The Material Imagination: Reveries on Architecture and Matter (Ashgate Studies in Architecture) - Hardcover

Mindrup, Matthew

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1472424581 ISBN 13: 9781472424587

Publisher: Routledge, 2015

Synopsis

In recent years architectural discourse has witnessed a renewed interest in materiality under the guise of such familiar tropes as 'material honesty,' 'form finding,' or 'digital materiality.' Motivated in part by the development of new materials and an increasing integration of designers in fabricating architecture, a proliferation of recent publications from both practice and academia explore the pragmatics of materiality and its role as a protagonist of architectural form. Yet, as the ethos of material pragmatism gains more popularity, theorizations about the poetic imagination of architecture continue to recede. Compared to an emphasis on the design of visual form in architectural practice, the material imagination is employed when the architect 'thinks matter, dreams in it, lives in it, or, in other words, materializes the imaginary.' As an alternative to a formal approach in architectural design, this book challenges readers to rethink the reverie of materials in architecture through an examination of historical precedent, architectural practice, literary sources, philosophical analyses and everyday experience. Focusing on matter as the premise of an architect’s imagination, each chapter identifies and graphically illustrates how material imagination defines the conceptual premises for making architecture.

About this title

About the Author

Matthew Mindrup is an Assistant Professor of Architecture at the University of Canberra, Australia.

Edition details

• Publisher: Routledge
• Publication date: 2015
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1472424581
• ISBN 13: 9781472424587
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 280