MSc Essay - Ways to Study - Arets vs Kahn
-
Upload
bogdan-tanase-marinescu -
Category
Documents
-
view
232 -
download
0
Transcript of MSc Essay - Ways to Study - Arets vs Kahn
-
7/27/2019 MSc Essay - Ways to Study - Arets vs Kahn
1/12
-
7/27/2019 MSc Essay - Ways to Study - Arets vs Kahn
2/12
BK MSc 1 Interior
AR1Ai031 Architectural Studies
1154672 Robert Wierenga
22 12 06 Julien Merle & Eireen Schreurs
-
7/27/2019 MSc Essay - Ways to Study - Arets vs Kahn
3/12
Ways of study
The individual place of study in the design for the University
Library Utrecht compared to the carrel in Kahns Exeter
Academy Library.
-
7/27/2019 MSc Essay - Ways to Study - Arets vs Kahn
4/12
A library is a very specific sort of building. A building where you
collectively do something individual.
Wiel Arets
A lot of people do not actually go to a library to search for
books. Some sort of digital catalogue on the internet is much
easier; you order the books and if you want, you could eithercollect them from the counter in the library or let them be sent
to you. The contemporary user shifts its focus to other functions
of the (library) building. To study in private remains one of
those functions. But more and more the library tends to be used
as a meeting place, where you casually meet, have a drink in
the bar that comes with the program, and maybe even seek out
a specific significant other. What do these two contrasting
functions mean to places of study?
The earliest separate library buildings still existing today are
that of the medieval monasteries and universities in England
and France. The scriptorium of a monastery is one of the firstplaces where books where kept and studied. 1 The demand for
natural light, to read and write, logically located these places
near the source of (natural) light in a building: a window. This
simple plan was arguably the best option for a long time a
good example is the Sainte-Genevive by Labrouste - and
maybe even holds today. With the invention of electrical light
and even earlier with the invention of printing, this plan had the
opportunity to change.
It is interesting to compare two -contemporary- library
buildings because the collision between individual and collective
is more present in modern society and the question of
publicness should always be answered in a design for a
library.2 I chose Wiel Arets design for the University Library of
Utrecht because in the way it treats the individual and the
collective it could be considered public whereas the Phillips
Exeter Academy Library by Kahn could be considered more
private.
a place of study was always placed near a window
to maximize the amount of time you could study.
1 Earlier libraries (Library of Alexandria, Egypt) are lost and most of them are
not recorded in plan or section. The need for natural light though should demand
a similar placing - adjacent to a window - of places to read.2 Wiel Arets interviews Rem Koolhaas about the Public Library, Seattle, USA
(2005)
WA: What were your aims when you started the design?
RK: We had the ambition to find out what role a 1000-year-old typology could
play in todays world, the ambition to find out what a public building means in
the age of the market economy; - taken from: Beek (2005) p. 192
-
7/27/2019 MSc Essay - Ways to Study - Arets vs Kahn
5/12
from entrance
Both buildings lack an obvious defined (main) entrance whichcould be clearly seen from the outside. The Exeter Library
because of its square plan and similar facades combined with an
arcade, the Utrecht Library because of the size of the entrance
compared to the whole building. LeCuyer says in response:
Kahn might have countered the cri ticism by def ining entrance
not as the location of the front door but rather as a complete
sequence of movement starting on the campus footpaths and ending
in Rockefeller Hall.3
While the above is still doubtful because even halfway the
sequence, when you arrive in the arcade, you could be on one
of three sides which has no entrance; Arets attitude to theentrance is also that of the entrance as a sequence. If you enter
the library building, you do not yet enter the library function,
but in front of you are stairs leading towards the main void in
the building which connects the library activities with each
other.
The sequence of door, stairs and main hall/void is very
consistent with the interpretation of the entrance as Kahn had,
though has a slight shift of its starting point: almost inside the
building instead of outside. Arets counterargument, would be
his answer when asked by Tilman if a building should make
visible whats inside:sequence: door > stairs > hall.
Een gebouw heeft een zekere dikte. Ik maak daarom geen
verschil tussen binnen en buiten. Om klimatologische en andere
redenen is een huid rond een gebouw nodig, maar verder lopen
interieur en exterieur in elkaar over. In de UBU loop bijvoorbeeld
het beton door van binnen naar buiten. Ik zie geen conflicten tussen
binnen en buiten.4
As you enter the building, the experience the two architects
want you to have is different; Kahn describes his aim for the
centre area as being a part of the entrance sequence, where
you should feel the invitation of the books by looking at the
shelves you could see by looking up through the circular
openings of the concrete construction,5 which itself forms an
almost sacred space of six stories high, with light coming from
above and displaying the function of the building as a
storehouse of knowledge.6
After visiting the library in Exeter and the Scharouns National
Library in Berlin with Wiel Arets, Bart Savenije talks with him
about their search for an ideal library environment. The
3 LeCuyer (februari 1985) p. 784 Tilman (november 2004) p. 375
The center area is a result of these contiguous doughnuts; its just theentrance where books are visible all around you through the big circular
openings. So you feel the invitation of the books. Louis I. Kahn in 1965 about
Phillips Exeter Academy Library. - taken from: Beek (2005) p. 1426 Wickersham (1989) p. 142
-
7/27/2019 MSc Essay - Ways to Study - Arets vs Kahn
6/12
difference between Kahns library at Exeter and the library by
Scharoun in Berlin is subject of conversation:
BS: What was important to me about the UBU was that it should
be a building with a collective space, from where you can move to
an individual workplace, almost like a private study, at a window.
That possibility of doing from completely public to completely
private was very special I thought. As far as thats concerned Exeter
is actually the very opposite of Scharouns National Library in
Berlin, which we visited later. [] When I saw that library, I new
that our reading room also needed to be completely open and
accessible. In Berlin visitors can do whatever they want but still
they respect one another. They don't bother each other; in fact they
even seek each other out. 7
The shift of [future] function of the main collective spaceintended for the UBU is interesting. First Kahns concept is seen
as ideal by Savenije and followed; after the visit to Berlin,
(private) studying is seen as being more part of the public
space. It looks as if this is an intentional strategy from Wiel
Arets: I also wanted to show them Scharoun's National Library
in Berlin because the reading room there is the most beautiful
one I had seen. The room resembles a valley in which people
are sitting and reading working and talking.8
Arets intended the UBU to be a meeting place for the whole
university. The staircase in the collective space is designed and
functions like a meeting place. People can see each otherstanding, working, walking and talking, from a lot of different
places in the building.9 The public function gets a big role in
both idea and design. But, as Arets stated himself, What is
different about a library is that it is a very specific sort of public
building. A building where you collectively do something
individual. [] The interesting thing about the phenomenon of a
library is that everyone wants to create a private domain, even
if only for ten minutes.10
Kahn really made the contrast between collective and individual
visible and physical, he even rejects a collective reading space
as being a place of study: Im not sure the large reading room
means very much any more because it is only a place where
boy meets girl and nobody reads. 11 Arets is quite on the
opposite: it is not only a place where they can work in a
concentrated fashion but also one where they can meet other
people without the need for any other stimuli except the
atmosphere that the building radiates.12
What seems interesting now is how both architects dealt with
their opinions on places of (private) study.
the main hall of Exeter Library, where boy meets
girl7 Beek (2005) p. 135-136 A dialogue between Bas Savenije (director of the
library in Utrecht) and Wiel Arets8
Ibid.9 Ibid.10 Beek (2005) p. 13711 Wurman (1986) p. 18012 Beek (2005) p. 194
-
7/27/2019 MSc Essay - Ways to Study - Arets vs Kahn
7/12
to place of study
The place at UtrechtThere are two types of individual space in the Utrecht University
Library. One is a cabin space, with a milk glass door, in it you
can study alone.13 The other, more interesting and more used,
individual space is not really a space on its own, but an
individual place within a collective space. Throughout the whole
building, from the first till the top floor, you can find these
places. The main characteristics: there is always a visual
relation with spaces under or above it, and most of the time it
has a visual connection to the main hall. In order to provide an
individual workplace for everyones way of concentrating, it is
positioned in such a way that the users choice of location also
determines the degree of communication with other users. 14
because of the milk glass doors, you cant see if a
cabin is occupied; notes are put between the door
and its frame to show they are.
appearance of openings towards public and private spaces.
Because of the possibility of communication everywhere, a kind
of intimacy is needed to have a feeling of individual scale. The
solution was to paint all the concrete inside the building black.15
The ambience so created provides no visual distraction and
gives a concluded feeling even in the large hall. 16
The whole building is detailed in the same way, from the
smaller to larger scale spaces like the big hall. Everything is
part of the whole. In Exeter each scale in the building has its
own character: On the interior, the [white] oak provides the
private intimate scale of the wooden shelf, desk, or chair, in
contrast to the room-like scale of the brick arcades and the
monumental scale of the concrete central hall.17
13 Because this cabin spaces are so private, they are sometimes even used for
sexual encounters.14 Beek (2005) p. 19415 If you look at old buildings of this kind which are fitted out with dark wood,
you realize that libraries were always places of contemplation in which there was
very little light. At the beginning of my design, colour and materials were very
important aspects. We soon became aware of a certain conflict, however. In old
libraries, it is easy to concentrate - that has a lot to do with the dark coloration -
but they don't normally have an interesting lighting atmosphere. In the
university library in Utrecht, I tried to combine both qualities: black walls and
ceilings, and a lot of light. There's another colour, though, that I'm never asked
about: white. Bright tables increase concentration when you're looking at the
white pages of a book. A bright-coloured floor senses to reflect light on to the
spines of books on the shelves. If the floor were also black, youd lose yoursense of orientation.Arets interviewed by Frank Kaltenbach on 19 januari 2005
in Munich. taken from: Detail (march 2005)16 Beek (2005) p. 13617 Wickersham (1989) p. 148
-
7/27/2019 MSc Essay - Ways to Study - Arets vs Kahn
8/12
The carrel at Exeter
Exeter began with the periphery, where l ight is. I felt thereading room would be where a person is alone near a window, and
I felt that would be a private carrel, a kind of discovered place in
the folds of the construction.
Louis Kahn in 1965 about Phillips Exeter Academy Library 18
The carrels made from white oak provide a separate world
where students sometimes even live: The study carrels, some
of which are assigned to day students, show clear signs of
homesteading, with ties and jackets neatly draped over
thermostats and favourite posters on the walls. 19 Kahns
decision two make the carrels the way they are is based on two
things. The carrel being part of the in between of theconstruction:
The name carrel20 implies something which is in the construction
itself, which you find as a good place to read. Its a natural outcome
of structure which says, Why dont we set a bench there? Its a
good place to be. Then you give the name, rather than saying, Well
have carrels. If you see in a program a direction to the architect,
We want so many carrels, what is lost is the discovery of the carrel.
You go back to the wonder of having discovered it, and from there
you get the sense that you have no right to have a carrel until, by
your construction, you rediscover the carrel. 21
carrel with a small adjustable sliding window, and a
larger window to lit the hallway.
The second reason has to do with different ways of using the
daylight: Blue light and White light
At Exeter, Kahn dist inguished between the direct white light
which streams in through the windows onto the study carrels and
tables, and the indirect blue light which filters down from the top
of the central hall. [] so in Kahns mind the descent of the blue
light dramatizes the students encounter with knowledge and truth
not in the collective setting of a classroom, but as an individual,
who would set foot in the hall alone. From the hall, as Kan
described it, the student would then go to choose a book from the
stacks, to finally emerge in the more prosaic white light of the study
carrels.22
In section you see how the carrel is shielded by the bookshelves
from the collective space of the concrete Rockefeller hall, and
turned to the faade. If we now compare it to a typical section
of places of study in the Utrecht Library, we see the similarities
and the differences.
18 taken from Living Library, Beek (2005) p. 14219
LeCuyer (1985) p. 76-7720 A partially partitioned nook in or near the stacks in a library, used for private
study. (source: www.thefreedictionary.com)section: placing of the bookshelves between main
hall (collective) and the carrel (individual).21 Wurman (1986 ) p. 17922 Wickersham (1989) p. 142
-
7/27/2019 MSc Essay - Ways to Study - Arets vs Kahn
9/12
In Utrecht most of the study places are located near the main
hall, with their back towards the books, and their view (if you
should choose to look) towards the main hall. In Exeter they
are all located to the faade with the collective places out of
sight. Both architects deploy the quality of double height
spaces, or a connection to a larger volume to enrich the space
of study. The sense of individuality in the carrel becomes even
greater because of that, the opposite happens in the UBU,
Because of that height and the connection it brings you feel
more part of the collective. It is interesting that the same
architectural means can result in different experiences.
main section: where are places to study positioned
in both buildings.
typical section: where are places to study positioned in both buildings.
-
7/27/2019 MSc Essay - Ways to Study - Arets vs Kahn
10/12
the difference between the relation of public and private places.
Wiel Arets: In Kahn's library in Exeter the collective is alsopresent, but less explicitly than in Scharoun's library in Berlin. I
think that we, as client and architect, unconsciously grew into that
idea. And I don't think there are many other libraries besides the
UBU that give so much emphasis to the collective. 23
Despite of the dimensions of the UBU space there is a studious
atmosphere; it has not the sacred qualities of the sculptural
Rockefeller hall, but is more public of character, which building
is ready for the future?
future
A lot of information only displayed in books for a couple ofyears ago is already becoming available digitally, and nowadays
the main source of information is the internet because of its
immediateness
What will be the future role of libraries; will books become
objects of great value and will be exhibited in a museum type of
building? Wiel Arets interviewed a couple of architects about
libraries and asked them similar questions about the time to
come:
Wiel Arets: What do you think about the position of the
traditional book in the near future when we consider new media as
a seemingly dominating source of information?Toyo Ito: The
more the image media advance, the more the meaning of Book as
Material grows. In the same way: the more the human brain
evolves, the more mans body in contrast has meaning. 24
Wiel Arets: What role remains for the book now and in the
near future, given that we are surrounded by new media?Rem
Koolhaas: Over the past 30 years Ive witnessed the inexhaustible
vitality of the book. And I find it fascinating to see how new
technology influences the book. SMLXL is inconceivable without the
whole notion of hypertext, but its still essentially a book. I think
23 Taken from: Beek (2005) p. 13724 Wiel Arets interviews Toyo Ito about the Sendai Mediatheque, Japan (2005)
taken from: Beek (2005) p. 162
-
7/27/2019 MSc Essay - Ways to Study - Arets vs Kahn
11/12
that the relation between man and book has an intimacy unrivalled
by other media. So its unlikely the book will ever disappear. 25
The same question was returned to Arets by Frank
Kaltenbach:26
Wiel Arets: A library is a place where books are stored and
where they can be read; but it is also a place of encounter and quiet
communication. We architects create an atmosphere in which people
can pursue other activities, not just reading books. Where once the
only medium was the book, today there are computers that possess
much greater scope. It would have been better to have called this
institution a media centre and to have offered film documents and
DVDs as well.
The UBU provides each desk with an internet connection andmost of the time with a computer installed. Exeter can do
without that. The opinions are different, the opinions will
change. Whats clear: the book remains. But will the library as a
(public) building survive, and will it as an institution of books?
25 Wiel Arets interviews Rem Koolhaas about the Seattle Public Library, USA
(2005) taken from: Beek (2005) p. 19226 Does it still make sense today to erect buildings for books, in view of the
digital media that are available everywhere? taken from: detail (2005)
-
7/27/2019 MSc Essay - Ways to Study - Arets vs Kahn
12/12
BIBLIOGRAPHY
books
Beek, M., ed (2005) Living Library: Wiel Arets Utrecht University
Library. (Munich) Prestel Verlag
Costa, X., ed. (2002) Wiel Arets. (Barcelona) Ediciones Polgrafa
Faiferri, M., ed. (2004) Wiel Arets. works and projects. (Milan) Electa
Architecture.
Wurman, R., S., ed. (1986) What Will Be Has Always Been: the words
of Louis I. Kahn. (New York) Access Press Ltd. and Rizzoli International
Publication Inc.
pages 178-183
articles
Cauberg, H., Kaltenbach, F., Toonen, S., Uehara, Y. and others (2005,
march) Universittsbibliothek in Utrecht. in: Detail: Vol. 45. No. 3:
pages 206-228
LeCuyer, A., (1985, february) Evaluation: Kahn's Powerful Presence at
Exeter. in: Architecture (AIA): Vol. 74. No. 2: pages 74-79
Tilman, H. (2004, october) Ongenaakbaar en tegelijk open. in: de
Architect: pages 48-57
Tilman, H. (2004, november) Het hele leven moet een feest zijn. Wiel
Arets over architectuur en interieur. in: de Architect Interieur: pages
32-37
Wickersham, J. (1989) The making of Exeter Library. in: The Harvard
Architecture Review: Vol. 7: pages 138-149
Websites
websites
www.library.uu.nl (main page of the Utrecht University Library)
Last viewed: 19/12/06
http://library.exeter.edu/index.html (main page of the Phillips Exeter
Academy Library)
Last viewed: 19/12/06
images
> a monk writing (partial) reproduced from a 15th century miniature,
the image is from "Les arts au moyen age et a l'epoque de la
Renaissance"by Lacroix, P. (1869) Paris
> Exeter main hall Wronsky, C.
> occupied cabin spaces by Krieger, J. de (2006)> carrel in Exeter from www.classicist.org (author: unknown)
> interior perspective Wiel Arets & Associates
http://www.library.uu.nl/http://library.exeter.edu/index.htmlhttp://www.classicist.org/http://www.classicist.org/http://library.exeter.edu/index.htmlhttp://www.library.uu.nl/