Architecture is Awesome #27: Asymmetry

 

Fallingwater (photo by Sxenko via Wikimedia used under the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.2)

 
This is another in my series of posts inspired by 1000 Awesome Things, the Webby Award-winning blog written by Neil Pasricha. The series is my meditation on the awesome reasons why I was and continue to be attracted to the art of architecture. 
 
Most consider asymmetry to be the absence of formal symmetry within a composition or whole. While it may suggest the opposite of symmetry—that is, the quality of being made up of similar parts facing each other on or around an axis—in fact asymmetry may itself be comprised of localized symmetries and strong centers, balanced with complementary weighting across axes that may not be evident straight away. In architectural usage, asymmetry evokes dynamism and movement, but also acknowledges the real-life nature of buildings—the multiplicity of functions they accommodate and the specifics of the physical settings of which they are a part.
 
When designing a building, architects typically strive to achieve order and balance within its overall composition. Whereas large symmetry offers a simple means to attain a classical, structured sense of order, the use of asymmetry as a compositional device requires greater skill and a more sophisticated understanding of wholeness and balance. Executed well, asymmetrical buildings display a harmony of contrasts that signify both a balance and a free-flowing tension between competing forces.
 
Architects strategically use compositional counterpoints to achieve balance within their asymmetric designs. When viewed from different perspectives, the visual weighting may vary significantly and at first appear unbalanced. For example, a building may feature a large, solid form at one side and many smaller, transparent components on another; however, a successful asymmetric design coheres seemingly unbalanced elements into a pleasing whole.
 
Both the Katsura Imperial Villa in Kyoto and the Sydney Opera House are examples of asymmetrical designs. Katsura is noteworthy because you cannot appreciate the whole of its built form from a single vantage point; instead, its asymmetric composition requires viewing from multiple vistas and active participation with its beautiful garden, and yet its wholeness is not in question. The Opera House exhibits numerous local symmetries within an overall geometry that is asymmetric. The local symmetries occur through a broad range of scales, displaying a correspondence between them by means of analogous forms and patterns that express a common origin.
 

Katsura Imperial Villa (photo by KimonBerlin, CC BY-SA 2.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0>, via Wikimedia Commons)

 

Sydney Opera House (photo byLenny K Photography from Sydney, Australia, CC BY 2.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0>, via Wikimedia Commons)

 
Frank Lloyd Wright’s Fallingwater is another excellent example of asymmetry in architecture. Like the Katsura Villa, it is incomplete without its physical setting. We consider Fallingwater a masterpiece in part for its exquisite balance between the asymmetrical forms of the house and the site that envelops it.
 
Robert Venturi argued that an architecture of complexity and accommodation does not forsake the whole. Instead, the whole is dependent on the position, number, and inherent characteristics of the parts. When designing buildings, architects most often must consider a host of complex, asymmetrical forces demanding accommodation of a multiplicity of functions. Ideally, the whole that results from their efforts is more than the sum of its parts. A successful design favors a difficult unity through inclusion (asymmetry) rather than an easy unity through exclusion (thoughtless symmetry).
 
At the most cosmic and consequential level, the thermodynamic arrow of time itself is asymmetrical. In a sense, architecture that is expressively asymmetric is more representative of life and the laws of nature than that which is strictly symmetrical. Symmetry abounds in nature, but upon close inspection it also reveals asymmetry at all scales. As Christopher Alexander posited, perfect symmetry is often a mark of death in things rather than life. In complex wholes, there are nearly always asymmetrical forces at work that require symmetry to be broken.
 
In a nutshell, the successful application of asymmetry in architecture boils down to balance and a harmonious relationship of parts to the whole. It may be counterintuitive to think of asymmetry and symmetry as two sides of the same coin, but they can be. Rather than being a mark of inequality or a lack of equivalence between parts, architects can utilize asymmetry with AWESOME effect, to design buildings and places that are balanced, visually dynamic, and expressive of wholeness and life.
 
 
Next Architecture is Awesome:  #28 Creation is a Patient Search