Alison Smithson How to Recognise and Read Mat-building Pdf Free

Dismantling and reframing programme and composition, mat-building envisaged compages every bit a dynamic, flexible armature

We owe the term mat-building to Alison Smithson. Her article 'How to Recognise and Read Mat-Building. Mainstream Compages as it has Developed Towards the Mat-Building' in Architectural Design of September 1974 included a definition of this blazon of building and an all-encompassing list of works and projects from the 1950s to the '70s related to information technology. Several studies have recently revived the interest in this topic.¹ As in the case of the buildings themselves, the appeal of re-reading Smithson's article lies in its open and flexible theoretical framing.

Smithson reviewed the items discussed at Squad 10 meetings, pointing out that mat-buildings were not dependent on a specific architectural language, and identifying certain contemporary works as offshoots of this phenomenon. 'Mainstream mat-edifice became visible, withal, with the completion of the Berlin Complimentary University', she said − but what are the characteristic features of a mat-building? We aim to answer this question by analysing five instance studies: four projects mentioned by Alison Smithson and another in our own locale of Valencia. Our research, which gave rise to an exhibition, explains and provides clear examples of the main mat-building strategies. The basic hypothesis focused on iii compositional principles: metrics, programme and place.

Original competition drawings illustrating the Gratuitous University of Berlin past Candilis, Josic, Forest and Scheidhelm

To empathize those decades of the last century, some context is needed. The link between Squad ten'due south ideas and French structuralism had already been analysed, demonstrating the belief of that generation of architects in the new social sciences, the application of relational thinking to the programme, and the legacy of linguistics to exist seen in the re-organisation of architectonic and urban concepts.² Examples include the revised concept of clan, the business for cultural identity, and the understanding of urban life every bit a function of the relationships among its inhabitants.

It is no coincidence that this happened at a fourth dimension of social and economic growth. After recovering from the Second World War, the countries of key Europe aimed for a welfare state requiring new programmes for a growing middle course. Large housing estates, tourist facilities, universities and administrative centres were often commissioned with short lead-times and governed by notions of flexibility and growth. They all insinuate to Opera aperta (The Open Piece of work) a term coined past Umberto Eco in 1962 in the realm of artful theory, insofar equally, as with works of art, their lack of formal definition is precisely the key to their potential multiplicity. 'The writer is the one who proposed a number of possibilities which had already been rationallyorganized, oriented and endowed with specifications for proper evolution', writes Eco.³

Courtyard at the Complimentary University of Berlin. First conceived in 1963 and completed ten years later. FU-Berlin's open-plan layout, a city in miniature, perfectly epitomised the dynamism and potential of mat-edifice

Much of the compages designed on the ground of these referents is systematic from conceptual and constructive perspectives, and shares strategies during its creative process. Mat-edifice seemed to apply new tools that dismantled the compositional principles of the early on modern menses. In the last quarter of 1963, Georges Candilis, Alexis Josic and Shadrach Woods worked in conjunction with the German architect Manfred Schiedhelm in two competitions, the results of which took critics by surprise. Although the design for the reconstruction of the eye of Frankfurt-Römerberg was not retained, it triggered a heated argue that culminated in the announcement of the winning design for the Gratis University of Berlin.

The Frankfurt programme entails thoughtful interaction with a well-established setting. The local council that organised the competition wanted to rebuild the metropolis centre in keeping with the historical character of a site that had been bombed during the war, by using 'town planning featuring modest blocks − either modern in style or imitating the old ones'.⁴ Nevertheless, the planning approach was based on a compositional network that could be adapted to cater for the urban center'southward time to come needs. The authors defined the project as a flexible megastructure on a scale directly related to the pre-existing construction.

1963 competition drawing for the reconstruction of the centre of Frankfurt-Römerberg, by Candilis, Josic, Woods and Scheidhelm

Many of Candilis, Josic and Forest' aspirations finally materialised in the paradigmatic Free University of Berlin whose open-plan pattern − typical of the universities in the 1960s − matched the characteristics of mat-building perfectly. This university is an exceptional example: its construction involved the French engineer Jean Prouvé and was overseen by the Berlin studio run by Manfred Schiedhelm, in collaboration with the American architect Shadrach Woods. In addition, the university was reconditioned and enlarged with a library by Foster + Partners, resulting in new reviews.

'In the Costless Academy of Berlin, the module is a part of time: 65.63 metres (some other Modulor dimension), is roughly the distance covered by a ane-infinitesimal walk'

Le Corbusier and Guillermo Jullian de la Fuente's design for the Venice Hospital (1964-65) is seen as the culmination of a line of work, but could also be accounted to be a sort of mat-building. The search for an chemical element able to repeat itself and spread out culminated in the definition of the design module, or Unité de Bâtisse: a volume with no facades, lit by natural lite directly overhead, with admission on the ground floor, and which spirals upward and is complemented past a horizontal apportionment filigree.

Another atypical case is Alison and Peter Smithson's blueprint for Kuwait entitled 'Urban Study and Demonstration Mat-Building (1968-72)'.^five This projection involved two points of particularinterest to the subject under written report here: its empathy with Arabic civilization and tradition of open spaces, and the introduction of climate command elements. The architects of the Kuwait project, despite its after engagement, one time again employed a mat-building design considering it enabled them to include the vast and heterogeneous plan required past the original ideas contest.

Urban Written report and Demonstration Mat-Building for State of kuwait, past Alison and Peter Smithson, empathises with Arabic culture and its tradition of open spaces and climate command

Oblivious to the theoretical framework of these discussions, but undeniably immersed in a subject area, many works of architecture reproduce mat-edifice principles with remarkable simplicity. This is the example of the building designed and congenital betwixt 1970 and 1974 for the Universitat Politècnica de València past L35, an architectural practice from Barcelona. Like other contemporary campuses, the design of this campus incorporates the departmental program into its functional distribution, and is built of prefab concrete characterised by an obvious formal clarity.

Completed in 1974, the groundscaping plan of the Universitat Politécnica de Valencia in Spain by L35 Arquitectos typifies and rationalises the mat-building ideals of flexibility and growth

Compositional principle one: Metrics

A mat-edifice is a big-calibration, high-density structure organised on the basis of an accurately modulated grid. A first look at whatever mat-building geometry shows a ground programme in the class of a regular filigree that constitutes the full general order. However, farther assay of the drawings reveals certain specific characteristics.

Kickoff, the size of the module used for the projection is surprising. Frankfurt, Berlin and Venice have the red and blue series of Le Corbusier'southward Modulor in common. Georges Candilis and Shadrach Woods met and began their careers at Rue de Sèvres, and their indebtedness, in this respect, is clear to see. In whatsoever case, in each of the three proposals but a few centimetres provide the starting betoken for designing buildings hundreds of metres in size (Effigy A).

Effigy A (click to enlarge)

In addition, the Modulor series forms the module which is multiplied in both directions to create all kinds of variations. In Frankfurt, Berlin and Kuwait one-half modules were too employed. In Venice, there are few consummate modules in the programme since nigh lack a quadrant (Figure B).

Figure B (click to overstate)

The basic Frankfurt module is approximately one-half that of Berlin, and is adamant by the width of the pedestrian streets: 3.66 metres (Modulor dimension) which just happens to be the same every bit the archways effectually the Odéon theatre in Paris.^{half dozen} The complete module measures 36.47 metres, ie, the depth of the adjacent buildings. In the Gratuitous University of Berlin, the module is a function of time: 65.63 metres (another Modulor dimension), ie, roughly the distance covered past a one-minute walk.

The formal construction of Venice Hospital starts with sequent additions: several Unités de Lit or bed modules (based on a module of ii.96m, a Modulor dimension) combine with several service rooms to form a Unité de Soins, or treatment module. Four Unités de Soins and the corresponding corridors constitute a Unité de Bâtisse; and finally, the hospital consists of a specific number of Unités de Bâtisse, square rooms nigh 60m forth each side.^vii Le Corbusier uses a completely different procedure to grade a size very similar to the one used past his colleagues in Berlin (Figure C).

Figure C (click to overstate)

On the other hand, Alison and Peter Smithson'south buildings in Kuwait, using a basic module of 20 metres (4 x five metres), and the Universitat Politécnica de Valencia, with a 36m module (based on the 3m series), arroyo the Frankfurt scale and demonstrate the effectiveness of round-figure metrics.

Furthermore, it must be said that the final upshot does not exceed a specific maximum dimension, ie, 400 metres, or a six-minute walk, according to the other scale used. It would seem that larger dimensions would overwhelm and jeopardise the design.

Finally, the assay of the underlying patterns in each case written report revealed a complex grid of strips forming a tartan-similar fabric. Each strip can exist understood to exist a widened grid line that houses a set of specific functions. This purpose-built filigree is simply a framework or fixed base of operations upon which a volume may (or may not) be congenital. It is precisely this ambivalence that enables compositional flexibility resulting in stratified and profusely perforated buildings (Figure D).

Figure D (click to overstate)

Compositional principle two: Plan

Issues related to the programme besides ascend in the grade of shared strategies in mat-edifice. In the words of Alison Smithson's definition, 'Mat-building tin can be said to epitomise the bearding commonage, where the functions come to enrich the fabric, and the private gains new freedoms of activity through a new and shuffled order, based on interconnection, close-knit patterns of association, and possibilities for growth, diminution and change'. The five instances studied practise indeed respond to this premise, directly linked to the relational thinking prevalent in the 1960s and '70s.

Under Claude Lévi-Strauss'south influence, structuralism embraces social phenomena like an 'abstruse organization constructed from relations amid unproblematic units'. Indeed, the construction would be 'a set of rules for defining relationships and correspondences'. These words can be practical literally to the functions of a mat-edifice, based on dismantling the program's functions, emphasising circulations and destructuring formal hierarchies.

Analysis of plans for Frankfurt-Römerberg, past Candilis, Josic, Woods and Scheidhelm. Though hardly distinguishable on the original drawings, different activities, such every bit offices, shops, housing and cultural facilities, enable the resulting mat-edifice to exist seen as a living organism

In the Frankfurt and Kuwait projects, the architects mention functional hybridisation as a value added. In both cases, the design includes offices, shops, housing, hotels and cultural facilities: different activities enabling the building to always be seen as a living organism. In Frankfurt, each of these parts of the programme is hardly recognisable on the general program. Candilis, Josic and Woods were chosen 'anti-monumental architects' − a label they were very proud of − because their urban intervention had no hint of representation more in keeping with the site's symbolic nature. In Kuwait, the Smithsons do not detail the regulations; in that location are no furnished plans or sections − the activities on each level are only described in the architects' written report. Administrative services are laid downwards like layers, moving from public to private realms, pierced by vertical advice towers and ventilation shafts.

The Venice hospital likewise uses layers of functions similar to those in Kuwait. The Unité de Bâtisse or basic pattern module follows a pre-established order past levels. The ground floor congenital on pilotis is a public area consisting of two mezzanines where full general services are provided and admissions take place. The adjacent level is used for medical aid (surgeries and operating theatres) and is too subdivided into two mezzanines that separate circulations from the other areas. The top floor is occupied past wards. Since each Unité de Bâtisse is intended to accommodate a medical service, adding them together enables all functions to exist interwoven similar an intricate pipage network. Some ramps and corridors are reserved for doctors and patients while the vertical cores are occupied by lifts for visitors and 'muddy' and 'clean' service shafts.

Analysis of the programme of Venice Infirmary past Le Corbusier showing apportionment paths

Assay of departmental programme and circulation flows at the FU-Berlin. Lack of hierarchy is an inherent characteristic of mat-buildings

Kuwait and Venice also resemble each other every bit regards apportionment. In both cases the freedom of movement permitted past an unobstructed ground floor − emphasised by dotted lines on Alison and Peter Smithson's plans − contrast with the motility in a edifice conditioned by vertical circulation cores.

Meanwhile, the Berlin and Valencia projects brand information technology clear that the departmental programme characteristic of European universities in the 1960s is suitable for mat-edifice. Showtime, university operations tally with the relational concept of the mat-building insofar as they prioritise correspondences betwixt departments rather than the traditional separation into independent faculties. This fosters breezy instruction based on the spontaneous encounters between students, teachers and researchers in the wide corridors. Information technology also caters for increasing numbers of students and changes in curricula which crave flexible structures that can be enlarged. And, finally, it encourages the gratuitous-flowing exchange of knowledge in keeping with the mat-building'due south inherent lack of hierarchy.

Topological organisational diagram for the Universitat Politécnica de Valencia mapping out the relative position of the constituent departments and their distance from the centre of the university. This organisational diagram thus becomes the basis for the plan

Walkways and courtyard at the Universitat Politécnica de Valencia in Espana by L35 Arquitectos

In Berlin, the real education occurs in the common areas such as interior walkways, courtyards and the gentle ramps between the two levels of this distinctly horizontal organism. In Valencia, the design process is dictated past a painstaking study of the departmental programme: depending on the number of semesters in which a student on 1 caste form attends two different departments, the architects quantify the intensity of the relationship between the two departments. They then use these data equally coordinates to draw a topological organisation diagram that establishes the relative position of the departments and their distance from the centre of the university: the Agora. Afterwards this analysis, the resulting organisation diagram is accuratelytransferred to the general plan. The architect of the mat-building is, higher up all, an organiser.

Compositional principle 3: Place

House and urban center have an identical nature to which the mat-building offers a structural synthesis.⁸ The dialogue with the (urban) place to which the mat-building belongs − or, at least, helps build ex novo − is the third principle in mutual to the 5 cases analysed. Non for naught did some reveal the well-established metropolis to be a staunch supporter of the project. This is the case in Frankfurt: the site of an old urban cloth destroyed during the state of war is now equipped with a network that has recuperated some of its sometime morphological features within a new order: the previous grain texture, the connection with the immediate setting and the functional multiplicity of the replaced fragment can exist seen in the new, reorganised formalisation. The Candilis, Josic, Woods design demonstrates the mutual values of the traditional urban center and the urban fabric composed by the mat-building.

Urban plans of Frankfurt showing the original dense grain of the textile (above) and the reorganised formalisation of the Candilis, Josic, Forest and Scheidhelm proposal (beneath)

The care with which Le Corbusier depicted the buildings typical of Venice most the future hospital reveals a regard for the celebrated urban center similar to Candilis, Josic and Forest' attitude to Frankfurt which, in the case of Venice, likewise concerns cultural identity. It is, in fact, the campiellos (squares) and calli (streets) of Venice that structure the in-patients' flooring: an immense tapestry raised to a higher place the lake on an increasingly large building. In this way the unlike Unités de Bâtisse reverberate these 2 elements of Venice urbanism as if the construction of the hospital was an enlargement of the urban center it was built for.

In Kuwait, the minarets of mosques are used every bit nodes of a visual web that fragment the mat-edifice and canalise the galleries while anchoring the new design to the tradition of the place.The minarets operate equally a network of stock-still points in the territory that beginning the lack of urban definition in a fashion mentioned by the Smithsons in the article 'Fix', published in the December 1960 result of the AR.^nine

Programme of Le Corbusier's Venice Infirmary (outlined in red) showing how it is raised above the site, like a tapestry or piece of metropolis

Department through the Venice hospital showing its clear horizontal functional stratification

On the reverse, the universities of Berlin and Valencia are both isolated from the consolidated urban center. Each could, withal, be said to exist a city in itself − with Berlin capable of spreading outand weaving its networks between the isolated buildings of Berlin-Dahlem, and Valencia capable of recreating a recurrent urban utopia of those days past employing a horizontal stratification that strictly separates vehicular traffic (on the ground flooring) from pedestrians (on a platform characterised by spontaneous social interaction).¹⁰

Before Alison Smithson called this type of compages 'mat-building' in 1974, Shadrach Woods had already referred to the Free Academy of Berlin as a 'groundscraper'. In some sketches for that competition Woods declared, 'In skyscraper type buildings disciplines tend to exist segregated. The relationship from ane floor to another is tenuous, almost fortuitous, passing through the infinite-machine-lift. In a groundscraper arrangement greater possibilities of community and exchange are nowadays without necessarily sacrificing any repose.'

Visual web of the Smithsons' Kuwait projection using minarets equally nodes and familiar stock-still anchoring points in a territory that lacks urban definition

Both terms were equally expressive and summarised some strategies opposed to modernity as it had been known so far. Form did not follow function; on the contrary, there were noaprioristic forms but sure human activities that would eventually define them. The metropolis was not functional only relational, not fabricated of isolated objects on a free ground flooring. Now, ashapeless built mass was spreading out and absorbing whatsoever variations in the plan. This is no place for atypical figures but for a system prone to serialise, regulate and repeat them. All these standpoints reveal the logical continuity of architecture in keeping with the environmental concerns of the '60s and '70s. Shadrach Woods devoted his last books to explaining this new management to American readers − What U Can Exercise (Rice University, 1970) and The Human in the Street (Penguin Books, 1975) − and an ironical Alison Smithson reproached him for such theories which, in her stance, only made sense wherever the Modern Motion had not yet fabricated inroads.^xi

REFERENCES

one. Since the Harvard Pattern School published Case: Le Corbusier's Venice Hospital and the Mat Building Revival, Hashim Sarkis (ed), Munich, London, New York: Prestel Verlag, 2001, many academic articles take been published in different journals.
2. Jean-Louis Violeau: 'Squad 10 and Structuralism: Analogies and Discrepancies', in Max Risselada and Dirk van den Heuvel, Squad 10. 1953-81. In Search of a Utopia of the Present, Rotterdam: NAi Publishers, 2005, pp280-85.
three. Umberto Eco, The Open Work, Cambridge: Harvard University Printing, 1989, p19.
4. Georges Candilis, Bâtir la vie. Un architecte témoin de son temps, Paris: Infolio Éditions, 2012, p231.
5. AR September 1974, pp179-90.
6. As the assistant builder Manfred Schiedhelm recounts, this Corbusian Modulor dimension of three.66m was considered functionally 'very suitable' in the Candilis, Josic, Wood studio. The architects' office was well-nigh the Odéon theatre and they often went past it.
7. María Cecilia O'Byrne Orozco, El proyecto para el Hospital de Venecia de Le Corbusier, thesis. Managing director: Josep Quetglas, Departament de Projectes Arquitectònics, Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya, 2007.
8. Alan Colquhoun recalls Alberti's illustration when addressing the 'superblock', in Collected Essays in Architectural Criticism, London: Black Dog, 2009, p78.
9. Alison & Peter Smithson, 'Fix', AR December 1960, pp437-39.
ten. According to Reyner Banham, '60s academy campuses are the fulfilment of certain urban utopias which, in many other cases, never got off the drawing board. Run into Banham: Megastructure: Urban Futures of the Recent Past, London: Thames and Hudson, 1976, p131.
11. Alison Smithson, 'A Worried Man. Man in the Street. By Shadrach Woods', AR November 1976, pp317-xviii.

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Source: https://www.architectural-review.com/essays/the-strategies-of-mat-building

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