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- | + | ===== The Timeless | |
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- | ==== The Timeless | + | |
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by Christopher Alexander 1979 ISBN 0-19-502248-3 | by Christopher Alexander 1979 ISBN 0-19-502248-3 | ||
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[[Reading Notes]] | [[Reading Notes]] | ||
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- | + | ==== a summary | |
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- | a summary | + | |
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There is a timeless way of building , it's a process through which the order of a building or a town grows out directly from the inner nature of the people, and the animals, and plants, and matter which are in it. Without the help of architects or planners , if you are working in the timeless way's town will grow under your hands, as steady as the flowers in your garden. When we have seen deep into the process to make a building or a town alive, it turns out that this knowledge brings us back to that part of ourselves which is forgotten. | There is a timeless way of building , it's a process through which the order of a building or a town grows out directly from the inner nature of the people, and the animals, and plants, and matter which are in it. Without the help of architects or planners , if you are working in the timeless way's town will grow under your hands, as steady as the flowers in your garden. When we have seen deep into the process to make a building or a town alive, it turns out that this knowledge brings us back to that part of ourselves which is forgotten. | ||
+ | ==== The Quality ==== | ||
+ | There is a central quality which is the root criterion of life and spirit in a man, a town, a building, or a wilderness. This quality is objective and precise, but it cannot be named. | ||
- | The Quality | + | The quality of places is never twice the same, because it always takes its shape from the particular |
- | There is a central quality which is the root criterion of life and spirit in a man, a town, a building, or a wilderness. This quality is objective and precise, but it cannot be named. | ||
- | The quality of places is never twice the same, because it always takes its shape from the particular | ||
+ | ==== Being alive ==== | ||
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- | Being alive | ||
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- | Patterns of events | + | ==== Patterns of events |
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- | Patterns of space | + | ==== Patterns of space ==== |
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Isn't it true that the features which you remember in a place are not so much pecularities, | Isn't it true that the features which you remember in a place are not so much pecularities, | ||
- | | + | exicting, the qualities which make Venice special, the qualities which make an eighteenth century |
A barn gets its structure from its patterns. | A barn gets its structure from its patterns. | ||
- | Is has a cetrain | + | Is has a certain |
The number of patterns out of which a building or a town is made is rather small. | The number of patterns out of which a building or a town is made is rather small. | ||
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- | The patterns which are alive | + | ==== The patterns which are alive ==== |
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- | The multilicity of living patterns | + | ==== The multilicity of living patterns |
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- | + | ==== The quality itself | |
- | The quality itself | + | |
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The idea that a building can-and ought- to be made of modular units is one of the most pervasive assumptions of twentieth-century architecture. Nature is never modular. Nature is full of almost similar | The idea that a building can-and ought- to be made of modular units is one of the most pervasive assumptions of twentieth-century architecture. Nature is never modular. Nature is full of almost similar | ||
- | 1. the same broad features keep recurring over and over again. | + | 1. the same broad features keep recurring over and over again. |
2. in their detail appearance these broad features are never twice the same. | 2. in their detail appearance these broad features are never twice the same. | ||
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The repetition of patterns is quite a different thing from the repetition of parts. When two physical windows are identical the relationship which they have to their surroundings are different, because their surroundings are different. But when the relationships of their surroundings-their patterns- are the same, the windows themselves will all be different, because the sameness of the patterns, interacting with the difference of the contexts, makes the windows different. | The repetition of patterns is quite a different thing from the repetition of parts. When two physical windows are identical the relationship which they have to their surroundings are different, because their surroundings are different. But when the relationships of their surroundings-their patterns- are the same, the windows themselves will all be different, because the sameness of the patterns, interacting with the difference of the contexts, makes the windows different. | ||
- | In a place which is alive, the right angles are rarely exact; the spacing of parts is hardly ever perfectly even. One column is a little thicker than another, one angle is a little larger than a right angle, one doorway is just a little smaller | + | In a place which is alive, the right angles are rarely exact; the spacing of parts is hardly ever perfectly even. One column is a little thicker than another, one angle is a little larger than a right angle, one doorway is just a little smaller |
- | The cahracter | + | The character |
No matter how much the person who makes a building is able to understand the rhythm of regularity, it will mean noting so long as he creates it with the idea that it must be preserved because it is so precious. If you want to preserve a building, you will try to make it in materials which last forever. You will try to make sure that this creation can be preserved intact, in just its present state, forever. Canvas must be ruled out because it has to be replaced; tiles must be so hard that they will not crack, and set in concrete, so that they cannot move, and so the weed will not grow up to split the paving; trees must be nice to look at, but not bear fruit, becauses the dropped fruit might offend someone. | No matter how much the person who makes a building is able to understand the rhythm of regularity, it will mean noting so long as he creates it with the idea that it must be preserved because it is so precious. If you want to preserve a building, you will try to make it in materials which last forever. You will try to make sure that this creation can be preserved intact, in just its present state, forever. Canvas must be ruled out because it has to be replaced; tiles must be so hard that they will not crack, and set in concrete, so that they cannot move, and so the weed will not grow up to split the paving; trees must be nice to look at, but not bear fruit, becauses the dropped fruit might offend someone. | ||
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+ | ==== The gate==== | ||
- | The gate | ||
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- | The breakdown of language | + | ==== The breakdown of language |
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- | + | Local Symmetries | |
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- | Local Symmetries | + | |
Organic, small-scale symmetry works better than precise, overall symmetry. | Organic, small-scale symmetry works better than precise, overall symmetry. | ||
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- | 1)[[/ |