Cladism

Modernism for me has always been about purity of form and materials. One of the greatest proponents of this was Corbu in his book Towards a New Architecture written in 1923. One of his major points in the book was how this material called concrete could be used in new and interesting ways … purity of form, structure as architecture and finish. A little later on, Mies was also pushing structural expression with steel and glass, exposed I-beams on the exterior as well is interior. Minimalist approach to design, quality materials, simple and rigorous, easily understood.

Ultimately these ideas were misinterpreted by mediocre architects and stripped of quality materials by developers. Just like an inexpensive volume knock off of haute couture, the result ultimately leads to a degradation of the original. So – onto the next style or movement! In architecture’s case, this next movement was postmodernism born in 1966 with Venturi’s Complexity and Contradiction in Architecture. This movement caught on as a reaction to all those boring boxes that were proliferating across the land. A philosophy which I believe also suffered the same fate as early modernism, cheap misinterpretations leading us to the next new thing … the short lived deconstructionist movement and so it goes.

So, where is the profession now, surely not in some sort of new modernist phase? Where is the purity of materials? The minimalism? No, buildings are too complex today, designing sustainability is driving façades in a way that Mies couldn’t imagine – façades are different on each side, less glass is more. Where is the purity in that? No, I would suggest that we are mixing what the 20th Century gave us overlaid with the realities of the march towards net zero buildings. Technically driven decorated modernism, or, may I be so bold to call it Cladism?

What is Cladism? Many of our building exteriors employ a rain screen system, at which point one can clip almost anything on it. Once we embrace artificial materials that in some cases imitate real materials we have lost purity. What is the inherent quality of a man made material, or is it so much sleight of hand? A brick wants to be an arch, concrete wants to cantilever. But what does Swisspearl want to be? What do any of these new materials tell you about what the architecture should be? Or, are they all so much wall paper, decorating the shed and the occasional duck.

Once we embrace thermal bridging we no longer have real structural expressionism, at least not on the exterior of buildings. Are we decorating our building with materials that drive the design? Are the fins and sunshades just so much ornamentation, particularly on the north façades and mechanical penthouses of our buildings? Do we google a particular building material for inspiration? Does this path down the google rabbit hole mean we look for inspiration for a design approach to the exterior cladding system instead of having an idea what the building’s program and context may say about the expression of the exterior and even the massing?

We see cladding materials come and go. Wasn’t green cooper cladding hot a couple of years ago? How about channel glass? When will terracotta be passé? Has the exterior cladding industry figured out that they can sell new materials just like the auto industry? Give us a new model every 4- 5 years, which makes the previous one look old hat? To carry that analogy further, is it less about what a car looks like and more about the technology, like automatic breaking, head’s up displays? And what happens after fully autonomous cars are everywhere? Will they become an appliance just like a toaster – you jump in and go where you want and who cares about the experience as long as you get there in one piece?

Likewise with building façades, will technology drive ever-increasing change? Automated windows and shades and glass that can change opacity are already here … embedded chips in your façade, anyone? Will self-driving façades, if you will, change and mutate to the microclimatic conditions and be more about technology and less about aesthetics? Will there be computer programs that will design façades based on microclimate data cross-referenced against a variety of building cladding systems? The ultimate efficiency in sustainable façade design!

Maybe not, but I believe the profession is entering a period of increasing options for cladding building, increasingly changing with little opportunity for familiarly for the observer – a messy vitality or just a cacophony of unrelated buildings clad in a vast variety of seemly meaningless materials?

So I ask, as design professionals are we designing buildings within a social fabric and a historic context or are we just becoming Cladists?

Related:
Musing on Articulated Façades