As the application of materials having transparent property-of-matter including glass increases sharply in modern architectural space, 'transparency' has become an important notion in explaining modern architecture. The notion differentiates into vari...
As the application of materials having transparent property-of-matter including glass increases sharply in modern architectural space, 'transparency' has become an important notion in explaining modern architecture. The notion differentiates into various ways, and it further has developed into the phenomenal notion supposedly involving observer's cognitive judgement besides the notion of material itself appearing as a way of expressing materials. Discussions on transparency are continually being done in contemporary architecture. Transparency, as one mentioned above, is a pattern which can not be overlooked in this age , and one of the liberal elements in design arising simultaneously. Buildings having such transparentness made possible the advent of space pluralistic and complex in contemporaryarchitecture. Also they are widely appearing, reflecting the urban context, improving the quality of inner space.
But the notion, transparency, has been explained as having various meaning in contemporaryarchitecture, for this reason, it is also true that the notion itself is being used ambiguously. Accordingly, in this study we took a look at various notions and possibilities on transparency, and paid our attention to the way, by what design principle it is represented and applied to architecture. With this in mind, we studied the transparency applied to contemporaryarchitecture viewpoint by viewpoint, analyzed the examples of contemporaryarchitecture sub-viewpoint by sub-viewpoint, and then, by studying the respective design techniques, tried to analyze and categorize the design techniques and their meaning appearing in contemporaryarchitecture.
Through these, we conclude as follows.
1) Categorization of various notions on transparency : Epidermis and Space
The notion transparency was contemplated and defined architecturally by a variety of scholars including Giedion and Rowe. And as a result of rearranging such considerations in the light of preceding research, we were able to see that the architectural aspects of expressing transparency could be classified largely into two viewpoints, epidermis and space.
Discussions on transparency from epidermal aspects could be understood both through the interest change in expressing cladding as a membranous notion in contemporaryarchitecture, and through the viewpoint of recognizing the importance of epidermis as a bordering surface between the inner and outer side. And discussions on transparency from spatial aspects could be understood through the interest in creating various space and through the experimental trials on ambiguous border from perceptual and conceptional viewpoint.
2) Transparency from epidermal viewpoint Transparency from epidermal viewpoint could be categorized into 1) emphasis on property-of-matter, 2) lightness of material itself, 3) visual ambivalence, and 4) non-materialized ultra-epidermis. According to this categorization, we could see the tendency toward space and shape manipulation: the detailed design techniques, by maximizing the property-of-matter expression of glass and metal, allude the respective property-of-matter itself to the character of the project, produce the various dynamic space and mass de-gravitating by way of transparentness of the materials, express the simultaneity of space by overlapping the images through inter-comparison of epidermal materials, and let recognize the solid be recognized as void through surface transparency. We could also see that the detailed design techniques comprise(organize, form) the epidermis having automaticity and time characteristic through non-materializing the epidermis, and that epidermis itself changes and plays a role of including changeable information.
3) Transparency from spatial viewpoint
In spatial viewpoint, transparency is summarized into sub-viewpoints as 1) existing(straightforward) space 2) ambiguous border and 3) space expansibility.
In discussions on transparency from spatial aspects, we could find techniques comprising dynamic space by inducing attention into various space through, from one space, granting the inner space components transparentness, thus letting the visual openness felt within inner space. We could also find in them that lights were actively flowed into inner space, that space straightforwardness is encouraged by sharing both inner structure and actions happening inside the structure with the observers from outer space, and that space inter-penetration and diversification are sought through making the border of respective space obscure like forming space of neutral nature between outer and inner space.
Above discussions on transparency have been being analyzed as variedly as the diversity itself in contemporaryarchitecture. Though it is inappropriate to summarize the discussions into several specific viewpoints, as the notional classifications on transparency are varied according to the points of individual researchers, it can be said that, by approaching with the standpoint of the designers who may have various difficulties in the course of design, the meaning of this thesis lies largely in the fact that it attempted to study the architectural application techniques of transparency notion both through epidermal aspect which could be said to decide on the appearance of the architecture shape and through, in physical aspects as a combination of space components comprising the inner space, spatial aspect to which architectural techniques of transparency notion are applied.
From now on, discussions on architectural application of more systematic and concrete transparency notion are thought to be needed.