A diagram tells a thousand words
We are visual people. We draw diagrams to visualise our ideas. We rely on diagrams as much for communicating with others as for clarifying our thoughts, for structuring and recording them. A diagram allows us to immediately convey a concept and to explain the intention of what we are trying to achieve. It can capture the essence of a project in a thumbnail. Often buildings are easiest to understand during their construction – when they show us their bones. A diagram does something similar; it provides us with a distilled version of the design. Reading diagrams of buildings is like “zooming” right out – the small details disappear and the big idea appears clearly in front of us.
The accompanying diagrams illustrate key principles of projects from recent years. For some projects it is the plan diagram that is the primary driver behind the scheme; in others it is the section diagram that most clearly illustrates the idea of the building; and there are also occasions where the plan and section become remarkably similar – here the diagram works in the round. Diagrams – although most of the time are born out of a hand sketch – are also represented as computer generated 2D and 3D graphics, physical models and reference images.
For further reading on the subject refer to “Architectus – Between Order and Opportunity”, Essay by Haig Beck & Jackie Cooper, Chapter: Clifford: Plan as Parti
