A. G. Rizzoli: Architect of Magnificent Visions

July 30th, 2008

I received my A.G. Rizzoli book in the mail today. It’s an excellent book. It includes a history of Rizzoli and many hard to find drawings. Highly recommended.

I posted about Rizzoli last week with more pictures of his work.

Posted in: Architecture, Books, Design
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A. G. Rizzoli

July 24th, 2008

My sister introduced me to this artist several years ago, and my recently acquired interest in architecture reminded me of his work. Achilles Rizzoli is an excellent example of what the human mind can accomplish when creativity and imagination are given ample time. Although the most of his body of work was drafted between 1935 and 1944, Rizzoli went undiscovered until 1990!

Achilles worked as an architect for a firm in San Francisco where he was a sufficient, but otherwise normal draftsman. However, his own architectural work was far more than just sufficient, it was magnificent. He would, during his free time, construct an elaborate fantasy world of exquisite buildings. Many being architectural caricatures of his friends and family.

Rizzoli would occasionally make the front room of his home into museum called the “Achilles Techtonic Exhibit”. Visitors that gave compliments or befriended Achilles would often return to find that they too had been depicted as a mansion or castle.

I particularly like the building at left. Notice the how symetrical it appears overall, but up close (click for a larger version) it isn’t at all. And, in addition to the building itself, all the intricate notes and excellent typography really pull it together.

I’ve ordered a collection of his work called “A. G. Rizzoli: Architect of Magnificent Visions” and should receive it soon. I’ll post some pictures when it gets here.

Posted in: Architecture, Design
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The Architecture of Happiness

July 17th, 2008

I was revisiting this excellent introduction to architecture today to compare it with F.L. Wright’s essays . One of my favorite things about architecture is how it marries mathematics and logic with art and humanity. But it wasn’t always this way. Botton writes:

“The principles of engineering may have brutally contradicted those of architecture, but a vocal minority of nineteenth-century architects nevertheless perceived that the engineers were capable of providing them with a critical key to their salvation — for what these men had, and they so sorely lacked, was certainty. The engineers had landed on an apparently impregnable method of evaluating the wisdom of a design: they felt confidently able to declare that a structure was correct and honest in so far as it performed its mechanical functions efficiently; and false and immoral in so far as it was burdened with non-supporting pillars, decorative statues, frescos or carvings.”

-Alain de Botton, The Architecture of Happiness

This idea of simplification by reducing beauty and utility into the same structures is fascinating to me. In my last post I quoted Wright speaking about “useful things” and I think this is what he was talking about.

I often times find myself considering the similarities between architecture and web design. Both mediums are interactive, permeable, and require the marriage of style and function. I wonder who I am, the architect or the engineer? The graphic artist or the developer? Great designers are both.

Posted in: Architecture, Books, Design, Quotes
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Frank Lloyd Wright - On Architecture

July 15th, 2008

Yesterday I picked up this book at a used book store downtown. I’ve never read Wright before so when I saw this beautiful cover looking out at me I knew that I needed to. It’s a chronological selection of his writing broken up into several sections with regards to his changing environment, philosophy, and style. So far I’ve only read his earliest works from his early 20s to early 30s, around the turn of the century.

Nearly every paragraph is quotable. Wright’s pen spews forth insight even when the subject may not be exclusively architectural in nature. Take this for example:

“Useful Things. Avoid all things which have no real use or meaning, and make those which have especially significant, for there is no one part of your building that may not be made a thing of beauty in itself as related to the whole.”

and this:

“Decoration. Decoration can tell your friends lots of things that you do not know and would not like if you did. It is of no use to you unless you do understand and appreciate it. It would not be sufficient justification for you to have it just because it looks rich or because somebody else had it.”

-Frank Lloyd Wright, Architecture and the Machine 1894

Incedently, my great great grandfather William Gates lived in Chicago and became good friends with Wright and even commissioned him to create original pottery for his Terra Cotta Company better known as TECO . I haven’t had a chance to visit Chicago yet, but my sister has recently relocated there so I am planning to go.

I hope this can be an ongoing theme of discussion here as I continue to learn about architecture and share my findings. Please feel free to send in related information.

Posted in: Architecture, Books, Design, Quotes
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