Architectural Model as Machine: A new view of models from antiquity to the present day

179 Pages·2004·5.17 MB·English

by  Albert Smith

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Architectural Model as Machine
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Architectural Model
as Machine
A New View of Models from Antiquity
to the Present Day
Albert C. Smith, PhD, RA
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Architectural Press
An imprint of Elsevier
Linacre House, Jordan Hill, Oxford OX2 8DP
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First published 2004
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Contents
Preface vii
Acknowledgments viii
Illustrations ix
Introduction xv
1 Define/Divine/Design 1
2 The changing mechanism of the scale model 39
3 Scale model as machine 61
4 Machine as scale model machine 69
5 Pandora and the modern scale model machine 89
Bibliography 127
Index 133
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Preface
Architectural Model as Machine offers a unique view of the architectural scale model’s varying
uses as a thinking and defining mechanism for understanding and demonstrating architectural
concepts. Interestingly, compared to the subject of architectural drawings, little specific
research has been done about the meaning of architectural models. When one considers the
important position scale models have maintained in the architectural process for centuries, this
seems quite strange. This book attempts to rectify this situation by presenting a broad-based
discussion of the representational qualities of the architectural scale model.
Scale models are a basic mechanism used to understand, explore and conceptualize archi-
tecture. Yet in architecture studios across the country, students and professionals are constant-
ly requesting additional information about the use and meaning of models in the design
process. Surprisingly, though my colleagues and I can refer to several ‘picture’ or ‘how to build’
books, little exists concerning the concepts of why and how architectural scale models are cre-
ated. For the past decade I have collected material and written on the theory of architectural
scale models to bring new understanding to this important subject. I believe Architectural Model
as Machineoffers a unique view of the architectural scale model’s varying uses as a thinking and
defining mechanism for understanding and demonstrating architectural concepts.
I am interested in ‘why’ and not the ‘how to’ of the methods architects use in design media.
Often architects cannot and do not explain their work, especially their design processes, conse-
quently it is necessary to extrapolate ideas and meaning from the artifacts they leave behind. My
project depends upon artifacts of the media that architects use to think. I am proposing to study
these artifacts across a range of time periods. My methodology is to use comparison and specu-
lation across architectural movements to question the uses of media in design and to find intent
and meaning in the context. My research is about translation and about cross-referencing con-
ceptual thinking, from period to historical period and across disciplines. I believe it possible to
discuss architectural ideas, indications of meaning and intention through the study of specific
design media. The artifacts speak about why they were conceived and how they were used to
help architects think through design, both as a medium and as a process.
This book looks at architectural models as mechanisms used for thinking about and defin-
ing future buildings and cultural issues. In this work models are viewed as a basic scaling mech-
anism used to understand, explore and conceptualize architecture. This research takes the position
that architectural scale models are created not only as a means of designing buildings, but also
partake in defining a culture’s cosmos. Though specific models from different historical periods
may physically appear quite similar, contextually, they can play different roles. Through the use
of analogy and metaphor, architectural scale models offer architects an understandable way with
which to develop and define their concepts.
Albert C. Smith
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Acknowledgments
This book was supported by a grant from the Graham Foundation for Advanced Studies in the
Fine Arts. I would also like to thank the University of Utah for supporting this project through
a Faculty Research Grant. The following people should be thanked for their support and assist-
ance in preparing this book: my wife Kendra Schank Smith, my research assistants, Shaun Moon
and Henrietta Oyula and finally Marco Frascari for his wonderful guidance.
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Illustrations
1 Futurama model from 1939 World’s Fair. Visitors to General Motors
‘Futurama’ exhibit. Original caption: 4/22/1939 New York, NY:
Seeing the world of tomorrow. Here is a view of the ‘Futurama’ feature
of the General Motors highways and horizons exhibit at the New York
World’s fair, showing how visitors will view the world of tomorrow from
comfortable moving sound chairs while touring a vast scale model of
the American countryside, covering more than 3500 square feet. The
‘Futurama’ is the largest scale model ever constructed, it includes over
500,000 buildings and houses, over a million trees and 50,000 motor
vehicles, many of which will be in motion. © Bettmann/CORBIS. xv
2 Cave painting of a man brandishing a spear. © Morton Beebe,
S.F./CORBIS. xvi
3 We Can Do It! Rosie the Riveter. War Production Co-Ordinating
Committee. Artist: J. Howard Miller. xviii
4 J. Robert Oppenheimer talking with Edward Murrow.
© Bettmann/CORBIS. xviii
5 Trisonic wind tunnel at the Marshall Space Flight Center.
An engineer at the Marshall Space Flight Center (MSFC)
observes a model of the space shuttle Orbiter being tested in the
MSFC’s 14 (cid:2) 14-Inch Trisonic wind tunnel. Photograph:
Courtesy NASA. xix
6 Saturn rocket engine test bed. A modified space shuttle main
engine is static fired at Marshall’s technology test bed. Photograph:
Courtesy NASA. xix
7 Engineering type model. A computer model for the protein crystal
trypanathione reductase, which is being studied in an effort to devise
a treatment for Chaga’s disease, a devastating illness caused by a parasite.
Photograph: Courtesy NASA. xx
8 Model of embassy to be built in London by E. Saarinen. Finnish-born
architect Eero Saarinen points to features of a scale model of the
embassy in London’s Grosvenor Square. © Bettmann/CORBIS. xxi
1.1 Prometheus brings fire from the heavens. Prometheus brings fire
from the heavens to humanity. Undated illustration. © Bettmann/CORBIS. 1
1.2 Undergraduate student model. Model of a virtual technology dance
studio by Brycen Allison developed in a studio taught by Albert C. Smith. 2