Architecture\'s Response to Nature Architecture

Architecture's Response To Nature

Architecture as an art form is far more than merely the design and building of houses that conform to a specific artistic ideal. Although this is indeed a big part of the process, architecture also serves as a platform for the development of new forms and designs, and combining these with the more traditional. Exemplifying these important paradigms are Red House, designed by William Morris and Philip Webb, and the Robie House, designed by Frank Lloyd Wright for his client Frederick C. Robie. Both homes connect not only with the design paradigms of their respective time periods, but also with an element of innovation and development, inspired specifically by the contemporary artistic and environmental elements surrounding them at the time. When comparing these two homes, it becomes clear how each respectively communicates with its environment to denote the specific architectural and artistic ideals behind them.

The Red House was completed in 1860, and served as the origin of the Arts and Crafts movement, as well as the English Free Style of architecture

. As such, the building represented pioneering architecture at its specific time and location. Another important element was Webb's use of local materials and craftsmanship to achieve the effect of Gothic Revival by means of clay tiling, corbelled brick work, rubbed brick arches and circular openings.

Because of its connection with Morris's passion for Arts and Crafts, and as the first of its kind, Red House is considered by some to be the most important Arts and Crafts home in England. As a direct result of the design and decoration of the home, Morris founded his design firm, Morris & Co., which in turn provided a springboard of definition and meaning for the Arts and Crafts movement

. As such, the home was built in harmony not only with its immediate physical environment, but also with the social and artistic needs of the time.

Like the Red House in England, Robie House is also considered one of the most important architectural works in the United States for its contribution to the country's architecture movements as they are manifest today. Like the Red House, Robie House incorporates a pioneering style for its time -- the Prairie Style. As such, its place in history and architecture is secured by its reputation as a forerunner of modernism in architecture.

The Robie House was designed by Frank Lloyd Wright for his business client Frederick C. Robie, a forward-thinking businessman who created a platform for the new, daring and innovative in architecture design. The home was completed in 1910.

Both Red House and Robie House form a unified whole with their respective exteriors. In the case of the Robie House, the Prairie Style involved a design that not only communicated with, but imitated the flat prairie fields of the United States. As such, the house exemplified pioneerism; a historically important American paradigm. Specifically, the design of the house then focused upon the horizontal, with vertical lines hidden as far as possible

In terms of its immediate environment, the shape of the house indicates a movement from exterior space into the interior

. Terraces provide an increasing degree of privacy from the relatively public space of the garden to the private space of the interior. Withdrawing from the west front, the entrance exists as a hidden vertical space, of which the darkness is countered by a bed of flowers. This indicates the open and natural lines of the American prairie fields. A very interesting element of the Robie House design is that it has neither a basement nor an attic; the latter was omitted to perpetuate the visual element of the horizontal represented by the house, while the former was omitted for the simple reason that Wright found it aesthetically unpleasant.

Instead, the communication of the house with the earth is a clean break between built surface and natural foundation, with only a four-step descent to allow for the furnace and coal rooms and a pit for working on the cars in the garage.

Another consideration in terms of the home's communication with its environment was its location in a city environment; the architect did not have much by way of natural environment to work with; hence a focus on geometrical construction to indicate the forms of nature -- in this case the prairie, was therefore of great importance to Wright4.

This environmental element is in contrast with the time during which the Red House was constructed; the site bordered on an extensive rural area in Kent, which provided a much larger space to allow nature itself to communicate with the built environment2. The countryside included orchards and farms, which were incorporated into the design of the home to form a unifying whole; the same principle used by Wright for the Robie House.