CONCRETE

CONCRETEEDITED BY WILLIAM HALL

ESSAY BY LEONARD KOREN

6 Concrete

William Hall

10 Concrete Thoughts

Leonard Koren

20

FORM

78

TEXTURE

126

JUXTAPOSITION

162 LANDSCAPE

222 LIGHT

262 MASS

296 PRESENCE

346 SCALE

378

Index

Glossary

382

Endnotes

Photographic Credits

For many years I lived in Waterloo on London’s South Bank and worked in Clerkenwell, north of the river. Twice a day I passed the National Theatre (73). To see this great building throughout the year – on a foggy March morning, in a warm September sunset, even in snow – was an education. Sometimes the large cuboid fly tower by Waterloo Bridge could feel dark and looming, sometimes pale and floating, and sometimes, when the conditions were right, it all but disappeared in a milky grey sky. Seeing how the atmospheric conditions affected the character of the building forced me to consider the role concrete played. How could people call this material austere or bland or cold? My experience demonstrated the opposite: concrete was lively and mutable.

No other building material has the scope and potential of concrete. It approaches architectural alchemy that the densely compacted Truffle (47) is made of the same stuff as the sinuous weightless roof of Meiso no Mori Crematorium (102). Or that the softly sculpted Hallgrímskirkja (223) is so closely related to the hard-edged Government Service Center (24). Consider Rachel Whiteread’s evocative and ghostly House (198) against Barragán’s vivid and heroic Satellite Towers (183). The intricate lace pattern at Nottingham Contemporary (57), or the crusty impression left when the logs of Bruder Klaus Chapel (52) were set on fire.

Approximately 7.5 billion m3 (265 billion cu ft) of concrete are produced annually. That equates to 1 m3 (35 cu ft) of concrete for every person on earth each year. Almost all buildings of the last century have some concrete component, such as foundations, and it is found in every country in the world – concrete transcends culture.

CONCRETE

10 Concrete

An expanding coiled ramp provides access to floors as well as the grand architectural statement explicit both outside and – as shown here – inside. Wright was enchanted by the seam- lessness that concrete offered, describing the building as ‘the quiet unbroken wave’. ‘Here for the first time,’ he wrote, ‘architecture appears plastic, one floor flowing into ano- ther … instead of the usual … layers cutting and butting into each other.’ Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, New York, USA, 1959, Frank Lloyd Wright

TEXTURE

17

This vivid composition of walls and water are part of a private estate including a house and stables. Barragán often developed his projects while they were being built. For San Cristóbal, he created temporary cloth walls prior to construction to help envisage the final walls’ arrangement, and later used coloured papers on the unfinished structure to ensure the correct blend of hues. San Cristóbal Stables, Mexico City, Mexico, 1968, Luis Barragán

19

Le Corbusier’s countryside monastery was designed, in the architect’s words, ‘to give the monks what men today need most: silence and peace … This Monastery does not show off; it is on the inside that it lives.’ Indeed, the otherwise brutally grey in situ concrete is brought alive by colour and light in this chapel. Sainte Marie de la Tourette, Lyon, France, 1960, Le Corbusier and Iannis Xenakis

20 Concrete

The Pantheon’s ceiling has been an inspiration to architects and builders for centuries, and remains the world’s largest unreinforced concrete span 2,000 years after its construction. The thickness of the dome wall varies from a heavy 1.2 m (3.9 ft) around the oculus – the only source of light – to an incredible 6.4 m (21 ft) at its base. Pantheon, Rome, Italy, 126 AD

98 Concrete

The rain streaks on this wall accentu-ate the herringbone shuttering of the in situ concrete. The unusually shaped chimneys – actually skylights – were inspired by the fortresses, lighthouses and silos of the neighbouring coastal town of Cascais. Paula Rego Museum, Cascais, Portugal, 2009, Eduardo Souto de Moura

114 Concrete

Many of Le Corbusier’s buildings for Chandigarh incorporate sun screens and apertures to encourage airflow and diminish the blazing Punjabi sun. The palette of boldly coloured walls offsets the starkness of the grey concrete and reflects the vibrant hues of India, as well as Le Corbusier’s own colour theories. Palace of Justice, Chandigarh, India, 1955, Le Corbusier

LIGHT

229

This lofty underground concourse, with undulating ribs of concrete, is so vast it could contain Canary Wharf (Cesar Pelli’s One Canada Square) laid on its side. Efforts have been made to retain daylight, so that – even 27 m (89 ft) below ground – passengers on the platform still have a glimpse of the sky. Canary Wharf Underground Station, London, UK, 1999, Foster + Partners

298 Concrete

This sculptural work divides Mexico City’s main motorway. While each tower is consistenly triangular in plan, the whole arrangement appears different depending on the viewer’s direction of transit. The shifting shapes and colours create an engaging and ambiguous monument. Satellite Towers, Mexico City, Mexico, 1957, Luis Barragán with Mathias Goeritz \

The Vitra Fire Station’s exploding shards of concrete convey movement and energy. This angular building leads visitors into its dynamic folds, leaning walls and strange in-between spaces. Vitra Fire Station, Weil am Rhein, Germany, 1994, Zaha Hadid

Now in a new, reimagined format – Concrete takes a fresh look at the world’s most versatile and abundant building material. Collating fascinating and beautiful concrete buildings by some of the most celebrated architects of the last century, it features familiar projects from Le Corbusier and Frank Lloyd Wright alongside work from some of the leading lights of contemporary architecture including Zaha Hadid, Herzog & de Meuron, and many lesser-known newcomers.

Illustrated with extraordinary photographs, each project includes an extended caption providing a commentary on the building. An essay by Leonard Koren, author of the best-selling Wabi-Sabi for Artists, Designers, Poets & Philosophers, offers an evocative and perceptive view of concrete through the author’s experience of studying architecture in California and living in Tokyo.

Concrete is a beautiful and informative visual exploration of a material often considered dull and cold but actually full of spectacular potential.

William Hall trained at Central Saint Martins and began his career in the office of the minimalist architect John Pawson. Formerly a Design Director at Phaidon Press, Hall now runs his own design practice in London, working with clients such as Calvin Klein, Henry Moore Institute and Tate.

Binding: HBFormat: 163 x 123Extent: 384ppNumber of images: 179Word Count: 15,000ISBN: 978 0 7148 7515 6

Phaidon Press LimitedRegent’s WharfAll Saints StreetLondon N1 9PA

Phaidon Press Inc. 65 Bleecker Street, 8th FLNew York, NY 10012

© 2017 Phaidon Press Limited phaidon.com