today class will be 4pm @ studio, and it will be spent in desk crits checking the work done and to be done for midterm. please create a list of the groups...more or less 15 minutes each!
The goal of the course is to teach students a method to understand, analyse and evaluate a city/site and its context. The intention is to produce tools that will be useful and applicable in Architectural Design and in professional life. The course will focus on Florence as a living city rather than an open air museum for tourist. It will help the students to read and understand the context of the city beyond the monuments. As architects we never draw on blank sheets of paper; hidden lines - sometimes more, sometimes less - are always present. This course will provide students with an approach as well as with the basic tools to recognize those hidden lines. During this semester we will cultivate the experience of looking at architecture with a different eye, focusing on the invisible links and relations between things. Le Corbusier used to say “…one obelisque: not architecture. Two obelisques: architecture!” Using Florence and it’s built history as a case study, we will explore the various meaning of context: urban context, landscape and geography, social and human environment, historical processes and stratified layers. Architecture in context is about process, ideas, programs and passion in facing unknown contexts even more than about final products. In your work, at desk crits, and during presentations instructor and crits will be looking for evidence that you are searching and exploring the context as something new and that you listen to and respond constructively to feedback and advices from teachers and peers.
