THE LIFE OF BUILDINGS
An enquiry into the (un)intended ambivalence of edifices
Roel van Lent
Origins
My aim is not to postulate another dead-conventional theme about the origins of architecture,
although a small examination about the origins of architecture would be useful in order to
introduce the subject. Martin Heidegger, in his famous Bauen Wohnen Denken, argues that the
High German word for building “buan”, originally means to dwell. The German words “ich bin”, I
am, and “du bist”, you are, are originally connected to “bauen”, which means that to dwell and to
be are originally the same, in the way that being on this earth is the same as to dwell on this
earth.1
This very interesting notion, that building, dwelling and being are etymologically connected,
brings us to the idea that our primary concern with being is to dwell. Before the first man became
a builder, or an architect - which is derived from the Greek words ‘arche’ and „technos’ which
means „masterbuilder‟ – in order to dwell, primeval man used caves, trees, or other pre-existing
objects that could function as shelter.
Primeval man was creative: it used a long existent, not for living „designed‟ artefact as an object
for dwelling. Is it therefore any wonder, that Darwin‟s “survival of the fittest”, an often
misinterpreted sentence, as “fittest” means best fitting to a habitat, primeval man had to dwell as
a way of survival. With the loss of our hair – one of the distinctive features that distinguishes the
human being from the primate – primeval man sought shelter and warmth in order to
compensate his Lacanian manque – which can only be substituted with a desire - a need - to
dwell.
Whether we are to believe that the primitive hut of Laugier or Semper were the first edifices ever
built, after man‟s shift from a nomadic to a sedentary existence, the architectural objects have
been called into being as a means for shelter – its very raison d’être.
Clash of Titans
Ever since the primitive hut, the basic means and needs for man to dwell have been altered and
adapted. An elementary need for certain rooms with distinctive functions such as living, cooking,
sleeping and bathing became prevalent in western cultures.
The titans of modern architecture, Frank Lloyd Wright and Le Corbusier interpreted the house,
the primary place to dwell, entirely different by using two antipodal metaphors: where the former
sees a building as an organism, the latter interprets it as a machine.
Although they clashed with their ideas, they had one very important aspect in common: the
shared belief that every space should be best adapted to its function, if possible with built-in
furniture and cupboards for storage, which leaves little room for a flexible use of the spaces.
As a reaction to pre-modern architectural designs, that were often put in a preconceived box,
E.E. Viollet-le-Duc, one of the greatest architectural theorists of the nineteenth century who laid
the foundations for the disparate conceptions of modern architecture, once wrote that in a
building every part needs to relate to one another and to the whole, like the parts of the human
body.2
Although they used completely different metaphors, they shared the same idealistic goal. But
there are always parts of the design that cannot be pre-controlled. One of the biggest critiques
against functionalism has always been that if a building is too adapted to its function, there is a
loss of flexibility.
Let us now look at a building with an unintended ambivalence, before we return to the intended
ambivalence.
Castel Sant’Angelo
Apart from the arsenal of historical examples of buildings which function has changed through
time, I would like to take the Castel Sant‟Angelo (ca. 135 A.D.) in Rome as an primary example.
The name Castel Sant‟Angelo has its origins in a legend, that in 590 Gregory the Great, one of
the Church Fathers, held a march to end the plague that afflicted a large part of Europe. When
they reached the Tiber, the archangel Michael appeared on top of the Castel Sant‟Angelo and
sheathed its sword, as a sign that the plague has ended.
Castel Sant’Angelo seen from the banks of the Tiber
The Castel Sant‟Angelo was originally intended as a mausoleum for the Roman emperor
Hadrian (reigned 117 – 138), one of the patrons of Roman architecture. His villa in Tivoli is one
of the pinnacles and best kept examples of rural Roman architecture and he was also the
commissioner of the Pantheon.
The mausoleum consisted of a 125-meter spiral ramp leading to the imperial tomb. The
circumambulation served as a metaphor for the cosmos so that the visitors circulate Hadrian‟s
ashes, just as the planets orbit the sun. Ever since the emperor Augustus, it was believed that
the Roman emperors were imbued with divine power, as they were linked to Apollo - the Sun
God.3
Only one and a half century later, the mausoleum was transformed into a fortress as part of the
Aurelian Wall, which enclosed the city of Rome. Together with a drawbridge, the spiral ramp
became an important feature of an escape route, even horseback riders made use of it for a
quick withdrawal within the city walls. In the mid 1400‟s, four bastions were added to make the
building better tenable. Through time, the building also served as a prison, arsenal, treasury
room and even a papal residence.
Although the fortress offered safety to the popes and their properties, the design was highly
uneconomical for residential purposes. Several additions and renovations had be made, but the
spiral-wise routing, ubiquitous massiveness, the building‟s large circumference as opposed to its
interior surface area and the low amount of daylight penetrating the building, makes it very
unappealing and unpractical as an object for dwelling.
The biographical account of the Castel Sant‟Angelo - or, in the case of Gregory‟s
abovementioned legend, one might say hagiographical account - is so interesting in this case,
since the architect never intended this building to function as an fortress, prison, or a papal
residence.
The Castel Sant‟Angelo therefore serves as the perfect example of how a building is adapted to
its function instead of its demolition, even though it can be highly inappropriate for some
purposes.
Antithesis
Castel Sant‟Angelo‟s antithesis is the RietveldSchröder House (1924) in Utrecht. As opposed to
the static Castel Sant‟Angelo, the dynamic design
of the Rietveld-Schröder House can best be
described by Theo Van Doesburg‟s words about
De Stijl movement:
„the new architecture is anti-cubic; that is, it does
not seek to fix the various space cells together
within a closed cube, but throws the functional
space cells away from the centre, towards the
outside, whereby height, width, depth and time
tend towards a wholly new plastic expression in
open space’.4
The Rietveld-Schröder House is a gesamtkunstwerk. Resembling Viollet-le-Duc‟s words,
furniture, building parts and the overall form are all
consistent expressions of the whole idea.5 Much
of the furniture is built-in, wardrobes also serve as
partitions, desks are extensions of windowsills,
Rietveld-Schröder House, first floor plan
and the beds can be used as couches. The space can be altered for each required activity:
bedrooms and bathrooms are created by either opening or closing the hinged or sliding walls,
shutters had to be placed before the windows to obtain more privacy. Rietveld promoted active
living, the house thus became a machine to live in.
Although Mrs. Schröder lived in the house until her death in 1985, the house had several
adaptations in its small life compared to that of the Castel Sant‟Angelo. Closets and cupboards
have been removed and added, the partition wall has changed and even a room for Mrs.
Schröder had been placed on the roof, for more privacy.
Thus the intended ambivalence of spaces, walls and cupboards by Gerrit Rietveld eventually
had the opposite result: the same inflexibility in the unintended ambivalence of the Castel
Sant‟Angelo. With the ambiguity of the beds or windowsills, the opposite effect is reached, since
they are still fixtures, albeit with a double function. The inhumane lack of privacy had later to be
compensated by an extra room on the roof.
One calls to mind the plan libre of Le Corbusier which suggests a flexibility, but this will only be
achieved by either partially or wholly demolish the partition walls and built-in furniture – to strip
the building. And isn‟t a flexible design with built-in furniture and cupboards a contradictio in
terminis?
Conclusion
This essay might have given the reader the impression that I am writing an anti-architectural
treatise here, that the user will use the building for what he or she wishes to, regardless of what
the architect‟s intention was. But my aim is rather to point out the grey area between what the
architect can design, and what the user eventually uses it for, and how this can change through
time. The architect‟s goal is therefore to fully explore this grey area.
Neither is this meant as a polemic against the ambivalence of building elements, which are part
of the set of design tools for every architect. The ambivalence of building elements is the sine
qua non of an economical design, for instance when a large staircase in a school or public
building is used as a stadium.
A building tends to live a life on its own. It cannot be entirely controlled by the architect, just as
the genes of parents might give a plausible idiosyncrasy for their child, but can never provide the
ultimate formula for its behaviour. The life of a building is dependent on its ability to be adapted
to several uses over time. Remarkably, both the intended and unintended ambivalence or
flexibility are two different means to the same end: that of the building being altered or
demolished. Eventually, the decision is made by the user.
There is an innate creativity in every individual, and he or she will use it after their own will. As a
way of survival, every man is capable to adapt his surroundings to his own needs, think of the
contemporary vagabond who uses structures like a bridge or a railway station as a shelter.
Frank Lloyd Wright, Le Corbusier and Gerrit Rietveld have become the Grand Inquisitors of the
famous parable in Fyodor Dostoevsky‟s The Brothers Karamazov, where he pleads for
controlling the human being. But the primeval creativity is still in everyone, and where Albert
Camus6 points out, that in order to survive, or even to live happy in modern society, man needs
to be rebellious. Their acting in a building cannot be fully pre-controlled.
This brings us back to an old formulated question by Le Corbusier: Architecture or Revolution?
Again the grey area will do – we need to give directions.
Notes
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
Martin Heidegger, Building, Dwelling, Thinking, as published in Neil Leach (ed.), Rethinking Architecture,
Routledge, 1997, p. 101;
Fil Hearn, Ideas That Shaped Buildings, MIT Press, 2003, p. 200;
http://christinawangrome.blogspot.com/2007/09/castel-sant-angelo.html;
William J. R. Curtis, Modern Architecture Since 1900, Phaidon Press, 1996, p. 149;
Idem, p.159
See Albert Camus, The Myth of Sisyphus or The Rebel
Images
Frontispiece: Castel Sant‟Angelo by Giovanni Battista Piranesi
1. Taken by Roel van Lent, 2007
2. From Colin Davies, Key Houses of the Twentieth Century, Laurence King Publishing, 2006, p. 45