A LECORBUSIER MINDSET

LeCorbusier itemized, in his Five Points Towards a New Architecture, his basic planning principals on how to approach design. The first four points address the structure, roof gardens, open plans, and horizontal windows, all of which are the basic building blocks of his architectural palette.

His fifth point, is titled “Free design of the facade.” Although the following passage does not address transparent thinking exactly, much of what he describes indeed is the essence of the transparent thought process.

“By projecting the floor beyond the supporting pillars..the whole facade is extended beyond the supporting construction. It thereby loses its supportive quality and the windows may be extended to any length at will, without any direct relationships to the interior divisions.”

This exactly describes the facade of Villa Savoye.

His concepts of projection, floating and overlapping are three key terms which we use every day in our transparent drawings. In essence, LeCorbusier is describing a freedom of design. He is describing a design mindset. He is giving us an insight into his creative process.  He is at least implying transparency.  And there may be overt transparency in his statement.

This LeCorbusier mindset might help as a jumping off point. When you might wonder what to do next in a drawing, consider projection, floating and overlapping. Project from the intersections of lines.  Float a form over another.  Overlap a plane over something else.  You might be surprised by what manifests on your paper.  And if the drawing has some sort of LeCorbuser tinge to it, that’s great!