STANDARD ERRORS: Architecture and the biopolitics of regulation
An unexpected application of the rule;
on language games, legal exceptions and architectural jokes
Liam Ross
STANDARD ERRORS: Architecture and the biopolitics of regulation
Liam Ross
An unexpected application of the rule;
on language games, legal exceptions and architectural jokes
“This lady resembles the Venus of Milo in many respects: she, too, is incredibly old, like her she has no teeth, and there are white patches on the yellowish surface of her body.”1
Paulo Virno, in Multitude, between innovation and negation (2008), proposes that jokes illustrate the logic of innovative action in general. Through a cross-reading of Freud’s taxonomy of Witz, Schmitt’s Political Theology and Wittgenstein’s Philosophical Reflections, Virno argues that jokes illustrate the ‘diagram’ of creativity; they represent in miniature the logical and linguistic techniques through which the human animal is capable of modifying its own form-of-life, or ‘life-style’. How so? Jokes employ the ambiguity inherent in language to make ‘false’ arguments or unexpected inferences (for instance, attributing an accidental predicate – the white patch – to the grammatical subject – the Venus of Milo). Jokes are linguistic games, but games that demonstrate the transformability of all linguistic practices. That is, jokes demonstrate that the rules of language are never sufficiently precise or flexible to determine what a given statement will mean within a particular context; they draw our attention to a constitutive gap between the semiotic register (the system of signs) and the semantic register (the meaning of statements). Indeed, jokes are techniques for opening up this gap, for creating a momentary crisis of signification – the familiar lag between the telling and the ‘getting’ – in which the audience is left temporarily adrift. By making unexpected applications of grammatical rules, jokes demonstrate that the meaning of our statements are not dependent upon those rules, but rather, draws upon some other capacity for sense-making. What is this other capacity?
Virno suggests that jokes are a specific instance of a broad problem, the question of how to apply a rule to a particular case. He turns to Schmitt and Wittgenstein to investigate this problem. According to Schmitt, and to the Decisionist tradition, the law, like language, can never be sufficiently precise or flexible to determine how it should be interpreted in a particular context; for this to be true, every rule would require a subsequent rule explaining how and when to apply the prior rule, and so on, ad infinitum. The regression implied by normative criteria can only ‘cut’ by the juristic decision, a decision that is not – according to Schmitt – supported by the law. The juristic decision necessarily entails a momentary crisis of legislation, because in order to apply a rule, one must first know which rule to apply. And in deciding which rule applies to a particular circumstance, a jurist must temporarily suspend the law, step beyond it, and make a sovereign decision. For Schmitt, every application of a rule – no matter how orthodox – necessarily requires a momentary suspension of that rule, a moment of sovereign decision-making. This fact, however, only comes to the fore in moments of legal ambiguity or exception, moments that – like the joke – occur when differing applications of the same rule coincide, such that no legal distinction can be drawn between the legitimate and the illegitimate. How does the jurist make a decision in this ‘state of exception’, where the law provides no definitive guidance? For Schmitt, the application of the law, the juristic decision, is always a short-cut which circumvents the legal framework it
operates within, making recourse to a pre-existing, pre-legislative ‘regularity’: “Every general norm demands a normal everyday frame of life to which it can be factually applied and which is subject to its regulations. The norm requires a homogenous medium. This effective normal situation is not a mere ‘superficial presupposition’ that a jurist can ignore; that situation belongs precisely to its immanent validity.”2
Between rules and regularity That is, following Schmitt, Virno argues that moments of linguistic or legal crisis – the joke, the state of exception – are not moments of anarchy, indeed, quite the opposite: “[t]he suspension of the norm permits the surfacing of the normality of practices, customs, relationships, inclinations, conflicts”. In the absence of explicit codes of conduct, we are thrown back upon the anthropological fullness of the situation we find ourselves in, a fullness which the law attempts to codify, but never fully succeeds. Or to put it in Wittgenstein’s terms; in the absence of clearly defined codes of behavior, human action falls back upon what he refers to as the ‘common behavior of mankind’; the vital, species-specific regularity which makes it possible, for instance, for two human animals that do not share a common language to nonetheless communicate. I think it would be a mistake to understand either Schmitt
STANDARD ERRORS: Architecture and the biopolitics of regulation
Liam Ross
or Wittgenstein to be suggesting a transparent commonality of human behavior, reducible, for instance, to either animal instinct, or to a transhistorical set of social codes; rather, the common behavior attributed to our species here is the very process of submitting our animal instincts to linguistic codification; the process of substituting our vital drives – fear and desire, sympathy and antipathy, submission and domination – with language: “A child has hurt himself and he cries; and then adults talk to him and teach him exclamations, and later, sentences. They teach the child new pain-behavior. ‘So you are saying that the word ‘pain’ really means crying?’ – On the contrary: the verbal expression of pain replaces crying and does not describe it”.3
So how do the moments of crisis described – the legal exception and the verbal pun - help us to understand the conditions of possibility, the techniques, and the stakes, of innovative action, or ‘creativity’? For Virno, what is at stake in creativity – what defines the human-animal’s capacity to modify its own ‘form-of-life’ – can be specified quite precisely; an innovative action is one which proposes new ways in which our instinctive drives can be substituted linguistically; new ways in which our vital, species specific ‘regularities’ can be negotiated through clausal structures. Jokes illustrate the resources that, as a linguistic animal, we are able to draw upon to effect such a change; they bring about moments of crisis, ambiguities of significance, in order to effect surprising re-orientations of meaning, which upset established relations between our drives, practices and language (the attribution of accidental predicates to the subject ‘Venus of Milo’ is creative, then, in as much as it exposes and undermines the codified lechery and cliquism of art connoisseurship). As Wittgenstein notes, “Language games do change with time”, and jokes are one of the mechanisms through which human actors can effect such change, either through eccentric or surprising applications of existing rules, or through the undermining and abolition of those rules. The condition of possibility for such a form of creativity, though, is precisely that there be a rule, or to be more precise; that we be part of a species that exhibits certain common and vital ‘regularities’, that this regularity be formalized through provisional legal and linguistic codification, and that we be challenged constantly to test the effectiveness of this codification, through applying it to particular cases.
that Virno specifies quite clearly what is at stake in any discussion of creativity, architectural or otherwise. The innovative potential of any discipline is not commensurate to the autonomy or ‘artistic freedom’ that it offers its practitioners, but rather to the points of contact that it maintains, the degree of friction that it can generate, with respect to the ‘everyday frame of life’ it operates within. Secondly, such a conception of ‘creativity’ offers a surprising challenge to both the time-old concern of architecture as the ‘compromised’ art, or to more contemporary concerns that architectural creativity is hampered by an increasingly regulated building industry. Not only is a fundamentally regular and actively regulated environment the pre-requisite of such an understanding of innovation, but further, creativity itself should be understood as strictly ‘sub-normative’; it is only through the existence of linguistically formulated codes that language games gain purchase upon, and can hope to affect, the instinctive drives that they substitute. That is, the possibility of creativity is always correlative to the nature and extent of established norms.
Thirdly, in the course of his argument, Virno offers – by way of Aristotle’s Nichomachean Ethics – an outline of the qualities that are indispensible to jokers, and therefore to creative action in general. These are phrónesis (practical wisdom, or prudence), orthós logos (an understanding of which law applies to a concrete circumstance), kairós (a sense of timing, brevity, and hence proportion), as well as éndoxa (an awareness of the engrained belie’s of the community in question). These are virtues abundant in Barristers, but not always associated with, or highly developed, in architects. Finally, such a re-construed sense of creativity suggests a shift in the staging oe architectural creativity. While conventional practice carries something of a BeauxArt legacy in the sense that the completed project is only ever a more-or-less successful realization of the initial, inspirational parti, for the architect-joker, the moments of greatest creative significance might be those conventionally overlooked moments - the submission to planning authorities, the building standards application, or the value-engineering exercise – in which, hemmed in by normative standards, the architect has greatest opportunity to re-construe those standards.
Two architectural jokes The prudence of architectural creativity What insight does Virno’s reflection on the joke offer to a consideration of the relationship between law and architecture? On the basis of this brief summary, I think it is possible to suggest a few provisional conclusions. Firstly, we might reiterate
The remainder of this article offers a brief presentation of two recent projects, designed by the author, described as attempts to crack an architectural ‘joke’. Both projects formed part of the author’s contribution to Venice Take Away: Ideas to Change British Architecture, an exhibition commissioned by the British Council for the British
Preliminary Report, Building Warrant Application, British Pavillion, Venice
Report by Director of City Development on non-compliance of British Pavillion with Scottish Building Standards Courtesy the City of Edinburgh Council
STANDARD ERRORS: Architecture and the biopolitics of regulation
Liam Ross
Pavilion at the 13 Venice Architecture Biennale, and touring to the RIBA headquarters i, London. As a pair of partially executed, temporary installations, their claims to architectural innovation are fundamentally limited; however, if something within the projects worked – that is, if their audience found them funny – it was perhaps to the degree to which they were able to generate a tension between the orthós logos – the rules that apply to a particular case - and the éndoxa – the engrained belief of a given community. th
Both projects were for site-specific installations in a gallery context, and served to accompany an exhibition of research conducted by the author on regulatory requirements, and their constitutive exceptions, in Edinburgh and Lagos.. The first design was to be situated in the British Pavilion i, Venice, and was conceived as a means to exhibit the non-compliance of this building with current British Standards; it was a didactic joke, intended to demonstrate the disparity between the projected image of British architecture, and the normative standards of its building industry. With the generous assistance of Edinburgh City Council, the plans of the British Pavilion (fig. 1) were submitted for Building Warrant Approval. The building surveyors report found the pavilion to contravene a number of current regulatory requirements (fig. 2); its entrance stair is not adequately protected against the spread of fire and smoke; it has no publicly accessible toilet, and its staff toilet provision is insufficient; its access provisions are not acceptable – a ramp or stair-lift should be provided to the principle entrance; the building has a long pedestrian access route, for which no resting places are provided; there are no vision panels on its doors; the protective barriers provided have gaps greater than 100 millimeterm, allowing a child to fall through them. In response to this report, I designed a series of temporary measures in order to bring the British Pavilion into compliance with British Standards, for the duration of the Biennale. These were tabled to the curators as an installation proposal (fig. 3). The curators found the proposal amusing-– with one exception. Three concerns were noted with regard to the proposed ramp; first, the layout of the ramp would make access to the neighboring Canadian, German and French pavilions inconvenient; secondly, the ramp would, in fact, need to be much longer than designed, as the ground slopes away from the pavilion; and thirdly, the pavilion already provides for wheelchair access, by means of a stairlift to a balcony at the rear of the buildin5.5 The ramp was omitted from the proposals, and the measures implemented (fig. 4). As it transpired, for the 2013 cycle, the Biennale organisers made a series of temporary installations io the Giardini and Arsenale venues, in order to provide wheelchair access for the duration of the event. Long temporary ramps were installed on the Veneta Marini and Arsenale bridges. The British Pavilion remained one of only three
venues not to offer either level or ramped access via its principle entrance (the others being Hungary’s pavilion, which also offers a stair-lift via a sideentrance, and Scarpa’s Venezuela Pavilion, accessed by four 1.2 meter long steps). Subsequently, when the exhibition toured to London, a similar proposal was made for an installation at the RIBA Headquarters. r made contact with the Institute, requesting a meeting with the building services manager, in order to discuss any regulatory exceptions that 66 Portland Place, as a listed building, was subject to, or alternatively to be provided with copies of the building plans, in order to submit them for Warrant Approval. This request was very politely declined. Though the manager enjoyed the proposal personally, there was nonetheless a concern as to how the findings of such a survey would be received by the trade press. An alternative proposal was made (contrastind the size-restrictions imposed by Domestic window-cleaning regulations with the scale of the gallery windows at Portland Place, fig. 5), but in the event, site-specific installations were omitted from the London exhibition. I would like to offer a general explanation, drawing upon Virno’s thesis, as to the differing reception of these two architectural jokes. It was acceptable for the British Council to apply British Standards to the British Pavilion – even though, indeed especially because, these rules were not, in this context, mandatory - only to the degree to which they contravened the local éndoxa; Venice is not a place in which edge-protection is normally provided, or expected. That is, the proposal worked as an installation in a gallery context to the degree it was legible as a sovereign decision, by a sovereign body, but that nonetheless demonstrated the fundamental compliance of the Pavilion building to a broader contextual ‘regularity’. By applying the rules, the British Council could enjoy their exemption of them. However, in the case of the wheelchair ramp, this gesture was not possible. Here, the local éndoxa had become broadly in line with ‘British Standards’. As such, the installation of a temporary access ramp might have been mistaken for what it was; the installation of a temporary access ramp. That is, the ramp-joke was in poor taste, because it made an exhibition of the inaccessibility of the Pavilion, its contravention of the contextual regularity. In the case of the RIBA headquarters, however, no joke could be made; the RIBA is chartered, but not sponsored by, a sovereign body, and as such maintains its status by upholding the highest standards of self-regulation. In this context, it was unacceptable to apply rules which were not only in line with the local éndoxa, but also legally mandatory; such an unexpected application would have made an exhibition, as intended, of the forms of exemption at work within UK buildings standards.
2 1 6 3 0 4 1 7 4 0
1 7 4 0
1 7 4 0
1 7 3
1 4 0 2 9 4
1 4 0 2 9 4 2 0 2 3 0 4
In g re s o
STANDARD ERRORS: Architecture and the biopolitics of regulation
Liam Ross
Proposed Intervention (partially completed), British Pavillion, Venice
notes
Eight proposed interventions at the British Pavillion in order to demonstrate compliance with British Standards 556mm 100mm Liam Ross 5 1
4 1
Freud, Jokes and Their Relation to the Unconscious, quoted in Virno, “Multitude, Between Innovation and Negation”, 136.
1
3 1
2 1
1
0 1
9 0
8 0
7 0
f ix light
5
inward opening light
6 0
Schmitt, Political Theology: Four Chapters on the Concept of Sovereignty, ibid: 116
2
5 0
4 0
3 0
3.
3
5.
1500
100mm
2.
4.
visual clarity & vision panels
posts and columns
1500
window cleaning
30-55mm
1.
2000
1000
6.
4.
identif ication of nosing
posts and columns
RAN BRETAGN
2.
1200mm
10m
Wittgenstein, Philosophical Investigations, ibid: 122
This research, conducted with Tolulope Onabolu, studied the emergence of two regulatory requirements – British Standard 8213 Safe Cleaning of Windows, and Lagos State Physical Development Regulation 15 Permissible setback – in order to demonstrate differences between their intent and effect. In the case of British window cleaning regulations, it demonstrated how these regulations, contra to their ambition of are not ensuring that buildings are designed to ensure that all occupant are capable of cleaning their own windows, but rather creating economies of risk-distribution that architecturally formalize existing wealth 8. disparities. In the case of the Lagos setback rule, it ramps demonstrated that the provision of setbacks for the purpose of fire-separation had the contradictory effect of locating buildings of high-hazard in location that risk spread of flame. See “Venice Take Away: Ideas to Change British Architecture”, AA Publications: 2012.
4
external escape stair
500
1500
1825
edge protection
150
1 0
opening leaf
150
f ix leaf
2 0
1.
4.
4.
3.
3.
5 I note the formal similarity between this list of reasonable objections, and Freud’s famous ‘leaky kettle’ joke: “A. borrowed a copper kettle from B. and after he returned it was sued by B. because the kettle now had a big hole in it which made it unusable. His defense was: ‘first, I never borrowed a kettle from B. at all; secondly, the kettle had a hole in it already when I got it from him; and thirdly, I gave him back the kettle undamaged.’” 1200mm
4.
4.
5.
8. 6.
0
5
6.
7.
0
5
1.
4. 3.
1200mm
10m 500mm
4.
6. 0
5
10m
STANDARD ERRORS: Architecture and the biopolitics of regulation
Liam Ross 4 1
3 1
2 1
1
0 1
9 0
8 0
7 0
6 0
5 0
4 0
3 0
2 0
1 0
1 3 5 1 8 0
. t.8 9 h 4 7 9
H .4 7 3
H .6 5 5
H .7 1 4
1 6 2
4 4 0
3 0 3
N 05
H .5 2 4
6 3 4
6 3 6 0
H .4 7 /3 7 1 4 M Q .3 0 5 . 2
H .4 8 2
+ 0 . 0
556mm
PR O IE Z IO N EL U CE RN AR I O
100mm
500mm
1 6 2 3 0 5
4 8 0 0
f ix light H .7 4 8
H .6 4 5
H .4 8 1
inward opening light f ix leaf
opening leaf
3.
edge protection
N 06
1 7 0 3 0 6
H .4 8 1 / 7 4 8 M Q .3 6 .1 9
1200mm
1 3 1 2 1 6
1500
external escape stair
4.
visual clarity & vision panels
posts and columns
150
2.
window cleaning
8.
4 8 6 0
5.
30-55mm
1.
4 7 9
N 07
100mm 500
480
380
PR O IE Z IO N EL U CE RN AR I O
580
+ 0 . 0
1500
1825
7 5
7 5 4 0
150
4 8 1
1 1 3 3
resting places
H .3 5 6 M Q .8 .4 3
. t.8 2 h
+ 0 . 0
1 7 4 0
1500
1 2 8 2 1 3
1 7 4 0
H .5 5 8
1 4 0 2 9 4
2000
1000
6.
identif ication of nosing
1. window cleaning
2. visual clarity & vision panels
Scottish Building Standard 4.8.3 / British Standard 8213: Design for safety in use and during cleaning of windows, inclosing door-height windows and rooflights. Design for safe cleaning should accommodate the fifth percentile of the UK adult population, ensuring that all building users are able to clean both faces of any glazed surface without the need for over-extension when reaching, or the use of a step-ladder or extender. Window size should be limited so as to limit the maximum reach necessary to 1825mm reaching overhead, and 556mm reaching out.
Scottish Building Standard 4.1.7 / British Standard 8300: Design of buildings and their approaches to meet the needs of disabled people. The entrance door should contrast visually with its immediate surroundings. Entrance doors and lobby doors should have viewing panels to alert people approaching a door to the presence of another person on the other side. If a door has a single viewing panel, the minimum zone of visibility should be between 500 mm and 1 500 mm from the floor. Each individual viewing panel should be not less than 100 mm in width.
Intervention: Fix-RH light shut. Board-up area not reachable within 556mm reach out. Board up LH light not reachable within 1825 from FFL.
Intervention: Paint entrance door contrasting colour. Fix LH leaf shut. Replace panel in RH leaf with new panel including vision panel as specified.
7.
1.
8.(repeat every 50m)
4.
50m 3.
1200mm
10m 500mm
4.
6. 0
5
4.
posts and columns
8.
ramps
STANDARD ERRORS: Architecture and the biopolitics of regulation
Liam Ross 4 1
4 1
In g re s o
In g re s o
0 1
9 0
7 0
2 1
6 0
1
5 0
0 1
4 0
9 0
3 0
8 0
7 0
4 1
1 0
3 1
5 0
1
3 0
2 0
0 1
9 0
1 0 0 8
4 0 1 7
3 0 1 6
2 0 1 5
10 4
0 0 1 3
9 0
2 0
8 0
1 0
7 0
6 0
5 0
4 0
3 0
2 0
1 0
H .6 5 5
H .4 7 3
4 7 9
H .7 1 4
H .6 5 5
4 7 9
H .7 1 4
H .4 7 3
H .6 5 5
H .7 1 4
1 6 2
1 6 2
1 6 2
3 0 3
3 0 3
3 0 3
4 4 0
4 4 0
4 4 0
H .4 7 3
H .6 5 5
H .7 1 4
N 05
+ 0 . 0
H .5 2 4
H .5 5 8
H .5 2 4
N 05
H .5 5 8
H .5 2 4
6 3 6 0
6 3 6 0
6 3 6 0
6 3 4
H .4 7 /3 7 1 4 M Q .3 0 5 . 2
H .4 8 2
+ 0 . 0
PR O IE Z IO N ECO NT ROS OF IT T O
+ 0 . 0
9 6 5 0
+ 0 . 0
PR O IE Z IO N ECO NT ROS OF IT T O
PR O IE Z IO N EL U CE RN AR I O
9 6 5 0
H .4 7 /3 7 1 4 M Q .3 0 5 . 2
H .4 8 2
+ 0 . 0
PR O IE Z IO N ECO NT ROS OF IT T O
N 05
H .5 2 4
H .4 7 /3 7 1 4 M Q .3 0 5 . 2
H .4 8 2
9 9 0
PR O IE Z IO N ECO NT ROS OF IT T O
N 05
H .5 5 8
H .4 7 /3 7 1 4 M Q .3 0 5 . 2
H .4 8 2
9 9 0
6 3 4
+ 0 . 0
H .5 5 8
PR O IE Z IO N EL U CE RN AR I O
PR O IE Z IO N EL U CE RN AR I O
556mm 556mm
PR O IE Z IO N EL U CE RN AR I O
9 6 5 0
4 8 1
4 8 1
4 8 1
556mm
100mm 100mm
4 8 0 0
4 8 0 0
H .4 8 1
H .6 4 5
inward f ix opening light light
inward f ix opening light light
inward f ix opening light light
inward opening light f ix leaf
2.
4.
4 8 6 0
4.
5.
4.
4.
posts andposts columns and columns posts and columns posts and columns
1 3 1 2 1 6
1000
1 3 1 2 1 6
H .3 5 6 M Q .8 .4 3
. t.8 2 h
. t.8 2 h
+ 0 . 0
. t.8 2 h
+ 0 . 0
1500
1 2 8 2 1 3
1 2 8 2 1 3
1 2 8 2 1 3
1 2 8 2 1 3
1 7 4 0
1 7 4 0
1 7 4 0
1 7 4 0
1 7 4 0
1 7 4 0
1 7 4 0
1 7 4 0
1 4 0 2 9 4
1 4 0 2 9 4
1 4 0 2 9 4
1 4 0 2 9 4
2 0 2 3 0 4
2 0 2 3 0 4
2 0 2 3 0 4
2000 10002000 1000 2000 1000
N 07
1 3 1 2 1 6
H .3 5 6 M Q .8 .4 3
2 1 6 3 0 4
1 7 3 2 0 2 3 0 4
150
2.
5.
In g re s o
In g re s o
2000
6. 5 1
5 1
5 1
5 1
4 1
4 1
4 1
4 1
3 1
3 1
3 1
3 1
2 1
2 1
2 1
2 1
1
1
1
1
0 1
0 1
0 1
0 1
9 0
9 0
9 0
9 0
8 0
8 0
8 0
8 0
7 0
7 0
7 0
7 0
6 0
6 0
6 0
6 0
5 0
5 0
4 0
30-55mm
2.
1500
1500
1500
2.
5.
external external external external escape stair escape stairescape stair escape stair
150
4 8 6 0
N 07
1.
window cleaning window cleaning window cleaning window cleaning visual clarity visual & clarityvisual & clarity visual & clarity & vision panels vision panels vision panels vision panels
4 7 9
5.
1500
+ 0 . 0
1.
100mm
150
H .3 5 6 M Q .8 .4 3
+ 0 . 0
1.
100mm
1500
H .3 5 6 M Q .8 .4 3
5 0
4 0
4 0
3 0
3 0
3 0
2 0
2 0
2 0
2 0
1 0
1 0
1 0
1 0
6.
6. 4. 6.4. 8. 4.8.
3. edge protection
4. posts and columns
Scottish Building Standard 4.4 / British Standard 6180: Code of practice for protective barriers in and around buildings. Barriers should be designed so as to minimize the risk of persons falling, rolling, sliding or slipping through gaps in the barrier. In buildings which can be accessed by children under the age of 5, gaps in a barrier or infill should not be large enough to permit a sphere of 100 mm diameter to pass through.
Scottish Building Standard 4.1 / British Standard 8300: Design of buildings and their approaches to meet the needs of disabled people. Each free‑standing post, e.g. a lighting column, within an access route should contrast visually with the background against which it is seen (it is desirable also to incorporate a band, 150 mm high, whose bottom edge is 1 500 mm above ground level, and which contrasts visually with the remainder of the column or post).
Intervention: Provide profiled infill panels to reduce gaps between balusters to 100mm.
Intervention: Provide 150mm deep visually contrasting band to free standing column and flagpole.
BRETAGN RAN BRETAGN RAN BRETAGN 1.
1.
1.
4.
1.
4. 3.
4. 3.
4. 3.
3.
1200mm
1200mm
1200mm
10m 1200mm
10m
10m
10m
8.
6.
7.
6.
7.
4.
8. 6.
7.
4.
0
0
0
5
0
5
5
5
6.
6.
6.
500mm
8.
4.
500mm
4.
500mm
500mm
4. 8.
4.8.
identif ication identif ication identif posts ication and identif posts icramps ation and posts ramps and posts ramps and of nosingof nosing of nosing columns of nosing columns columns columns
5 0
4 0
3 0
5.
1200mm 1200
9 6 5 0
2 1 6 3 0 4
2 1 6 3 0 4
2 1 6 3 0 4 In g re s o
1.
100mm 100mm
1500
4 8 6 0
N 07
1 3 1 2 1 6
In g re s o
PR O IE Z IO N EL U CE RN AR I O
4 7 9
. t.8 2 h
9 6 5 0
1200mm 1200mm
150
4 8 6 0
N 07
9 6 5 0
3.
30-55mm
4 7 9
3.
500
PR O IE Z IO N EL U CE RN AR I O
PR O IE Z IO N EL U CE RN AR I O
4 7 9
9 6 5 0
7 5 + 0 . 0
PR O IE Z IO N EL U CE RN AR I O
3.
30-55mm
PR O IE Z IO N EL U CE RN AR I O
+ 0 . 0
opening
3.leaf
30-55mm
PR O IE Z IO N EL U CE RN AR I O
7 5
+ 0 . 0
PR O IE Z IO N EL U CE RN AR I O
PR O IE Z IO N EL U CE RN AR I O
7 5
7 5 4 0
+ 0 . 0
1500
+ 0 . 0
opening f ix leaf leaf
edge protection edge protection edge protection edge protection
500
+ 0 . 0
7 5 4 0
7 5 4 0 + 0 . 0
7 5 4 0
H .4 8 1 / 7 4 8 M Q .3 6 .1 9
1 1 3 3
H .4 8 1 / 7 4 8 M Q .3 6 .1 9
1 1 3 3
H .4 8 1 / 7 4 8 M Q .3 6 .1 9
1 1 3 3
H .4 8 1 / 7 4 8 M Q .3 6 .1 9
7 5 + 0 . 0
opening f ix leaf leaf
1 7 0 3 0 6
H .7 7 5 / 1 4 5 M Q .1 0 9 . 2 3
1500
1 7 0 3 0 6
H .7 7 5 / 1 4 5
500
1 7 0 3 0 6
opening f ix leafleaf
N 06
M Q .1 0 9 . 2 3
1 1 3 3
1 1 3 2 0
H .7 7 5 / 1 4 5 M Q .1 0 9 . 2 3
N 06
1825
1 7 0 3 0 6
H .7 7 5 / 1 4 5
N 06
1825
1 7 0 3 0 6
N 06
1825
N 01
1825
N 01
7 5
N 01
150
H .4 8 1
150
H .7 4 8
1500
H .6 4 5
150
H .4 8 1
1500
H .7 4 8
H .6 4 5
1500
H .4 8 1
500
H .7 4 8
H .6 4 5
150
f ix light H .7 4 8
M Q .1 0 9 . 2 3
100mm
H .1 1 4 5
H .4 8 2
N 01
100mm
1 6 2 3 0 5
1 6 2 3 0 5
H .1 1 4 5
4 8 0 0
556mm
4 8 1
1 6 2 3 0 5
1 6 2 3 0 5
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8.
ramps
1200mm 1200mm
10m 10m
580 480 480
380 380 580
500mm 500mm
.4.
STANDARD ERRORS: Architecture and the biopolitics of regulation
Liam Ross
8.8.
8.8.
sts posts andand ramps ramps lumns columns
resting resting places places
5. external escape stairs
6. stair width & identification of nosing
7. ramp
8. resting places
Scottish Building Standard 2.9.37. In order to protect the occupants from fire and smoke during evacuation, the external escape stair should be protected against the outbreak of fire from within the building. Where an escape stair which has a total rise of more than 1.6 m, every part of the external wall including fixed windows or glazing not more than 2 m from the escape stair, should have a short fire resistance duration.
British Standard 8300: Design of buildings and their approaches to meet the needs of disabled people. The width of a stair between handrails should be not less than 1 000 mm. Each step nosing should incorporate a permanently contrasting continuous material for the full width of the stair on both the tread and the riser to help blind and partially sighted people appreciate the extent of the stair and identify individual treads. The material should be 50 mm to 65 mm wide on the tread and 30 mm to 55 mm on the riser, and should contrast visually with the remainder of the tread and riser.
Scottish Building Standard 4.1.5 / British Standard 8300: Design of buildings and their approaches to meet the needs of disabled people. This British Standard recommends that the approach to a building is level. If a change in level along the access route is unavoidable, it will be necessary to provide a sloped surface on which a wheelchair user can travel. The key issues in the design of a ramped access route are the gradients of flights and the distances between landings. Where the gradient is too steep or an individual flight too long, a wheelchair user might not have sufficient strength to propel him-†or herself up the slope.
Intervention. Paint / adhere 1m wide visually contrasting stair nosing to external entrance stair.
Intervention: Provide sloping surface to allow wheelchair access to ‘Piano Nobile’ (stair lift to rear of property not compliant). 1:20 pitch, 10m flights, 1.2m landing.
Scottish Building Standard 4.1.5 / British Standard 8300: Design of buildings and their approaches to meet the needs of disabled people. Access routes on level ground should have resting places not more than 50 m apart for people with limited mobility. Seating in resting places should provide a variety of seat heights, ranging from 380 mm to 580 mm, within which a height of 480 mm is suitable for wheelchair users. Armrests should be provided to help people lower themselves onto the seat and stand up. Armrests should not be at the extreme end of the seat but set in so as not to restrict the lateral transfer from a wheelchair to the seating. They should also not restrict front or oblique transfer. A supportive back‑rest should be incorporated for at least 50% of the length of the seat.
Intervention: Board up basement window within 2m of external escape stair.
7.
7.
8.(repeat 8.(repeat every 50m) every 50m)
50m 50m
Intervention: Provide bench every 50m from British Pavilion to nearest car-park. Design of bench to offer a variety of seat heights, and specified arm- and back-rests.
STANDARD ERRORS: Architecture and the biopolitics of regulation
Liam Ross
Proposed Intervention (uncompleted), 66 Portland Place, London
4 No. proposed spandrel panels for the RIBA Gallery, Portland Place, in order to demonstrate compliance with British Standards
1825
556
window cleaning
fig. 1 Detail Proposed decals (red) and manequins, illustrating permissible glazed area under BS8213 RIBA Gallery, Portland Place {NB: Presume outward opening side hung windows}
Scottish Building Standard 4.8.3 / British Standard 8213: Design for safety in use and during cleaning of windows, inclosing door-height windows and rooflights. Design for safe cleaning should accommodate the fifth percentile of the UK adult population, ensuring that all building users are able to clean both faces of any glazed surface without the need for over-extension when reaching, or the use of a step-ladder or extender. Window size should be limited so as to limit the maximum reach necessary to 1825mm reaching overhead, and 556mm reaching out. Intervention: 4 No. Spandrel panels, made up of 8’x4’ ply sheets, Boarding-up area not reachable within 556mm reaching out (window cleaning access via 9 no. outward opening lights).
Liam Ross
Proposed Intervention (uncompleted), 66 Portland Place, London
4 No. proposed spandrel panels for the RIBA Gallery, Portland Place, in order to demonstrate compliance with British Standards
STANDARD ERRORS: Architecture and the biopolitics of regulation
Liam Ross, ESALA, Edinburgh Thanks to Colin Wishart, City of Edinburgh Council
Š University of Edinburgh 2013 All photographs and images by the author, unless otherwise stipulated No part of this publication may be reporduced without prior permission ESALA Edinburgh College of Art University of Edinburgh http://www.ed.ac.uk/schools-departments/edinburgh-college-art/architecture-landscape-architecture