Le Corbusier Villa Savoye Information

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The Villa Savoye is a wonderful demonstration of Le Corbusier's 'five points of a new architecture', which he developed in 1927, exploiting the new opportunities of reinforced concrete:Thepilotis(supporting columns): 'The house onpilotis! The house is firmly driven into the ground - a dark and often damp site. The reinforced concrete gives us thepilotis. The house is up in the air, far from the ground: the garden runs under the house...'The roof gardens:'...the garden is also over the house, on the roof... Reinforced concrete is the new way to create a unified roof structure. Reinforced concrete expands considerably. The expansion makes the work crack at times of sudden shrinkage. Instead of trying to evacuate the rainwater quickly, endeavor on the contrary to maintain a constant humidity on the concrete of the terrace and hence an even temperature on the reinforced concrete. One particular protective measure: sand covered with thick concrete slabs, with widely spaced joints; these joints are sown with grass.'Free plan:'Until now: load-bearing walls; from the ground they are superimposed, forming the ground floor and the upper stories, up to the eaves. The layout is a slave to the supporting walls. Reinforced concrete in the house provides a free plan! The floors are no longer superimposed by partition walls. They are free.'The horizontal window:'The window is one of the essential features of the house. Progress brings liberation. Reinforced concrete provides a revolution in the history of the window. Windows can run from one end of the facade to the other.'The free facade:'The columns set back from the facades, inside the house. The floor continues cantilevered. The facades are no longer anything but light skins of insulating walls or windows. The facade is free.'(Quotations from Le Corbusier are from the house's visitor brochure published by the Centre des monuments nationaux.)'The approach is by car and as one passes under the building (a demonstration of urban doctrine), and follows the curve of industrial glazing (of which the geometry was determined by the car's turning circle), it becomes clear that one is to be drawn into a machine-age ritual. The plan of the building is square (one of the 'ideal' forms from Vers une architecture), curves, ramp and grid of structure providing the basic counterpoint to the perimeter. The section illustrates the basic divisions of a service and circulation zone below, a piano nobile above, and the celestial zone of the solarium on top: it's the section-type of Le Corbusier's ideal city but restated in microcosm.''If the Villa Savoye had been a mere demonstration of formal virtuosity it would not have touched expressive depths. The tension of the building relies on the urgent expression of a utopian dream. Icons of the new age such as the ship and the concrete frame blend into forms born of Purist painting. The rituals of upper middle-class existence are translated into an allegory on the ideal modern life which even touches upon the Corbusian typologies for the city: separate levels for people and cars, terraces open to the sky, a ramp celebrating movement. The fantasy is translated into conventions that avoid arbitrariness and that reveal Le Corbusier's ambition to make an equivalent to the logic, order an sense of truth he had intuited in the great styles of the past. Rationalism was a point of departure, but not the aim. He wished to re-inject the ideal content that relativism and materialism had destroyed.'

Souce 2:Situated in Poissy, a small commune outside of Paris, is one of the most significant contributions to modern architecture in the 20th century, Villa Savoye by Le Corbusier. Completed in 1929, Villa Savoye is a modern take on a French country house that celebrates and reacts to the new machine age. The house single handedly transformed Le Corbusiers career as well as the principles of the International Style; becoming one of the most important architectural precedents in the history. Villa Savoyes detachment from its physical context lends its design to be contextually integrated into the mechanistic/industrial context of the early 20th century, conceptually defining the house as a mechanized entity.Le Corbusier is famous for stating, The house is a machine for living. This statement is not simply translated into the design of a human scaled assembly line; rather the design begins to take on innovative qualities and advances found in other fields of industry, in the name of efficiency.

In response to his aspirations and admiration of mechanized design, Le Corbusier established The Five Points of architecture, which is simply a list of prescribed elements to be incorporated in design. The Five Points of architecture can be thought of as Le Corbusiers modern interpretation of Vitruvius Ten Books on Architecture, not literally in the sense of an instructional manual for architects, but rather a checklist of necessary components of design. So much so that Villa Savoye is thoroughly tailored to Corbusiers Five Points.The Five Points of Architecture:_Pilotis [slender columns]_Flat Roof Terrace_Open Plan_Ribbon Windows_Free Faade [free of structural members]At this point in Le Corbusiers career, he became intrigued by the technology and design of steamships. The simplistic, streamlined result born out of innovative engineering techniques and modular design had influenced Corbusiers spatial planning and minimalistic aesthetic. The pilotis that support the decks, the ribbon windows that run alongside the hull, the ramps providing a moment of egress from deck to deck; all of these aspects served as the foundation of the Five Points of Architecture and are found in the overall composition of Villa Savoye.Upon entering the site, the house appears to be floating above the forested picturesque background supported by slender pilotis that seem to dissolve among the tree line, as the lower level is also painted green to allude to the perception of a floating volume.The lower level serves as the maintenance and service programs of the house. One of most interesting aspects of the house is the curved glass faade on the lower level that is formed to match the turning radius of automobiles of 1929 so that when the owner drives underneath the larger volume they can pull into the garage with the ease of a slight turn.The living quarters, or the upper volume, are fitted with ribbon windows that blend seamlessly into the stark, white faade, which void the faade(s) of any hierarchy. The ribbon windows begin to play with the perception of interior and exterior, which does not fully become expressed until once inside.

However once inside, there becomes a clear understanding of the spatial interplay between public and private spaces. Typically, the living spaces of a house are relatively private, closed off, and rather secluded. Yet, Le Corbusier situates the living spaces around a communal, outdoor terraced that is separated from the living area by a sliding glass wall. This notion of privatized areas within a larger communal setting is a common thread later on in Le Corbusiers housing projects.Both the lower level and the upper living quarters are based off an open plan idea that provokes the inhabitant to continuously meander between spaces. As an architectural tour de force, Le Corbusier incorporates a series of ramps moving from the lower level all the way to the rooftop garden, which requires the inhabitant to slow down and experience the movement between spaces.Villa Savoye is a house designed based on the architectural promenade. Its experience is in the movement through the spaces. It is not until one becomes familiar with the subtle peculiarities that the movement and proportionality of the spaces evokes a sense of monumentality within the Parisian suburb.