Notebook III - School of Architecture - The Chinese University of ...

house&city
8 Architecture is the formal extension of the
common human instinct for building shelter in
search of safety and permanence. It embodies
both the physical and the metaphysical;
the secular and the sacred. It is the result of
habitation in all its aspects and scales, and the
expression in built form of all human institutions,
from a primal hut to THE HOUSE, the
village, and THE CITY. It is the embodiment of
human intentions, myths, and traditions, past,
present, and future, all unified in the eternal
presence of each work of architecture.
9
The study of architecture is ultimately the study of
works of architecture.
A work of architecture is much like an object in
nature. It is unique and universal at the same time,
a complete and internally coherent form, and at the
same time a component of a larger form. Its study
requires formalized thought if it is not to be merely a
description of the form itself.