With all the change in Architectural style within the 19th century, we see a new type of Architecture emerge as architects begin to build vertically. With a bricklayers' strike in Chicago, iron skeletal frames were not only being used for the interior frame but also the exterior frame. Over the next five years, metal frames were being used in almost every building reducing the weight of the office building blocks by more than half. They also elimintated the thick supporting walls at the ground floor and basement. With this improment building design began to change along with technology such as the invention of the passanger elevator. Buildings began to rise and rise to the skys.
Home Insurance Office Building, Chicago. By William Le Baron Jenney
With this new architectual style, design was changing rapidly for these office buildings. Louis Sullivan thought that witht he tall office block being a totally new building type, it required a complete new way of thinking so he established the three principle function rule.
- There is a basement below the sidewalk level which houses mechanical equiptment and utilities
- First principal visible area is the street-level zone. Here there are a mix of street shops with a public entrance leading to the central elevator.
- Above is the second visible area which consists of stacked identical office cells grouped along corridors branching out from the central spine where the elevator is located.
- Atop all of this is the third area consisting of some offices, elevator machinery, and other utilities.
Red: First Principle area
Blue: Second Principle area
Orange: Third Principle area
Adler and Sullivan Guaranty Building in Buffalo, New York
When looking at the architectual changes of vertical buildings, the basic principles of stacking come back to my mind. It is important to remember the importance of the basic principles of design and also that even with the change to modern architecture, they are still present.
Just as the Egyptians stacked and built to the skies:
Pyramids of Giza
So we are still repeating the same stacking and building to the sky in our own modern language.
Buji Skyscraper in Dubai
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