Abstract:
Contemporary architecture can frequently be divided into two schools of thought - the "Starchitect", look-at-me brand and the subtler, contextually sensitive, try-and-find-me buildings. The contextually sensitive buildings have a level of comprehension about the way in which the city has existed prior to its own existence. This thesis will investigate how architecture takes into account its context at the time of its design. Additionally, it will investigate how contemporary architecture can be imbued with the "principle of discretion", so that a building can be placed at the centre of the city can respond to its context, without demanding or taking away from what has existed for so long before, instead being additive and enhancing the present. How, then, does a building conceal and camouflage itself? The architecture of integration can be examined by looking at Architects like Alvaro Siza and Rafael Moneo, who seamlessly integrate their designs into historical contexts. By investigating their body of work to realise how this complex, contextually appropriate architecture is created from its context. This thesis will investigate the concept of context through a design. Specifically, it will refer to and investigate context as having the potential to capture a particular epoch of the city. It will also discuss how new buildings within the urban context can exist more than as just a thin veil of reference to what has existed and what does exist, but as a constant notation. Furthermore, it will discuss these ideas with reference to contemporary stone and masonry construction. In his essay on interpretive culture, Clifford Geertz, the anthropologist, discusses the notion of thick and thin descriptions in terms of behaviours. This concept can be extended to architecture. Thick Architecture will be treated as buildings that operate at a multitude of layers, not just as the physically thick.