HOW LOUIS KAHN’S ARCHITECTURE

HOW LOUIS KAHN’S ARCHITECTURE

Introduction

For many years, sunshine was the only source of effective day light. The aim of creating wide spaces and openings large enough to diffuse light to the interior of buildings was the main domination of architecture. Fully glazed facades and efficient artificial light sources have freed architects from these problems of the past. Advanced daylight systems and strategies of control are other steps presumptuous in providing user-friendly, day-lit, and energy efficient buildings.Architects have to incorporate these systems intothe buildings’ general design strategy and integratethem into the architectural process from its beginning stages. Many architects have cropped up in the recent past with immense skills in designs that ensure ample working space and enough sunlight in structures. Louis Khan is among these architects. He is one of the greatest and most appealing designers of all time. He designed significant and important structures with great sense of material, light and space. This editorial brings out the ways in which elements such as space and light with the help of good example from his works influenced Louis Kahn’s architecture.

The first works of Kahn bear classical international style of architecture. Somewhere along the way, Khan decided to leave behind the old traditional architectures and focus on innovation. He had the push to give meaning to the bases of architecture via re-examination of structure, space, form, and light[1]. The elements he grew in are a great source of inspiration to him as some scholars put it. He comes from Philadelphia city, which was a place where numerous factories had large windows. Some of Kahn’s earlier works display that the structures were very solid. Recently, his architecture exposes a sense of place, depict the real side of architecture, and expose the successful application of plutonic geometry principles. He has the creditof re-introducing various ideologies, which contemporary architects have deserted like sing geometrical principles, centralized spacing, and solid mural strength usage. Kahn has also realized the usefulness of sunlight which is greatly demonstrated by the Egyptians and Greek works. These works display broad use of sunlight via different types of openings and windows[2].

Examples of Louis’s Projects with Space and Light Elements

All the elements of design philosophy have attributions to all the works of Louis beginning with his first innovative work at Yale University in which he added an Art gallery. This work is very attractive as people can see the prominence focused on the architectural innovations depicted by the floor slab system and the hollow concrete ceiling, which was an outstanding performance. His artistic sense is eminent from the design of triangular staircase, sitting in a circular concrete shell, showing the space for servants to be unique from the spaces of the building to be served. He demonstrated ample use of spaces and is responsible for the inception of the served and servant spaces. His art of space consideration is eligible from the following scenarios: Entrance to the Art Gallery of Yale University, Rear view of the building from the garden, View-down into the stairwell at the Art Gallery, and View-up to ceiling of stairwell.

Kahn used his principles to create outstanding pieces of work, which made a great deal of sense to the usage of space and light. Some of his extension or the Richards Towers of Philadelphia, bring amazing impacts with the transformation in light, feasible due to the apt utilization of light and space. Workers get totally different conditions of working in the buildings at varied times of the day. By building the Institute of Salk in La Jolla, California, Louis made another astonishing work, which had extraordinary motivating number of structures.

Richard Medical Towers exposes many significant aspects of Kahn’s architecture. The principles have had often implementation by many designers but not in the same level and time. Kahn uses this building to demonstrate the application of served spaces, beats the problem of insufficient sunlight, and prominently integrates material, process and form. According to Jaimini Mehta and RomaldoGiurgola, Richards Medical Towers creates an important turning point in modern architecture.

The Institute of Salk in La Jolla, New Jersey, emphasizes the principle of keeping buildings simple but strong. Kahn uses this structure to achieve an amazing use of pace; the ample space in the Laboratories for conducting research, the space available for office practices where ideas arise, and much more. The educational institution exposes an astonishing integration of action and mind. The building’s amazing concrete floors and surfaces give exact detailing and magnificent look. The generation of the building answers the need to confine particular places and does not rely on a wide envelope to shield such particular space. Some scholars define the main court of the structure in an artistic way. They say that the court is a sure Kahn-like space of shining blue water, a band facing the ocean showing what human work can attain with geometric principle and domineering but best deliberation, to provide the scale with less sweep of the ocean, here the pacific, a regretful gesture (Cummings and Kahn, 1989).

Louis Kahn was famous for his skill to make epic architectural structures that elicited human scale. He utilized bare concrete and bricks as his building tools and used specially polished surfaces like travertine marble to reinforce various textures. In addition to his consideration for spaces during design and curving of structures, Kahn never left out the sense of natural light and its importance. In his several projects such as the  houses of Salk Institute that converge, the institute of management of India in Ahmadabad, India, the US Consulate in Luanda, Angola, and the Dhaka’s National Capital, which were situated in hot sunny climates, Kahn created visually dynamic sunscreens as he believed that the structures should be givers of light. The walls in those buildings with differently made openings covered inner rooms from the hot sunlight. The imagination of a great wall in ruins showcases an old part Louis’s treating of light as a core aspect in two unaccomplished projects, Hurva in Jerusalem, Israel, and Mikveh in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, as well as one of the greatest works of his, the Kimbell Art Museum in Fort Worth, Texas (Solomon 2009). The art museum’s narrow lit in the concrete vaults allows light to enter. The light diffuses through by the travertine and oak present in the gallery interiors.

Louis’s work in Dhaka integrates various periods of history (local and general), and grapples with questions of individuality by trying to give form to a post-colonial order combining religious and secular aspects in its organization. The building is a democratic symbol in a country, which does not yet contain a fully functioning democracy, a statement of “modernity” with albeit, contains many ancient resemblances. Louis Kahn has confirmed that he could transcend the boundaries of western architectural conversations, giving form to the social and political aspirations of nations recently freed from imperialism. He transpired through the buildings of the past and developed them through his usual abstraction into resonant contemporary emblems.

According to Louis, the role played by natural light is one of the main aspects in creating architectural spaces that could be extraordinary in their appearance. The “giver of light” is a statement that Louis Kahn coined in his description of structures. Some of his projects located in hot climates display his sense of light appreciation. The Institute of management of India in Ahmadabad, India, the houses of Salk Institute, the US Consulate in Luanda, Angola, and the National Capital of Dhaka have visually dynamic sunscreens created by Kahn[3]. All of these projects have great walls taking various shaped openings, which assist in protecting inner spaces from the extreme direct light from the sun. Other projects of Kahn like Hurva in Jerusalem, Mikveh Israel in Philadelphia Pennsylvania, and the Kimbell Art museum in Fort Worth, Texas, have displayed Louis’s thoughtful take of sunlight. For instance, in the Kimbell Art Museum, light comes in through slits (tiny openings) in the concrete vaults and then later allowed to move into the gallery interiors, which have oak and travertine fillings[4].

Kimbel Art Museum is an amazing work of Louis in Fort Worth as it beautifully exposes utmost perfection, whichhas comparisons only to Greek works. Kahn used all available resources and tools without mistakes, that resulted in a structure, which had all contents working in a congruent way, and the system in its entirety worked perfectly.Most structures, utilize materials to an unsatisfactory extent but this building was an exception.

The power and purpose of light in his design is not the cheap idea of mounting a large window to let in light. Instead, he incorporates it via two different aspects of building; the geometric forms and the division of space. Division of spaces into servant and master areas in is the organization concept that Louis Kahn used in the design of Richardson Medical Laboratory at University of Pennsylvania, one of the main change setting buildings of the 1960s[5]. With a scrutiny of scientist’s works and different experiments and devices used, Louis Kahn concluded that there was no design of space to content the experiments. He thought that the scientists should have a corner for thought, which is concisely a studio of slices of space. With his belief in design as a trait based on humans, Kahn went to generate comfortable spaces that scientist could utilize efficiently in their work. A room with warmth of light from the sun can give the necessities. His solution was to generate great stacks of studio and link them to the high service towers that would have parts to carry liquids a.............