open plan that gives to the architect the possibilities to place the space with liberty, but always thinking in the geometry, symmetrically. To solve the nucleon of the bathroom and kitchen he project a wood box that

contains two bathrooms, the kitchen and a wardrobe, but not as we all think about symmetry, he decides to put this volume a little displaced of the center. Philip Johnson (1906 – 2005) was born in Cleveland, Ohio in USA. Differently of Mies van der Rohe, he built his famous Glass House for himself in New Canaan, Connecticut in 1949, inspired of Mies’ works at the Farnsworth. Built in the top of the hill, this gives to the house some privacy. The structures of the house, differently of the Farnsworth House, are in the border of the house, and can be also the frame for the glass panels. Also like the Farnsworth House, the structure provides this open floor plan that, in this case, is composed by 3 elements that divides the plan. The circular bathroom, the balcony of the kitchen and the wardrobe of the bedroom. Differently than the Mies project that uses a volume to unite this program. The house is elevated from the ground on a basement of red brick and just like Farnsworth the nature surrounded integrates itself in the project. With that, the relation of interior and exterior becomes an important way to interpret the project, the house is the relation with the exterior, with the nature, the house was projected with those glass panels and this is the “reason” of the house.

Lina Bo Bardi (1914 – 1992) was an Italian and Brazilian architect very important for the modern architecture movement in Brazil. She was born in Rome, and after the World War II, she and her husband moved to Brazil, where she lives until hers finals days. There she becomes a reference for the architect, because of her experience and knowledment. The Casa de Vidro was built at São Paulo, in the neighborhood of Morumbi, today a very rich neighborhood. But at the 50’s there wasn’t houses built there and there was only the Atlantic Forest in the hill. Differently of the Glass House, which was built in a hill, Lina Bo Bardi used the declivity to project the house. The main entrance uses the declivity to create a staircase that leaves to the main floor. The back of the house is a solid volume that contains the service’s room, and the house advance to make a linear floor, that’s why the use of pilotis, similar to Le Corbusier 5 points. With reinforced concrete, the slamb and the roof are those lines that form a plan with these glass curtain walls made a great volume over the mountain. The relation between the construction and the nature is almost like in the way to preserve it and integrate. Also with an open floor plan, Lina projects 2 places, the first one with the

living room, the dining room, and a little bibliotheca; and the second one with the service’s room in the back, and the dormitories, the bathroom and the kitchen. Between these two main areas, there is a courtyard that gives to the Casa de Vidro a difference besides the other two projects, this could be analyze as a way to bring more to the interior of the nature that is in the territory. Lina Bo Bardi and Mies van der Rohe, because of their immigrate, they were able to take with then their work outside the Europe. Lina in Brazil and Mies in the USA, both of them with a relationship to the territory. The lightness of the steel could give to these projects a new way to think the living in the modern house. The use of steel and glass reinvented the traditional houses, the way of the relation with outside. The differences between then could be listed as: the solution of the interior open plan, how to use the territory, the volumes created, privacy in a house full of glass (with curtains, putting the project on the top of the hill, using the forest as a way to preserve the interior live). Previous page images: Glass House, Philip Johnson, New Canaan, 1949; Farnsworth House, Mies van der Rohe, Chicago, 194551; Casa de Vidro, Lina Bo Bardi, São Paulo, 1951.

The american Home:

from Ludwig Mies van der Rohe to Carlos JimĂŠnez

. Craig Ellwood, Daphne Residence, San Francisco | 1958-61 The legacy of the masters: Mies van der Rohe - use of white steel - horizontality | Farnsworth

. Luigi Moretti, “Il Girasole”, Rome | 1947-50 Broken geometries: one house or two? - move walls to capture more light - cut the façade | one building cutted or two buildings separeted

. Louis Kahn, Fisher House, Pennsylvania | 1960-67

. Robert Venturi, Vanna Venturi House, Pennsylvania | 1961-64 - “It is the difficult unity through inclusion rather than the easy unity through exclusion”. (Venturi, Complexity and Contradiction in architecture, 1966). of the tradition? of the references? - inspired façade by Michelangelo - Porta Pia

. Paul Rudolph, Bass Residence, Forth Worth | 1970-76

. Michael Graves, House at Indian Hill, Cincinnati | 1990

. Luis Barragรกn, Gilardi House, Tacubaya | 1976

. Luis Barragรกn, Gilardi House, Tacubaya | 1976

The House of Memory

From Bilbao to Valmy: Contemporary Museums and the Shapes of Time We can analyze the Guggenheim museum in Bilbao, by Frank Gehry as a reinvention of the museum typology. The building is a strange object in the middle of Manhattan, an object with complex curves made of titanium plates. The building now seems to me an object of art in itself. Unlike the New York project, in which the premise “form follows function” was developed in the course of the new interpretation of the museum, in the Bilbao project, it seems to me a more formal rather than functional question. However, the idea of artwork contained in the two buildings is present in different ways. As in the building of the Lina Bo Bardi Museum of Art, which is much closer to the Guggenheim Museum in New York, its form follows a new interpretation of the museum’s function. However, can a museum space be neutral? In the MASP project, Lina Bo Bardi can show us a very rich and delicate interpretation of art, architecture, urbanism and museography. A building that thinks of all possible aspects of the architect’s performance. She can with the Crystal Easels leave in the hand of the visitor the interpretation of the works of art exhibited there. We can make the path we want and build a line of reasoning only ours.

Something that can be compared to the projects of Franco Albini, especially a project for the Palazzo Bianco in Genoa between 1949-51, when it allows us to touch, move and see from all angles the sculpture of Margherita di Brabante on its movable pedestal. In these two cases the public is placed as protagonist of the place and the understanding of art. Besides them, great names in Italian architecture, such as the group of architects BBPR and Carlo Scarpa, have projects in which the building and the way of presenting the work of art is of the utmost importance. The BBPR group produced a semi-circular panel that housed Michelangelo’s Pietà Rondanini sculpture at Castello Sforzesco (1954-56), making the visitor feel the surprise of discovering - behind the panel - a work of art. Or with Carlo Scarpa’s project for the Palazzo Abatellis project, with an exhibition set with completely new supports and the use of colors as a background of the sculptures, as if underlining these works. With these projects I think it is not possible to say that these spaces are neutral. From Frank Lloyd Wright to Frank Gehry, I can read several ways of dealing with art and museography. From a certain attempt of neutrality with the use of the white color in its interior until the expression of inter-

ference employing funds, ways of exposing the object, and the object itself being the architectural construction. In this line of thought where the architect is an agent of these new modes of interpretation, we have the designs of the memorials. And once starting from the concept of “memory house” for museums, memorials are the clearest expression of this concept.

and the framing of the mill says tells us about Valmy. We could say, then, that museums have gone from a simple position of expository and neutral spaces - to a certain extent - to active places that help to tell, narrate and recover memory.

We can take the cases of David Chipperfield’s restoration project to the Neues Museum and Peter Eisenman’s Memorial to the Dead Jews of Europe. In different ways, these projects tell us and rescue memories, be it the bombings that the building of the Neues Museum suffered during the Second World War; or Jews killed in World War II - even the architect claiming there is no reference to the number of dead, the most common interpretation runs counter to the image of a cemetery. It seems to me how the designs of Libeskind, Prost and Faloci lead us to an understanding of architecture beyond physical and built space. The redeemed memory builds the site, the light entering through the cutouts of the facade of the Jewish Museum builds the interior of the memorial, the soldiers’ names written on the metal panels make the narrative of the elliptical ring of the Notre Dame Memorial

Previous page images: Plan of MASP, Lina Bo Bardi, São Paulo, 1968; Support for the sculpture of Margherita di Brabante, Franco Albini, Genoa, 1949-51; Semi-circular panel, BBPR, 1954-56.

Architecture and Landscape Fogo Island

In the documentary “Strange & Familiar architecture on fire island” was possible to see some projects of the architect Todd Saunders. His way of thinking project as shown in the documentary shows us a concern with the issue of local culture and landscape. Having been raised in the Fogo Island region, Saunders always seeks out architectural references and local culture in his work, whether with the fishery, the ladies who sew, or the local carpenters working for his projects. In addition, the architect seeks a very strong relationship with the island, framing in openings of the most diverse sizes the landscape of Fogo Island. His project, as stated in the documentary, seems like it has always been there in the landscape. Its materiality mixes with the stones and the undergrowth and, unlike being a landmark or a monument, it integrates into the whole. Because of this, Saunders always looks for a “simple” - but “twisted” architecture, as in the case of Tower Studio where he stresses the importance of making a model before building, something his grandparents always said to him. Its relation with architecture does not seem to me only academic, projectual or theoretical, but of memory. In the documentary his grandparents are mentioned, his childhood, the memory of the local population. he seems to treat architecture with a much more sentimental form than simply seeking the “perfect or beautiful form”.

It seems to me that the projects deal in a very contemporary way, but at the same time with respect to the past. The idea of inviting designers from various places to reinterpret and create new objects from existing objects shows us this. Reinterpretations of chairs, chandeliers, all from a vernacular architecture present in this region. The option of using local people and local material reinforces this concern of the architect to always return to the local culture, very important at the moment in which we live, where architecture becomes something almost generic and the details of the architecture that was developed in a certain region it is lost. As stated in the documentary “Anything that is frozen is dead”, which is also valid for architecture. In his projects, Saunders also takes care to mark and emphasize the question of the local architectural form, not only in the exterior of the building, but also in the internal part - as in the case of Tower Studio and Fogo Island Inn. Certain details of the construction shows us this concern. At the Fogo Island Inn. the architect thinks in detail of the layout of the wooden floor to mark the two different axes that guide the design. During the documentary I perceived that the architect is engaged with the place to give us experiences and expressions of it.

Drawing of the two main axes. Saunders Architecture - Fogo Island In., Fogo, Canada - 2013.

Saunders Architecture - Fogo Island In., Fogo, Canada - 2013. Drawing of the layout of the wooden floor.

Previous page image: Saunders Architecture - Fogo Island In., Fogo, Canada - 2013.

Modernity and tradition in architecture

When Frampton in his book Modern Architecture: a Critical History, quotes Walter Benjamin - which says about the angel of history, that this is looking to the past, but a storm, the progress, prevents him from standing still - we can understand what the author understands as progress and the evolution of history. They are inherent and impossible to deny - the world evolves and develops. And just as in the world, the architecture also develops in technical, conceptual and approach aspects. However, modern architecture, in attempting to deny a preexisting tradition, was stuck in its own ideas and seems to me to be paralyzed in an idea of society that it did not reach. According to Frampton (1997): “(…) in the name of a senseless reason, it has led man to a situation in which he begins to be as alienated from his production as from the natural world” (FRAMPTON, 1997, p.10, free translation).

The cultural tradition that modern architecture ignored in the name of rationalization and new methods of construction is being incorporated into the most varied architectural projects today and in various parts of the world. Critical Regionalism for Frampton, in my point of view, is a matter of assimilation between traditional architecture and modern architecture. “While opposing the sentimental

simulation of the local vernacular, at certain moments Critical Regionalism will insert vernacular elements reinterpreted as disjunctive episodes within the whole” (FRAMPTON, 1997, p.377, free translation).

An example of a reinterpretation of the vernacular is the project of Francis Kéré, Gando teacher’s Housing in Burkina Faso (2006), where the architect uses local and traditional architecture as a basis for the thought of the form, the constructive techniques and materials for the project. In this case, a modern architecture approach would completely ignore the location of the project and the local techniques. The use of land for the construction and others techniques becomes a critical act.

space. In this case, the experience is not only in the vision, but in entering and leaving the rooms, to feel the different temperatures when walking from one place to another. In a way, this modern architecture that is aligned with a traditional culture - critical Regionalism according to Frampton (1997) - relates very strongly to the place in which it is inserted, with a technique already known and, even with references from other places, tries to create a rich information network of examples, not just a single architectural view. “His appearance suggests that the inherited notion of the dominant cultural center, surrounded by dependent and dominated satellites, ultimately represents an inadequate model for assessing the present state of modern architecture.” (FRAMPTON, 1997, p.377, free translation).

that was embedded in it, in the why of its questions. The attention to “secondary and technical” elements, as Frampton (1997) says, does not seem to me a bit impoverishing for the building, but rather it enriches and changes the way of thinking architecture, highlighting elements that were just placed or docked in the plant. In addition, the notion of rationalization has been raised as a way of seizing and expediting the construction, something that is not condemnable. But I think it is very important to always analyze the great framework in which architecture is inserted and the great social role it has. After all, according to Giulio Carlo Argan (1992): “It is not possible to eliminate from architecture the problem of social function: it is built for life. But it is necessary to distinguish between function and purpose: architecture can have a social function without specifically proposing the realization of a reform in society” (ARGAN, 1992, p. 288, free translation).

In a way, even Albert Kahn condemns this type of architecture, with the same formulas for all situations and for all buildings (BUCCI, 2017), even being one of the great names of 20th century industrial architecture.

I do not think a criticism of modern architecture in general is valid. We must always think of the context

In addition, Frampton also addresses the question of experiencing the project for critical Regionalism, which made me think of the project Family House at the Empordá, by Ricardo Bofill Taller de Arquitectura, in Montràs (1973). Where the experience of the project takes place through the movement between the “house”, since it is somehow “exploded”, each room is configured as an independent volume and connected by external

Francis Kéré - Gando Teacher’s Housing, Burkina Faso - 2006. Drawing.

Bibliography Albini, Franco. 1954. My experiences as an architect in exhibitions in Italy and abroad. Venice. Argan, Giulio Carlo. 1992. Arte moderna. Tradução: Federico Carotti e Denise Bottmann. São Paulo: Companhia das Letras. Frampton, Kenneth. 1997. História crítica da arquitetura moderna. Tradução: Jefferson Luiz Camargo. São Paulo: Martins Fontes. Hitchcok, Henry-Russell, and Philip Johnson. 1932. The Avoidance of Applied Decoration. Le Corbusier. 1925. The Decorative Art of Today. Loos, Adolf. 1908. Ornament and Crime. Sullivan, Louis. 1892. We should Refrain Entirely from the Use of Ornament for a Period of Years. Wright, Frank Lloyd. 1901. The art and craft of the machine. Wright, Frank Lloyd. 1908. In the cause of architecture.