Honesty & Deception in architecture today
Honesty and deception in architecture today do not only comprise of material, they include structural, space and form, surface articulation, operation and even the publication.
Materials
Either the material is mass produced by machines or handmade, I love the concept of Frank Lloyd Wright which combines and intensified those of Ruskin and Viollet-le-Duc. Mass production saves time and the quality of the products are of the highest quality as they are made in a control environment. In contrary, man made products are always more exquisite but time consuming. The advancement of technology could not be denied in the 21st century, thus why not? Technology gets our life easier, and technology could kill two birds in one stone sometimes. For instance, a smart façade not only makes the building more aesthetically presentable, it could also help on environmental aspect such as filtering the air or cooling down the building. Regardless of how it is produced, whether technology is implemented or not, the most vital factor is the quality of material.
I definitely agree on this quote, by John Ruskin. In this era, everyone wants an economic solution. Thus, in most of the developments, architects are trying to cut cost in term of materials. It is acceptable in the way architects choose concrete and brick structure instead of steel structure as steel structure is much expensive in Malaysia. The property owners are usually deceit on the quality of materials applied. Some irresponsible developers want to get more profit and hence applied the lower quality material, deceiving the owners.
With quality material, the materials can be left naked, no others coating are needed. The material itself already possess its own natural beauty. Taking the example of brick and wood, bricks produced might have slight colour difference whereas every single piece of the wood have its distinct and unique vein pattern on it.
Below shows the examples of projects which lay the material naked by Bikin Studio:-
1. Subsoil House, Kuala Lumpur
2. Kong heng Villa, Ipoh
3. Plan b @ Kong Heng, Ipoh
Space and form
What wows others in architecture? What interest the lecturers to understand more about your design idea in the studio session?
Having a “forms follow function” and a “{function follows form” architecture, which both wows the public, I would be more impressed by the “forms follow function” one, as the most important role of architecture is to get the users to experience the spaces instead of just becoming an eye candy with that impressive exterior or forms. The internal spaces might not be that well planned compared to the one applying “forms follow function”.
How does space and form interrelate to each other? I am to discuss how does space and form related back to honesty and deception. Honesty in space and form is by one eye glance on the form of the building, you could understand the internal spaces. In contrary, deception in space and form happens when internal spaces experience is totally different from what we expected judging from the exterior form.
Lots of buildings today are drawn towards honesty of space and form as time is the concern of most architecture firm today. The firm could accept more projects when the time dedicated to each project is shorten. Furthermore, sometimes the time frame given by the client to design the building is also too limited (2 weeks for a masterplan and towers design?). With all these constraints, not much thoughts are put into the project, a more practical, conventional and safe design is proposed and built.
Projects that possess deception in space and form always draw my attention to figure out the details and study on how they achieve this spatial quality without neglecting the form of the building. There are always thoughts behind the design and every single detail and spatial quality at every inch of the building is the concern of the architect.
Pictures showing House by Phyd Arquitectura in Moreira
The house resembles a miniature prison-like structure with minimal windows, a grey color scheme and dismal landscaping. However, once you enter the building through its large hidden glass doors, the interior is extravagantly different from that of the outside.
Pictures showing the Thermal Vals by Peter Zumthor where deception of space and form is also applied
Publication
“Deception has been a part of architecture since long before Photoshop” quoted from the article written by Shaunacy Ferror. Sir John Soane once use paintings and succeed to sell big projects such as Holy Trinity Church in London, to clients. Renderings do not always tell the truth, The scenario getting even worse in this era after the existence of Photoshop. A lot of advertisements/ publications today have computer-rendered, perfect-looking rendering, but it is totally impossible in architecture. Visual trickery and deception causes colours and materials change, trees placed into balconies and plazas disappear, and projects that looked bathed in a heavenly light on the computer screen end up looking more like concrete fortresses in real life.
Pictures on the left shows the painting of Soane’s monumental new entrance to the official residences at Downing street 10 1825 that was never built
That is also the reason why we as student, always having the lecture to give this advice, “don’t get too graphical in your presentation board, you are to present your architectural design idea, not the renderings..”
However, even when honesty is implemented, the sales promotion team will request for a more impressive one to lure others to buy the properties.
To conclude, there is not right or wrong to implement either honesty or deception in architecture, but in the sense that the development does not deceive the users and property owners from others profession for your own benefit.
