The Function of Form - Softcover

Moussavi, Farshid

Softcover

ISBN 10: 8496954730 ISBN 13: 9788496954731

Publisher: ACTAR, Harvard Graduate School of Design, 2009

Synopsis

In The Function of Form, internationally acclaimed architect, Farshid Moussavi, provides a provocative critique of the historically opposing relationship between function and form to reveal the contradiction at the heart of modernism. We need to move away from the definition of function as utility, she argues, to align it with how function is defined in mathematics, biology or music. Form, on the other hand, should be considered not only in the way buildings are produced, but also how they perform sensorially. Function and form, considered together in architecture, stand in opposition to the dualism which defined our approach to the built environment throughout the twentieth century. This book provides a thought-provoking account of the challenges facing the 21st century built environment, and an enlivened awareness of the wider possibilities of architectural form.

About this title

About the Author

Farshid Moussavi is Professor in Practice in the Department of Architecture, Harvard University Graduate School of Design. She trained at the GSD, University College London, the Bartlett School of Architecture, and Dundee University. Prior to establishing Foreign Office Architects (with Alejandro Zaera Polo) in London in 1992, she worked with the Renzo Piano Building Workshop in Genoa and the Office for Metropolitan Architecture in Rotterdam. Her London-based firm, FOA, is recognized as one of the most creative design firms in the world, deftly integrating architecture, urban design, and landscape architecture in their projects. They have produced numerous critically-acclaimed international projects, most notably the Yokohama Ferry Terminal. Other built projects include the Bluemoon Hotel in Groningen, The Netherlands, the Spanish Pavilion in the 2005 Aichi International Expo in Japan, a technology center in Logrono, a publisher's headquarters in Paju, Korea as well a department store and Cineplex and pedestrian bridges in Leicester.

Review

A must-have for any designer, The Function of Form makes for a tremendous resource as a reference when investigating possible forms/structural systems for a given project - allowing readers to quickly compare spatial quality and affects of various systems, while also providing reasonably in-depth explanations as to how these qualities are achieved by the different systems." --AMNP

"Here is one (book) that is thoughful, useful, and only incidentally related to Ms. Moussavi's practice. Yet it is about architecture. The book is ostensibly a survey of distinct structural spanning systems, all of which contain repetitive structural members and variations on their arrangement, scale, or shape." --Tropolism

"A thought-provoking account of the challenges facing the 21st century built environment, and an enlivened awareness of the wider possibilities of architectural form." --Archidose

"...this book (is) a valuable resource for almost everyone: from students, to architects who need to deal with a structure in early stages of design, up to someone dealing with parametric tools for complex structures, because at the end the systems are the same: from Bruno Taut to SOM, to FOA." --ArchDaily

"The Function of Form is a 'must' for any serious college-level arts collection. It proposes a new theory of form based on repetition and differentiation, offering a way for function in built forms to be conceptualized as a transversal process. Architecture and arts libraries will find this a technical, comprehensive analysis of the parts of forms that interact and reciprocate, going beyond text to pack pages with finished designs offset by pages of diagrams and explanations." --The Midwest Book Review

"The book is ideal for students, as it enables them to discover how subtle differences in the manipulation of structure impact the spaces, articulated as the affects noted for each entry." ----Archidose

"Using real life examples from the ancient to the contemporary, Moussavi reduces a building to its most basic components. Then, after the striptease, she dresses the structure back up with every possible variation, starting with the simple and austere before layering on fabulous flourishes." ----Interior Design

Edition details

• Publisher: ACTAR, Harvard Graduate School of Design
• Publication date: 2009
• ISBN 10: 8496954730
• ISBN 13: 9788496954731
• Binding: Paperback
• Language: English
• Number of pages: 520