Check the proportions of a façade with a few geometric lines (diagonals of similar rectangles, the golden section) so that its parts share one order and nothing is arbitrary.
Rules · Proportion · Modules
The Modulor
Take the height of a man (183 cm) and of his raised hand (226 cm) and divide each by the golden section, again and again, to obtain two interlocking series of dimensions for every part of a building.
red series … 27 · 43 · 70 · 113 · 183 cm; blue series … 53 · 86 · 140 · 226 cm (each ≈ previous × φ)
Le Corbusier developed the Modulor during the 1940s as a measure that would reconcile the metric and imperial systems with the human body and with the golden section. From the navel height of 113 cm the red series rises and falls by φ; the blue series doubles it. He used it to dimension the Unité d’habitation in Marseille (1947–52), whose concrete bears a relief of the Modulor man. The system shows the golden section adopted openly as a design rule, the opposite of the retrospective discoveries criticised in Measure before you believe.
Related rules
Size everything from a single scale: a red series in which each measure is φ times the one before, anchored on a man 183 cm tall, and a blue series of its doubles, anchored on his raised hand at 226 cm.
red: … 27, 43, 70, 113, 183, 296 … (×1.618) · blue: … 53, 86, 140, 226, 366 … (= 2 × red)
To divide a line in extreme and mean ratio, make the whole stand to the larger part as the larger part to the smaller; the ratio is φ = (1 + √5)/2 ≈ 1.618. Construct the golden rectangle by swinging the line from the midpoint of a square’s side to its far corner.
φ = (1 + √5)/2 ≈ 1.618; φ² = φ + 1; 1/φ = φ − 1 ≈ 0.618
Treat claims that a building embodies the golden section with suspicion unless the designer’s own writings or drawings say so and careful measurement agrees; a ratio near 1.6 is found somewhere in almost anything.
Cite this page Chris Paton, “The Modulor”, The Textbook of Architecture, https://textbookofarchitecture.com/rule/modulor. Text, drawings and models licensed under CC BY-NC 4.0.