Buildings' characteristics.

In principle, the elements of buildings are the same as the elements of any product; materials, processes, forms and appearance, selected and arranged to meet the demands and needs of manufacture and use. Although a building could be regarded as one product, it is in fact an assembly of many individual products, some of which are purpose designed to suit special requirements but many of which are obtained from suppliers, chosen from ranges of pre-designed alternatives.

Many of the raw materials and components already exist, and it is the way that they are put together that creates the new building, influenced by all the issues previously identified for product design, based on an understanding of the purpose of the building and the needs of its users.

Buildings serve a practical function as enclosed shelters, capable of maintaining a reasonable level of environmental comfort and safety in order to sustain human activity. The selection and use of materials in a local context can be seen throughout the world; African mud-huts, Eskimo igloos and North American Indian tepees, and throughout the UK; Welsh slate roofs, Suffolk thatch and Norfolk flint are all examples of local design solutions based on readily available materials, and understanding the skills developed through lengthy experience.

As well as creating buildings to suit their physical needs, different cultures and successive generations created and continue to develop forms, styles and decorations reflecting additional values and concerns. For example, the Egyptian, Greek and Roman civilisations built elaborate and sophisticated shelters, influenced amongst other things by their perceptions of art, religion and power. Vitruvius, a Roman author in his ‘Ten Books on Architecture’ offered a definition of the constituents of buildings which is still useful today:

● Commodity: function and practicality.

● Firmness: construction and durability of materials.

● Delight: appearance and attractiveness.

Historically, architectural or building styles survived for long periods of time, gradually evolving over hundreds, or even thousands of years as empires expanded and then contracted. In the UK, design and construction of buildings periodically incorporated the ideas of dominant European civilisations such as the Romans, Vikings and Normans, and later the more peaceful discovery and absorption of the sophistication and beauty of continental architecture, notably at the time of the Italian Renaissance. Many splendid Victorian structures were built by the entrepreneurs of the Industrial Revolution to demonstrate their new wealth and self-importance in society. The use of materials and structures typical of time and place, described as vernacular architecture was familiar to designers, builders and users, unifying the built environment and creating a certainty in the way in which it was understood.

During the twentieth century, however, design and construction changed rapidly as ideas, materials, technology, transport and communications developed and opened up new possibilities. Perceptions of what buildings are for and what they can look like has changed too. Since the 1960s, leisure centres, supermarkets and out-of-town hypermarkets have been invented, precast concrete high-rise housing has come and gone and the design of industrial buildings has been transformed from mere ‘sheds’ into buildings of ‘award winning merit’. We now have mixed use buildings, combining commercial, leisure and residential functions, and redundant buildings being transformed by changing their use to suit contemporary demands.

The design of each building type, however, is simply an assembly of elements, and it can be argued that the quality of these buildings has resulted from the ability or failure to recognise the true significance of all the relevant elements at the time that they were designed and constructed. For example, the swift demise of the pre-cast concrete, deck access, urban tower blocks, constructed in a hurry in the 1960s and 70s was perhaps predictable because so many elements were ignored or plain wrong.

Radical theories about function associated with inadequate technology and management, created an inevitable time bomb, and many of these developments have already been demolished, some within a mere 20 years of their first being occupied. Learning from mistakes has been a very painful and expensive experience for everyone involved. Interestingly though, the sweeping condemnation of the buildings of this era has recently been reviewed, and a number of examples from the period are now been restored and listed as being of architectural merit.