On May 23, 2009, at 11:12 AM, William Conger wrote:
One of the classic architectural problems has to do with how to cap
a tall building.
In a single bound? <g>
Not to mention how to erect them at all, without the aid of powered
machines.
This brings us to the matter of how, in the making of something,
outside constraints may seem to limit the maker but by conforming to
those constraints the maker can bring great inventiveness to the
undertaking ... ta-da, "creativeness." Enclosing spaces and capping
tall buildings is such a problem of the efficient cause, and the
solutions over the years have become out touchstone monuments: the
squinches of Hagia Sophia, the lintels of Stonehenge and Thebes and
the Acropolis buildings, the Roman barrel vaults, the Gothic pointed
arches--all before powered machines and structural steel (which
allowed such things as vast cantilevered roofs).
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Michael Brady
[email protected]
