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    How to Architect
    How to Architect
    How to Architect
    Ebook140 pages44 minutes

    How to Architect

    By Doug Patt

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    About this ebook

    The basics of the profession and practice of architecture, presented in illustrated A-Z form.

    The word "architect" is a noun, but Doug Patt uses it as a verb—coining a term and making a point about using parts of speech and parts of buildings in new ways. Changing the function of a word, or a room, can produce surprise and meaning. In How to Architect, Patt—an architect and the creator of a series of wildly popular online videos about architecture—presents the basics of architecture in A-Z form, starting with "A is for Asymmetry" (as seen in Chartres Cathedral and Frank Gehry), detouring through "N is for Narrative," and ending with "Z is for Zeal" (a quality that successful architects tend to have, even in fiction—see The Fountainhead's architect-hero Howard Roark.)

    How to Architect is a book to guide you on the road to architecture. If you are just starting on that journey or thinking about becoming an architect, it is a place to begin. If you are already an architect and want to remind yourself of what drew you to the profession, it is a book of affirmation. And if you are just curious about what goes into the design and construction of buildings, this book tells you how architects think. Patt introduces each entry with a hand-drawn letter, and accompanies the text with illustrations that illuminate the concept discussed: a fallen Humpty Dumpty illustrates the perils of fragile egos; photographs of an X-Acto knife and other hand tools remind us of architecture's nondigital origins.

    How to Architect offers encouragement to aspiring architects but also mounts a defense of architecture as a profession—by calling out a defiant verb: architect!

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherThe MIT Press
    Release dateFeb 17, 2012
    ISBN9780262301008
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      Book preview

      How to Architect - Doug Patt

      © 2012 Massachusetts Institute of Technology

      All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form by any electronic or mechanical means (including photocopying, recording, or information storage and retrieval) without permission in writing from the publisher.

      For information about special quantity discounts, please email special_sales@mitpress.mit.edu.

      Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

      Patt, Doug, 1968–

      How to architect / Doug Patt.

         p.  cm.

      Includes bibliographical references and index.

      ISBN 978-0-262-51699-0 (pbk. : alk. paper)

      ISBN 978-0-262-30100-8 (retail e-book)

      1. Architecture. I. Title.

      NA2550.P38 2012

      720—dc23

      2011024384

      10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

      d_r1

      Thanks Morty

      Contents

      Preface

      A    Asymmetry

      B    Building Codes

      C    Choir

      D    Design

      E    Ego

      F    Form

      G    Gravity

      H    Human

      I    Invention

      J    Juncture

      K    Kevin Bacon

      L    License

      M    Mathematics

      N    Narrative

      O    Obsolete

      P    Proportion

      Q    Quirky

      R    Routine

      S    Style

      T    Translate

      U    Use

      V    Vocation

      W    www

      X    X-Acto

      Y    You

      Z    Zeal

      Postscript

      Acknowledgments

      Preface

      The word architect is a noun, but I like to use it as a verb. This misuse has kicked off some lively discussions about architecture and language, and the effect of using parts of speech and parts of buildings in different ways than were intended. Buildings are like sentences. They have a structure. They follow rules. But when you break the rules, it doesn’t always mean that you’ve ruined the place, or the expression. Changing the function of a word, or room, can also produce surprise and meaning. Exceptions can produce inflections, and misuse can lead to invention.

      This book is about how to architect. You can think of it as a starter book—a place to begin. It grew out of the videos I create and post on the Internet at YouTube and howtoarchitect.com. If you are thinking of going to school to become an architect, or considered it once but changed your mind—or if you simply have a street interest in buildings—this book won’t hurt you. Take it for what it is: first letters, not final words. If you are a practicing architect, it may remind you of some of the things that drew you to the profession before you were licensed, and how much smarter you are now than then. If you are like me, you have probably asked yourself at one time or another: what is architecture? and what is an architect? This book addresses those questions in simple, A–Z terms.

      I’m a big fan of hand drawing and lettering, so I introduce each entry with a hand-drawn letter. Beneath each letter is a brief discussion of the highlighted term in relation to the practice of architecture, or an attempt to show why the particular thing or idea I’m presenting might belong in the architect’s lexicon. Like most architects, I prefer pictures to words, and I’m a lot more secure drawing than writing, so I make use of drawings to reinforce some points, and I include photographs and computer-generated images for the same reason.

      I’ve found over the years that a big complaint from high school students and their parents is that guidance counselors are generally not equipped to discuss the profession of architecture with students, or to give much guidance to students who want to become architects. I also meet many people, well beyond their college years, who either worry about the fact that their children want to become architects or think that architecture is a dispensable profession. This book is meant to give encouragement to aspiring architects, but it also acknowledges that the opposite urge exists: the urge to deny the young their architectural wish. For as much as we are fascinated by architecture, our culture also has a tendency to suppress architectural fantasy and desire—to marginalize architecture and those who practice it as superfluous. Against those who would say build, but do not use an architect, this book is a defiant verb. Architect!

      A

      A is for Asymmetry

      Asymmetry is the opposite of symmetry. A mirror provides a symmetrical reflection whereby the surface of the mirror is the axis through which space is divided. When an object is divided by an axis and the sides don’t match,

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