(for me): aesthetics, purity, character, art [of] construction. solutions that make sense. a full coordination of design to construction...a fusion if you will.
 

dude, you just opened up a can o worms...
 

bad gabe...bad
 

this could get ugly,......excellent post!
 

it's getting ugly, you just wait
 

bring it....oh you brought it...well then serve it up.
 

are we dancing or writing? i feel so alone with my pathetic reply.
 

i agree with you tommy boy...a fusion!
the problem is that the reality of architecture, in my experience, is much less than that. designing a building with an artistic and beautiful aesthetic character [inside and out] is one thing but carrying it out is another.
to me "good architecture" is like tom said a "fusion" of good design and quality construction. design that is relivent to its time, context and materials. and construction that is refined and meticulus. what of it?
 

now find people who will actually do that.
 

it's getting ugly!!
 

good architecture is a delicate dance on the stage of the city....a "flirtation" of conflicting elements. Form flirting with function, and function flirting back. concepts counting steps with construction techniques. details dancing with deadlines. budgets bumping elbows with beauty. One may lead the other, but it can't be forceful or stern. even while leading it must react to it's partner. Each element of the process must be strong enough to stand on it's own, but know that the beauty is in the whole. when all elements of a building come togther and dance in that perfect form, that my friend is when you have great architecture.
 

elegantly put man.
 

anyone have a different opinion or something to add? come on eric impossible to top but say something.
 

i was strapping the velcro on my tap shoes during erics flow. i think that is the most fantastic wrap of words i've seen in a long time. i had to show it to my princ. he loved it aswell...it started a dialogue:
how ever you look @ it...both architects and contractors are working for the same goal: the client. our only common interest is to create a fantastic project for him/her...something worthy of placing our names behind. control of construction is where it breaks down. (our group spends as much time @ the computer as we do on site)...we also trust and know the judgement of our gc's. in a design/build conditon the line is more exact and control is there (for a better use of a word)...i don't know...how do you guys run things? i would love to do design/build @ some point in my life...the problem is i only have a drill and sander to my name @ the moment. i guess i could do a shelf or something. haha.
 

The topic of timeless architecture came up in the Fashionable Architecture thread, I was milling over this idea in the shower today and well, honestly, timeless seemed to connect itself with the loss of culture. When a society learns to live a new way the architecture of old becomes timeless, no longer of use and unable to grasp the future, while the past has already slipped away. Ruins scattered on every continent fall into this category, even abandonned research stations in Antartica. So, yes, the comment is correct. Vacant warehouses and shut down factories, toppled grain silos and oddly decontstructionist barns, the list goes on and I'd like to add to it. There is one thing I must say though, the idea of timeless architecture automatically being good architecture disturbs me. I'm not sure why but I believe that good architecture should be so hard to explain that you can't say what it is, you have to build it.
 

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