Hi! I haven't been here for a while because I decided not to write until I have something to say.
This time I found this wonderful piece of art: La Folia. It's an early music piece coming from Spain and it was rewritten and  performed in countless variations across the Europe. We architects should learn from it. It's about creating different patterns coming from one initial phrase played in the beginning. Countless variations, just like in the streets of European cities.



Performed by Jordi Savall.

drawing by Joaquin Lorda

I have stumbled upon this wonderful website of the University of Navarra which contains some lessons on classical architecture written for Spanish students. It covers the main principles, lots of building types and some famous treatises on architecture. The literature has also been specified so you can explore beyond the website. 

What I liked the most are those drawings in the first chapter, lesson 5. 3. Level two: the outlines. Here you can see a great idea in which each part of the image contains the entire picture. It is definitely not just about  the design, it represents a certain worldview represented by many traditional teachings and contemporary scientists like David Bohm and Benoit Mandelbrot.

Wikipedia Creative Commons

I'd like to start our review of traditional European architecture with affordable housing. Very often today it becomes a sterile and brutal place were poor are supposed to live while the authorities think they've done their best they can to help them. It has not always been so.

In 16th century Augsburg, Germany, a merchant called Jakob Fugger the Rich founded this social housing enclave to help the needy citezens. A noble idea - and it is still in use today! While the urban plan is organic but quite schematic the main value of this settlement except being cheap is that it actually has quite some charm. It makes a life more humane - it goes beyond function. Small number of floors and urban density mixed with picturesque roofs and gables makes it a pedestrian friendly place and even a model for social housing today. If you build it beautifully you will love it after 500 years. Not the case with modern social housing.

A map

A typical unit

Hi! I'd like to post some examples of traditional european architecture both urban and rural on this blog. By "traditional" I mean that of all social classes. Before I do that we must have a look at this map of cultural landscape in Europe which I will always refer to so that we see how the influences mix together. There are different opinions and criteria and not everything can be shown in one map but this is a general overview (a mixture of climate, geography and culture/architecture) of a cultural landscape that mostly influenced architecture during the past 2000 years in Europe. Finally you must know that this is an amateur map so if you have some suggestions of how to improve it and you think your part of the world has been neglected be free to write some comments.