Big buildings ignore the context around them; they are independent of the surrounding fabric they are meant to tie into, becoming objects that merely hover in space. The sudden appearance of these big buildings diminishes the aspects of quality and experience causing the concept of architecture to be rethought. Their distant relationship with the ground, due to technological advances such as the elevator, creates an inwardly focused space. The building only continues to grow taller, allowing program to run wild, for it is impossible to define all of the spaces based on the activity on every floor. The purpose of these buildings looks towards the efficiency of cramming every aspect of life into one building, encouraging it to only grow taller
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In Rem Koolhaas’ essay, “Bigness and the Problem of Large”, Koolhaas attempts to address the issues of Bigness, “Bigness no longer needs the city: it competes with the city; it represents the city; it preempts the city; or better still, it is the city” (515). Koolhaas is not eliciting that Bigness describes the singular monumentality of a building, but that Bigness and the problem of large is the newfound struggle between urbanism and architecture as concepts that have to find a way to coexist in a city encapsulated within a single large building, that has no preexisting theory for its existence in the first …show more content…
One of the earliest examples of a city within a building came from Grant E. Hamilton in 1895 who published, “What We Are Coming To” for Judge Magazine which encompassed a drawing of multiple shops, means of transportation and circulation, entertainment sites, and homes mashed and stacked on top of one another. This design depicted the hopes of embodying everything an individual could ever need to survive all in one place. In many ways, this shows how this idea of efficiency has always been present in theory, however until more recently would have been impossible to actually construct. Koolhaas points out that since the supporting technologies, such as the elevator, electricity, air conditioning, steel and new infrastructures have finally caught up they have “unleashed an architectural big bang… forming a cluster of mutations that induced another species of architecture” (498). Therefore, making it possible for ideas like Hamilton’s to come to life, while giving way to the theory of bigness as a plausible reality.
Since Bigness is now a possible, the “problem of large” becomes this mutant species of design, which has redefined architecture and urbanism from their original definitions into something completely different. Koolhaas utilizes his “Theory of Bigness” to breakdown the impact
In Rem Koolhaas’ essay, “Bigness and the Problem of Large”, Koolhaas attempts to address the issues of Bigness, “Bigness no longer needs the city: it competes with the city; it represents the city; it preempts the city; or better still, it is the city” (515). Koolhaas is not eliciting that Bigness describes the singular monumentality of a building, but that Bigness and the problem of large is the newfound struggle between urbanism and architecture as concepts that have to find a way to coexist in a city encapsulated within a single large building, that has no preexisting theory for its existence in the first …show more content…
One of the earliest examples of a city within a building came from Grant E. Hamilton in 1895 who published, “What We Are Coming To” for Judge Magazine which encompassed a drawing of multiple shops, means of transportation and circulation, entertainment sites, and homes mashed and stacked on top of one another. This design depicted the hopes of embodying everything an individual could ever need to survive all in one place. In many ways, this shows how this idea of efficiency has always been present in theory, however until more recently would have been impossible to actually construct. Koolhaas points out that since the supporting technologies, such as the elevator, electricity, air conditioning, steel and new infrastructures have finally caught up they have “unleashed an architectural big bang… forming a cluster of mutations that induced another species of architecture” (498). Therefore, making it possible for ideas like Hamilton’s to come to life, while giving way to the theory of bigness as a plausible reality.
Since Bigness is now a possible, the “problem of large” becomes this mutant species of design, which has redefined architecture and urbanism from their original definitions into something completely different. Koolhaas utilizes his “Theory of Bigness” to breakdown the impact