Ralph,  We up here in the sticks are known for our common sense, straight
forward, no-nonsense way of life and it is usually borne out in our
buildings.  I don't know what happened with our family farm house, designed
by my gggrandfather in the   1850s.  Mostly it is all straight, clean
lines--like you would expect--except the bedchamber at the top of the
stairs.  It has three 90 degree angles and one gracefully curving wall,
which, of course, leads to a curving wall on the other side which is the
long hall back to another bedchamber.  There were 5 chambers upstairs at
one time, one has been converted to a WC and panty combined when my parents
lived upstairs and my grandmother lived down.  This house is an unusual
design as it was designed to be 2 appartments but not up and down but
rather side by side with a common kitchen and each family using the
chambers upstairs as necessary.  Both families were related--father and son
and wives.  It's a neat old house though--there are 10 finished rooms and 3
unfinished rooms on the third floor.  Ruth






At 9:08 AM -0500 1/10/02, Ralph Walter wrote:
In a message dated 1/9/2002 10:28:01 PM Eastern Standard Time,
[log in to unmask] writes:

I don't quite understand why a void inside the
gigantic sculpture is any different to the void inside
the big rectangular box.  I see lots of wasted space
inside rectilinear buildings ... so why pick on
Frank's non-rectilinear buildings from that aspect.

I walk down lots of long and winding corridors in
rectilinear buildings ... and follow tortuous routes
to reach my destination.  Yet these things function as
buildings in your language?



david,

I don't understand what the difference is either, but I'm afraid it
basically comes down to a highly sophisticated combination of
Neo-Ludditism, professional success envy, and "It looks funny so I don't
like it."  I'd rather have a more rational objection, and there really is
something that bothers me about these buildings being undesignable and
unbuildable without computers. On the other hand, I have no objection to
your Opera House, at least based on the exterior views I've seen.

And yes, the rectilinear boxes function (if not always perfectly, and
admittedly sometimes badly) as buildings in my view.  Somehow, the use of
right angles makes sense to me, and I'm always deeply suspicious of "funny"
(I can't think of the proper name for non-right) angles and curves in
buildings-- they seem arbitrary, capricious  "designer-y" and a pain in the
ass to build and work with-- and I know they're more expensive than boring
right angles.

Call me Stodgy

--
Ruth Barton
[log in to unmask]
Westminster, VT