Christopher Alexander is a (now ex-) professor of architecture at Berkeley whose most famous books, The Timeless Way of Building and A Pattern Language, have inspired a sort of cult. He believes that in architecture beauty is attainable by following rules, or recipes, which he calls patterns. The same problems occur over and over again, and the patters, which he claims not to invent but to discover, are well-known ways of solving them. A Pattern Language consists of 253 of these, with photographs and descriptions. Alexander maintains that beautiful cities and towns will result from following the patterns. He aims to demystify all of architecture, and to a great extent he succeeds.
His patterns range in breadth from city planning to room decor, and many of them are alarming in their specificity. Cities should contain no more than 9% parking space; political communities should be around 7,000 people (this is reminiscent of the 19th century socialist crank Charles Fourier, who recommended 500 as ideal); no urban downtowns should serve more than 300,000 people; most buildings should be no more than four stories high; terraces should be at least six feet deep; every room should have light on at least two sides. Sometimes Alexander buttresses his rather ex cathedra pronouncements with studies and arguments; sometimes not. "Nine Percent Parking" gives a fair taste of his style:
We [he has co-authors] suspect that when the density of cars passes a certain limit, and people experience the feeling that there are too many cars, what is really happening is that subconsciously they feel that the cars are overwhelming the environment, that the environment is no longer "theirs," that they have no right to be there, and so on... Instead of inviting them out, the environment starts giving them the message that the outdoors is not meant for them, that they should stay indoors, that they should stay in their own buildings, that social communion is no longer permitted or encouraged.
We have not yet tested this suspicion. However, if it turns out to be true, it may be that this pattern, which seems to be based on such slender evidence, is in fact one of the most crucial patterns there is, and that it plays a key role in determining the difference between environments which are socially and psychologically healthy and those which are unhealthy. [Italics his.]
Article comments
1 - Mark Saleski
yes! definitely a great book. i stumbled upon it one day last summer while at a tiny bookstore on the coast of maine (actually, the store was Rue Cottage Books, run by Nicols Fox...author of Against The Machine).
anyway, i pick the thing up and it's just engrossing...no matter which page you turn to you find interesting material, often presented in quite unusual ways.
2 - Eric Olsen
Thanks Aaron, welcome back!