252 pp, ill. b.n.

Foreword, Gian Luigi Maffei, University Of Florence - Building Interpretation And Isuf, J.W.R. Whitehand - University Of Birmingham - Introduction, Anne Vernez Moudon, University Of Washington - Preamble, Gianfranco Caniggia, First Part - Introduction: Motives And Propositions - The Crisis In Building Production And Teaching - Specification Of Terminology And Basic Definitions Consciousness - Spontaneous Consciousness - Critical Consciousness - Yield - Type - Building Type - Typological Process - Phase - Second Part - Interpreting Building Structure - Building As An Historical Individuation (Spatial And Temporal) Of The Typological Process, From Elementary Matrixes To Complex Derivations Interpretation - Co-Presence - Derivation - Surveying Aggregations For Degrees Of Organicity - Serial - Organic - Scalar Components Of Built Objects - Elements - Structures - Systems - Organism - Critical-Operative Formative Characteristics Of The Evolution Of Building On Four Concurrent Dimensional Scales, Coinciding With Four Moments-Phases Of Progressive Understanding Of The Human Environment - Buildings As Individuations Of Building Types Diachronic And Diatopic Diversification Of Typological Processes - Synchronic Variants - Basic Building Types - Row Houses And In-Line Houses - Law Of Successive Doubling - Pertinent Area - Mature Row House - Progression Of Row Types - Base Type - Level Of Specificity - Characteristics Of The Base Type - Antecedents Of The Base Type - Elementary Cell - Growth Of The Type: Specialization Of Rooms And Functions - Interpretation Of Different Typological Processes: Genoa, Florence And Rome - Distinction Between Basic Building And Specialized Building - Typological Series - Type, Building, Model - Dialectic Between Building And Type: Identifying The Level Of Specificity - Aggregates As Individuations Of Typical TissuesAggregate - Urban Tissue - Basic Tissue And Specialized Tissues - Routes - Modularity Of Tissue - Built Lot - Pertinent Strip - Nodality And Polarity - Building Along A Matrix Route - Building Along A Planned Building Route - Building Along A Connecting Route - Block - Contrada - Base Tissue - Break-Through Route - Infill Building - Infill Tissue - Tissues Of Como, Genoa, Rome And Florence. - Settlement And Urban Organism As Individuation Of Typical Connections Between Aggregates - Settlement Organism - Urban Organism - Settlement - Proto-Urban Nucleus - Urban Nucleus - Base Settlement Organism - Periphericity And Centrality - Elementary Urban Nucleus - Hierarchy Of Urban Routes - Centralizing And Dividing Axes - Intersections Between Nodal Axes And Punctiform Nodalities. Dialectic Between Counter-Radial Boundaries And Axes - Doubling Of The Urban Organism - Role Of Buildings And Specialized Tissues In The Urban Organism - Hierarchies Induced By Urban Axes And Poles: Examples Of Rome, Genoa And Florence - Examples Of Modular Urban Growth: Rome, Genoa And Florence. - Territorial Organism As The Individuation Of Typical Connections Between Route, Settlement, Productive And Urban Organisms Route - Settlement - Production - Proto-Urban And Urban Centers - First Cycle: Plan -First Phase- Ridge-Top Route - Second Phase - Secondary Ridge-Top Routes - Promontory Settlements - Third Phase - Local Cross-Ridge Route - Position Of Proto-Urban Center - Continuous Cross-Ridge Routess - Fourth Phase - Synthetic Cross-Ridge Routes - Position Of Urban Center - Improper Synthetic Cross-Ridge Routes - Valley Bottom - Second Cycle: Consolidation - First Phase - Main Valley Bottom Routes - Second Phase - Third Phase - Fourth Phase - Third Cycle: System Recovery - Fourth Cycle: Restructuring - Territorial Type - Territorial Typological Process - Base Territorial Type - Relatively Impassable Limits - Cultural Area - Increasing Scalar Dimensions Of An Area - Relationship Between Cultural Area And Territorial Type - Territorial Typological Process - Territorial Organism Modularity. - Conclusions: How Historic-Typological Interpretation Of The Environment Actually Works - Critical Glossa, Nicola Marzot
This volume codifies the method to read building structures that have appeared in the past at "spontaneous awareness" level in a progression of scalar sizes ranging from buildings and clusters of buildings to urban organisms and the territory. Focusing on past architecture is the field of "process classification" that is the key to using history in working as architects in the modern world. We wish to extract the laws of behaviour, formation and mutation of manmade structuring on the various scales of man's work as we consider this knowledge to be the only possible solution to the architectural crisis that has dragged on for over two centuries. It results in planning based on reviving the tradition of "producing" building not as dogmatic adaptation to past building methods but intended to contemporaneously fit our work into the continuity of laws and behaviour codified in our cultural area; these laws can only be understood and consequently used as an effective reference system by carefully reading the built environment that surrounds us.