Drawing to Conclusions: sketching the modulated subject of le Corbusier
Throughout the meandering donkey (perhaps-ass) steps of his
architectural path, Le Corbusier often stated the importance
he placed on the relationship between the building envelope
and its accommodation of function. A dialectic between the
functional apparatus - liberated from traditional conformity
by the free plan - and the skin of the building, which
suspends such functions within its surface. It was a
relationship, which for Le Corbusier, was apparent in its
inherent simplicity: "one day we noticed that the house,
like the motor car, could be a simple external covering or
membrane, containing multiple organs in free arrangement."
The envelope of the building - the poetic surface of the
free facade - is aligned to the condition of a simple
external surface, which merely articulates its internal
functions. The envelope produces a referential skin which
limits the extent of the functional process, defining its
field of influence. The functional skin becomes a structural
element, a public covering, necessary to define a pathology
of the interior, forming a closed surface which manufactures
its internal condition(ing).
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