Topic > Analysis of Christopher Alexander's book "The Timeless Way of Building"

“Architecture should speak of its time and place, but aspire to timelessness.” (Frank Ghery) Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an original essayOne of the most interesting treatises of Christopher Alexander is "The Timeless Way of Building", first published in 1979. The author of the book Christopher Alexander himself is an architect. As well as an architect, he is a lover of mathematics and science. He received his childhood education in science and after earning his bachelor's degree in architecture, he continued his education and earned a master's degree in mathematics and then a PhD in architecture from Harvard University. As an architect he sought beauty and in the 1960s he attempted to seek a "vision of design", how to design, what to design and how science and mathematics contribute to design. He felt the need for a theory that supported the “design vision” from which the product can be obtained. He researched that theory and presented it in his book “Timeless Way of Building”. Christopher sought an architecture for man that is made of the proportion between nature, building materials and context and that is an extension of nature. It's about how nature stabilizes itself beautifully and poetically through natural processes. The way used by nature is stable while nature itself continuously changes depending on the changing situations. He suggested that construction should also grow like nature and that the growth of construction depends on the “lives of the inhabitants” and not on the principles of construction. When this “life” is happy, free and at peace, then it makes man capable of becoming part of the place as much as the place becomes part of the man. The book is framed in an unusual architectural text in which Alexander describes his concept in titles that provide an overview of his entire theory and then a detailed description added under the titles. It provides a poetic point of view of the built environment in a precise and concrete way. His theory is based on the linguistic model used to discuss and create architecture. This language model is the main core of the book, outlined in chapters 1 to 10 and supported by specific examples for better understanding. Black and white photographic illustrations and thumbnail sketches are used throughout the book, some of which are given references while others are just visual representations to support the text. The book is organized into “three parts” and each part explores many theories. Part of the book consists of "complexity theory", part is related to "architecture and urban planning theory" and part is a "spiritual treatise". In the introductory part of the book Alexander described that there is only one way of building that is "timeless" and this way is more essential and indispensable. The timeless building never ages with the passage of time but the more it ages the more it adds value, sustains itself and grows according to the circumstances with the passage of time. Three parts of the book are called “The Quality”, “The Door” and “The Way”. In the initial part he defined the nameless and indefinable but existing and still recognizable quality. This quality is self-generated and cannot be created. The building with this nameless quality should not be separable from nature but be part of it. The nameless quality does not mean that it is ambiguous or non-specific, but this quality gives the feeling of being alive, as a whole, comfortable, egoless, as eternal and free. None of these individually defines the quality but collectively gives the nameless quality that frees people from conflicts.