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Thetarchitecture

Golden Ratio Architecture
 
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If you look out of the window in a busy city, all you see are large rectangular blocks that look like smog. How great it would be to look at architecture like StBasil's cathedral, the Louvre, etc, in your own city. The easy way to achieve this would be to use the golden ratio. This would result in both beautiful box skyscrapers and some really excentric spiral buildings, with corkscrew sculpture in their landing, and other pleasing buildings useing one of the oldest known mathematicl irrational number.

[Jason and the argonauts for math, go in search of theta and his golden ratio]

[ sctld ], Apr 21 2001

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       Simple economics makes buildings boxy, boring and functional. Yeah, I wish buildings were prettier too. I also wish I had a million dollars... whatever. Lame.   

       You seem to be under the confused notion that use of the golden ratio is somehow either necessary or sufficient to produce good architecture. It is neither.   

       Use of the golden ratio in architecture is, of course, as old as antiquity.
egnor, Apr 21 2001
  

       Indeed, but if every building used the golden ratio, which most uildings today do *not* then buildings would be pleasing to the eye. And the golden ratio can sufficiently produce good architecture, egnor.
[ sctld ], Apr 21 2001
  

       You think if cities were full of large rectangular blocks that look like smog, but built *in the golden ratio*, that they would look more like St. Basil's Cathedral or the Louvre?   

       Not to repeat myself, but the thing holding back good architecture is not that nobody's ever thought of using the golden ratio, but that building owners simply don't want to spend money and waste space on "eccentric spiral buildings" and the like.   

       ("Oh! That's what we've been missing, the *golden ratio*! Now all our big grey concrete cube buildings will be *pretty*, and eccentric spirals will suddenly appear out of nowhere, and it won't cost any more than before! Thank you, sctld, you've saved the day again!")
egnor, Apr 21 2001
  

       egnor: The golden ratio has been proven to be eye pleasing, so a tuck hear and an elongation their would *indeed* make it look better.   

       [Is egnor a phonetic equivelent of ignore?]
[ sctld ], Apr 22 2001
  

       I've spent a great deal of time with Golden Ratio designs myself. In order to break things down, I went the whole route, used Compass, etc. Once a person understands how to let the numbers do the work, the Compass is no longer necessary to lay things out. No spiral need exist if one doesn't want it to. Either way-results are a joy. a/b=b/a+b
thumbwax, Apr 22 2001
  

       There's a long, long way between "eye-pleasing proportions" and "StBasil's cathedral, the Louvre, etc", let alone "really excentric [sic] spiral buildings, with corkscrew sculpture in their landing".   

       Architecture, even modern, ugly, boxy, architecture, does use the Golden Ratio in many cases. In many other cases, it is not possible; the plot of land may be a certain size, and economics and zoning laws may dictate the height.   

       "Egnor" is my name. It's pronounced with with a short 'e', not a short 'i', as in "Neither >egg nor< chicken am I." You are, however, free to ignore me, and you even have the power to delete my annotations, should you wish.
egnor, Apr 22 2001
  

       Trouble is, architecture seems to be a shotgun marriage of function and aesthetics. No divorce possible yet, given the economics of building materials and land. To make it worse, fashions change and yesterday's cool postmodern concrete-and-glass cantilevered double-pyramid is today's eyesore. sctld, would you settle for neo-neoclassicism?
Dog Ed, Apr 23 2001
  

       Egnor, ican't delete your annotations, it is unethical. The whole idea of deleting annotations goes against the UN declaration of human rights, and besides, if i deleted someones annotation it would mean that i have no respect for them.   

       [Respect the man who speaks his mind, for he does respect you]
[ sctld ], Apr 23 2001
  

       I'm with Rod's Tiger, I would like to see some fractal architecture. That would be messed up.
EvoketheTiger, Apr 23 2001
  

       How 'bout a Mobius building, we'd have a wild time with elevators. Hmmm... but I guess that wouldn't work in three dimensions, nevermind.
AndyRPI, Apr 23 2001
  

       You could have two Mobius buildings from one if you cut a klein bottle in half, but then where would you live?
[ sctld ], Apr 27 2001
  

       I think i'll stick with my rural bungalow, with large spiral back garden, with intersecting circles and golden ratioi shed where i keep my g....
[ sctld ], Apr 29 2001
  

       Aesthetically pleasing shapes are forms are not limited to the Golden ratio derived geometry. A good architect relies anything from symmetrical to asymmetrical shapes and forms. Not to mention grid, pattern, fractal, non-Euclidean geometry, chaos theory etc etc.
neoearth, Apr 23 2006
  
      
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