Unified Architectural Theory: Form, Language, Complexity - Softcover

I taught a course on architectural theory, organized so that external students could follow much of it online from wherever they were located.  Even those students who had no access to the textbooks could still learn a great deal about the basic concepts from my notes summarizing the reading material. Altogether, this material represents a new and ultimately more intelligent approach to understanding architecture. My Weekly Lecture Notes included here summarize and comment on the principal arguments from the reading assignments, which were revised after the class discussed the content in a roundtable manner. The focus was on a Unified Architectural Theory, which includes and describes all of architecture, from traditional buildings to the latest design trends currently in fashion. More importantly, this comprehensive theoretical framework is based upon science and not on personal opinion. The theory is testable and has predictive value. The unified theoretical framework is practical, original, entirely general, and applies directly to cutting-edge design. Students by the end of the course could judge what makes a "good" building, not only for its adaptation to human use, but also from the point of view of being able to learn something from it. Is it functional and emotionally satisfying, and does it contribute to elevating the quality of life of its users? (From the Preface).

We are on the threshold of a new way of thinking about, learning, and practicing architecture. Ready to abandon design based on often-irrelevant images for a more meaningful paradigm, we find answers in combining timeless truths with recent scientific results. These explain how architecture can re-attach itself to nature.
"'Unified Architectural Theory' is not theory at all. It is evidence. It lets us see how until recently we have always designed and built. We've built buildings and spaces and towns that reflect the order in our genes, in the biological world we're part of. We've felt at home in them because their order makes space for our body and our soul. Now we rediscover how to build a world that does not alienate us from who we are, a world that gives us joy, a world that brings us home." -- Dr. Ir. Jaap Dawson, Technical University Delft.
"The information that I have learned in this one class has been more important than almost all the rest of my classes combined." -- Jacob LeMieux, University of Texas.