Rules · Plans · Geometry · Theory
Compose from the plan: base it on the elemental figures (circle, square, rectangle and their derivatives), arrange its parts symmetrically about axes, and develop section and elevation from it together.
Stratton’s whole book rests on this: design in building is primarily concerned with the plan, and the finest work is rhythmically composed in plan, section and elevation at once. Geometrical figures please more than irregular ones, and symmetry about axial lines is what makes a building read as one thought.
He asks the student to master these simple forms and the accepted ways of covering and lighting each before attempting anything complex, and to borrow from precedent rather than invent too soon. The debt to Durand, whom he cites, and to Beaux-Arts teaching is plain.
To find how thick the pier of an arch must be, divide the intrados into three equal parts; draw a line from the springing through the first division, and produce it beyond the springing by its own length. A vertical through the end of that line marks the outer face of the pier.
pier ≈ ¼ span (semicircle) · ≈ 0.23 span (equilateral) · less for a lancet
Hold that the beauty of the orders comes from fixed proportions that please by nature, as consonances do in music; where the ancients differ, the differences answer to circumstances such as distance and height.
Give the flight of steps before a temple an odd number, so that one who starts with the right foot will also set the right foot first on the top.
To set a round dome on a square bay, imagine a sphere passing through the four corners of the square; cut it by the four vertical planes of the sides and by the horizontal plane of their crowns. The four spherical triangles left in the corners are the pendentives; the circle at their top carries the dome.
sphere radius R = S⁄√2; arches = sphere ∩ side planes (radius S⁄2); ring at h₀ + S⁄2 with radius S⁄2
If the sphere that forms the pendentives is simply continued above the ring, the bay is covered by a single shallow dome, the sail vault or pendentive dome, which springs directly from the four corners.
crown = h₀ + S⁄√2 (lower than a hemisphere on the ring, h₀ + S)
Give the villa garden porticoes for sun and for shade, grottoes made in imitation of nature with tufa and shells, evergreens planted in straight rows at equal distances, and hedges of box; set vines on columns over the walks.
Cite this page Chris Paton, “Begin with the plan, on a geometrical basis”, The Textbook of Architecture, https://textbookofarchitecture.com/rule/stratton-plan-first. Text, drawings and models licensed under CC BY-NC 4.0.