Architecture
Architecture is the design of structures; how they are built. An architect must study for many years to become qualified. The purpose of most architecture is shelter. On a small scale, a garden shed or a stable are examples of simple architecture. On a large scale, architecture may mean the designing of whole towns and cities. In a more general sense, architecture can be the designing of any kind of thing, from a chair to a computer. The word architect is even starting to be used as a verb. A person might 'architect' a system. (This is not correct English, but it is an example of how language changes and develops).
The Word Architecture.
The word architecture seems to suggest something higher, more noble, than simply the designing of a building. A successful building should speak of wisdom handed down through thousands of years. Sadly that wisdom is very often ignored. Most new construction is poor in design and materials. People rip out delicate, elegant wooden windows and replace them with crude, heavy white plastic 'units'. They throw away lightweight slates, split by hand from the mountains, which have turned the softest shades of grey, only because the nails holding them on have rusted. They replace them with heavy concrete tiles dyed red, which make the beams of the roof dip. They build shelves and closets from chipboard (woodpulp and glue, pressed tight to make an imitation of wood). These have no grain like real wood, so they dip and collapse with only a small amount of weight.
History.
In the past, people built huts and wood houses to shelter from the weather. For reasons of cost, the houses were simple and small. For safety, they were often close together. Great civilizations like the Ancient Egyptians built large temples and structures, like the pyramids. The Ancient Greeks and Romans made what we now call Classical Architecture. The Romans, working over 2000 years ago, copied the arch from the Etruscans, who copied it from the Mesopotamians. The stone columns which still hold up so many important buildings, like the Parthenon in Athens, were simply copied from the first wooden posts.
Classical Architecture is very formal, it always obeyed laws. It used symmetry, which really means balance, and it used proportion which means keeping shapes to certain patterns. The Golden Mean was a rule (or law) which said, (to put it very simply) if you are making a room, or any other thing, it will work best if you always make the long side 1.6 times longer than the short side. There are many laws in Classical Architecture, like how high the middle of an arched bridge needs to be (which depends on how wide the bridge needs to be). These laws were learned from centuries of experience and they are as true today as they were 2000 years ago.
In some parts of the world, like India, the architecture is famous for stone carving on temples and palaces. Different architectural styles were made in China, Japan, Southeast Asia, Africa, Mexico, and Central and South America.
Later, people in Western Europe in the Middle Ages made Romanesque architecture, then Gothic architecture. Gothic buildings have tall, pointed windows and arches. Many churches have Gothic architecture. Castles were also built at this time. In Eastern Europe, churches usually had domes. People were copying the Classical Architecture from the past, but adding their own ideas and decoration.
Then in the 18th Century the Industrial Revolution happened and people began to invent machines to make things quickly and cheaply. Many factories and mills were built during, or after this revolution. 100 years later, in the Victorian era, architects like George Fowler Jones and Decimus Burton still followed the Gothic style, to build new churches. But towards the end of the 19th Century, architects began to use the newer, cheaper materials like metal girders and reinforced concrete to build. An example is the Eiffel Tower in Paris. Buildings can now be built taller than ever before. We call them skyscrapers. This new technology has made us free from traditional limitations, but it has also made us free from the ancient laws.
Modernism, which started as early as 1890, has resulted in some handsome, impressive buildings, like the Chrysler Building in New York, but also some truly horrible buildings. The ancient laws have been forgotten, or ignored, as architects have become more interested in doing something 'original'. It seems incredible that we can make these mistakes, when our ancestors built with such skill and beauty. Our wide use of, and dependance on, machines has made many of us think like machines. The famous Modernist architect Le Corbusier once said "A house is a machine for living in". We have come a long way since our first mud huts, but perhaps we have also lost something along the way.
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