5. Buildings Neighbourhood Character
Finding unity in the urban environment
“The interest in ensembles is partly responsible for the attention paid in architectural theory to style, and to repeatable form. All serious architecture aims at an effect of unity....”
Roger Scruton (1979) The Aesthetics of Architecture p.11
Vernacular construction
- Ordinary or ‘vernacular’ buildings are not consciously designed. They tend to follow well-established precedents for layout, construction and appearance.
- Ordinary buildings have a major impact on the form, character and amenity of a locality. However, their cumulative impact is more significant than the particular features of individual examples.
- Ordinary buildings are too numerous to study singly. However, they can be classified and interpreted according to underlying patterns or ‘types’.
Special buildings: how designers think
- Functional requirements do not automatically determine a building’s form and appearance. Designers also need a ‘form-giving’ concept.
- Form-giving ideas may come from geometry, site conditions, structural systems, historical precedents and symbols or story-lines.
- Design concepts are seldom realised in a pure or ideal form. They are almost always adapted in response to a project’s setting and purpose.
- Design is an iterative process. There is never a single ‘perfect’ solution. Instead, the investigation of options can continue as long as time allows. For this reason, designers often like to keep their options open until the last minute.
- Design cannot be reduced to a formula. Individual designers have their own preferred ways of working, and what suits one project may not suit another. However, there are a number of frequently used compositional strategies. These include balance, symmetry and hierarchy.
Building features which contribute to good urban design
Layout of buildings and open spaces
- In many locations, particularly in the older gridded sections of our towns and cities, most buildings conform to a common alignment. They are laid out parallel or perpendicular to one another.
- Where this occurs, new development should continue the pattern. If buildings depart from this common alignment, they will appear conspicuous, and they may also create awkward irregular open spaces.
- When land is first subdivided, it is frequently laid out with lots of a standard size and shape. Buildings are often placed on these lots in a uniform manner e.g. set back the same distance from front and side boundaries. If new construction is to fit in, it must respect these recurring dimensions.
Overall building dimensions
- Height is the most commonly used parameter for assessing the impact of new buildings in areas of established character. However, relative height differences are usually more important than absolute limits.
- A preoccupation with height can mask the impact of other building dimensions. Excessive footprints and long uninterrupted elevations can be equally disruptive.
Combinations of primary and secondary forms
- Traditional building styles are usually based on assemblies of large and small forms.
- The main volume of a house may be augmented by a secondary wing at the front and a lean-to extension at the rear. Bay windows, entrance porches and the like may add smaller modules to the composition.
- Where these patterns exist, new development should continue the modular composition so as to produce a similar degree of visual complexity.
- To some extent, splitting a large new building into subsidiary volumes can mitigate its impact. While an additive composition can never fully conceal bulk, it can provide transitional volumes which mediate between the development and its neighbours.
Fronts and backs
- The fronts and backs of buildings have quite different associations. Usually these two orientations are kept separate, and each is given a distinct appearance.
- In traditional city fabric, fronts face fronts and backs face backs. If this convention is ignored in new development, functional conflicts along with unseemly juxtapositions between public and private zones.
Scale in the urban environment
- Scale is the impression of size which is gained from a comparison of dimensions. A precise definition requires the subject and object of the comparison to be identified.
- Comparisons are frequently made between one part of a building and another, or between new and existing buildings. Scale is also judged by a building’s relationship to human stature.
- Well scaled buildings reveal their true size. They are neither larger nor smaller than expected.
Useful references
Andres Duany and Elizabeth Plater-Zyberk (1991) Towns and Town-Making Principles
- Series of case studies and essays placing New Urbanism in context. Includes description of codes.
Francis Ching (1979) Architecture, Form, Space and Order
- Highly graphic and accessible architectural primer describing vocabulary and compositional principles.
Charles Moore and Gerald Allen (1976) Dimensions: Space, Shape and Scale in Architecture
- Excellent reference on architectural form and composition.
