Course Syllabus

Detailing and Sustainability in Scandinavian Architecture

Semester & Location:	Spring 2024 - DIS Copenhagen
Type & Credits:	Elective - 3 credits
Major Disciplines:	Architecture, Design, Interior Architecture
Prerequisite:	None
Corequisite Course (s):	Architecture Design Studio, Architecture Foundations Studio, Urban Design Studio, Urban Design Foundations Studio, Interior Architecture Studio, Interior Architecture Foundations Studio
Faculty:	Angela Gigliotti (she/her), Fabio Gigone (he/him) (current students please reach out to faculty via Canvas Inbox)
Time & Place:	Thu 14:50-17:45 in V10-A33

Course Description

This course focuses on the translation of conceptual design intent into built work, in other words on drawings. The content of the course is placed within a Scandinavian context of detailing and sustainability and the focus will be on the drawing activity, overall on the design process and the implications of detailings' drawing for the design as a whole. Case study assignments and analysis based on Scandinavian buildings will be combined with lectures and field studies to prominent examples in Copenhagen with the aim to produce relevant outcome relevant for the students’ portfolio and own studio projects.

The making of wall sections and application of building products will not be studied - on the contrary, detailing and sustainability are analyzed through a holistic - rather than performative - approach in which the core is only architectural representation. The course will present the concept of detailing, including the materiality, as an integral part of the entire design process as opposed to drawings as an activity reserved for the final project phases; in this frame, a focus will be made on the vectorial representation of detailing and social sustainability as a key strategy to establish good professional practices and to intervene consciously on the living environment. 

Co-requisite

Simultaneous enrollment in a studio core course at DIS, in the disciplines of Architecture, Interior Architecture or Urban Design, at the professional track or foundation level.

Learning Objectives

• To develop an appreciation of detailing as an activity that informs the entire design process and not only the final stages.
• To gain an awareness of the process of translating via architectural drawings conceptual design intent into built work.
• To achieve a basic understanding of sustainable issues, strategies, projects, and processes in Scandinavia

• To work individually towards a collective outcome by being able to give relevant and helpful reviews to peers

• To develop and practice methods of vectorial architectural drawings and representation in order to learn how to communicate personal projects to a wider audience of experts and not in a professional manner.

Faculty

Angela Gigliotti (she/her/hers)

Ph.D. (Aarhus School of Architecture, 2020). M.Sc. (Building Architecture, Polytechnic University of Milan, 2011). Visiting Ph.D. Candidate (Architectural Association, School of Architecture, U.K., 2018). Teaching Assistant, Polytechnic University of Milan, Italy, 2010-13, and at NMBU University in Ås, Norway, 2014-15. Under the field of the architectural history of practices, research interests include labor, professionalism, diplomatic architecture and the welfare state. She has been awarded by Carlsbergsfondet as the HM Queen Margrethe II’s Distinguished Postdoctoral Fellow at the Danish Academy in Rome (ETH Zürich and Aarhus School of Architecture, 2021-2024). Beyond academia, Co-Director of the research-based practice OFFICE U67 ApS . With DIS since 2016.

Fabio Gigone (he/him/his)

Ph.D. (The Royal Danish Academy / Excellence Centre for Privacy Studies at the University of Copenhagen, 2023). Degree in Architecture (IUAV Venice, Italy, 2007). Under the field of History and Theory of Architecture, his research converges on Early Modern Architecture in Northern Europe. Adjunct Professor at ISIA Urbino - School of Graphic Design, Italy (2009-12); Associate Professor at NMBU University in Ås, Norway (2015-18); Unit Faculty at Aarhus School of Architecture, Denmark (2015-2018). Academic Guest at the Institut für Geschichte und Theorie der Architektur, ETH Zürich, Switzerland (2020-21). He has been awarded by Carlsbergsfondet as the International Postdoctoral Fellow at the Danish Academy in Rome and ETH Zürich (2024-2025). Beyond academia, he served as editor of the Instructions and Manuals section of Abitare magazine (2007-10); co-founder of San Rocco Magazine (since 2010); and as Creative Director of Domus magazine (2011-12). He is co-Director of the research-based practice OFFICE U67 ApS. With DIS since 2021.

Readings on Reserve in the DIS Library

Practice 

• Ford, Edward R. The Details of Modern Architecture. MIT Press, 1998.
• Gigliotti, Angela and Rugbjerg, Troels Utzonia: From / To Denmark with Love. ListLab Publisher, 2020.
• Tsukamoto, Yoshiharu, and Momoyo Kaijima. Graphic Anatomy. Toto, 2009.

Theory

• Frampton, Kenneth. Studies in Tectonic Culture: the Poetics of Construction in Nineteenth and Twentieth-Century Architecture. 2001.

• Beim, Anne. Tectonic Visions in Architecture.: Bearbejdet Og Revideret Udgave Af Phd: Tectonic Visions in Architecture, Kunstakademiets Arkitektskole 1998. Kunstakadmiets Arkitektskole, 2004. Focus on: “Tectonics in Architecture” pp. 49-65 and “Ideal Visions” pp. 27-47

• Ford, Edward R. The Architectural Detail. Princeton Architectural Press, 2011. Focus on: "The Architectural Detail" pp. 287-313 and pp. 17-47 

In addition, pertinent materials will be uploaded to DIS Canvas during the semester as: 

• Gigone, Fabio, et al. “Instructions and Manuals” Column within Abitare, n. 475-496 RCS Publisher Spa, 2007-2010.
• Centis, Ludovico; Gigliotti, Angela and Gigone, Fabio,  “Foresturbia: manual for a landscaped city", 2018.

Course Details

Representation as a language

Starting from the assumption that everything could be represented, the question is understanding how. Technically speaking, a good representation is obtained through what is called “Ensuring perception.” In other terms, we have to ensure that what we show is perceived as we intended. The question to pose to ourselves is “who will read our illustrations?” Representing architecture (more than other subjects) is probably the most emblematic issue related to the history of representation in general. The architecture has always been both an art (related with aesthetics) and a science (building) and during the time has increasingly boosted its own complexity.

That means if we want to keep and describe the inner complexity in architecture (but even for other subjects) we have to use a more abstract approach, asking to the representations to solve the increase of complexity of the concrete phenomenon in front of us. In this context, the Drawing as a tool assumes a central role in the representation: only the translation into a vector graphic helps to look how the architecture works internally, therefore managing the complexity may give it understandable to the readers.

Like in every system of communication, even in the graphic representation of architecture the idea of what the information is, remains the first issue to clarify and know. The corresponding ancient greek words were μορφςh and εiδοςb: form and idea. So in the representation, the information is nothing more than the essence of a content transmitted by a sign or a group of signs. There’s a flimsy symbiosis and balance between the signs (here lines, annotations, texts, everything part of the drawing) and their meaning or content: to allow this symbiosis to emerge is the main task for a good work on representation.

Learning analogically but represent digitally

Another important issue to be conscious of is the difference between the analog and digital approach within visualization and detailing techniques, inasmuch it has completely changed the learning process in the recent past. Historically, the tradition of detailing has been related to the ability of an architect to enrich and give a value and a meaning in the architecture itself while today the detailing has the risk to become simply a technological answer and solution to presentational demands. In parallel, the learning processes, particularly in the realm of architecture, are influenced by the evolution of the digital media and reflect an indirect transmission of the knowledge. Our mind is shaped organizing its capability to learn following the way in which the new media work. During the course the pedagogical approach will take in account how to deal with this transformation (from analogical to digital) to exploit it and make effective its own role without being affected by a loss of learning structure.

Detailing – the art of making

An architectural concept inherently contains the intention to make something. Making architecture involves joining elements together into a meaningful whole. Making architecture is mute without the ability to communicate ideas through architectural drawings. Once drawn the joints are details and can be thought of as the transformation of the architectural concept into built work. Without the representation, the architectural concept remains an abstract thought, which does not fully enter the realm of architecture (making).

The details are likewise dependent upon the concept, and without the concept, they would be a meaningless collection of technical solutions. As in any transformation process, new information and ideas will emerge during the process that may call for an adjustment or revision of the original concept. Detailing is therefore not only the pure implementation/execution of an idea but an integral part of the entire design process. 

Within this frame, sustainability forces architects to integrate conscious strategies in the building detailing as crucial parts of design considerations and to widen the contextual design approach to surrounding environments.

Scandinavian detailing

There are certain tacit universal tools and qualities to the art of making that are shared by any designer of architecture. There must, however, also be particular qualities of making that are characteristic of a given place, time, and culture. This course will focus on detailing in Scandinavia framing the modern (XXth century) and contemporary time periods. We will examine conceptual aspects, technical factors, material sensibilities, cultures, and sustainability, as they have formed and are manifested in Scandinavian architecture. 

Contextual awareness

An examination of detailing in a Scandinavian context should generate an awareness of the importance of contextuality for the creation of architecture. In a world where design frequently takes place outside the designer’s ‘home’ context, it is critical to be aware of the phenomenon. It is also important to develop a method of understanding context in order to allow architecture to have universal meaning, as well as to serve a specific place and people. Even the communication is specifically referred and included in a particular cultural and social context, which should be understood in order to sift through and evaluate the significance of each piece of information present in a document.

Approach to Teaching

Learning will happen through a combination of lectures, intensive case study work, student presentations, field study visits and in-class workshops.  The goal is to combine objective learning and technical knowledge with reflection on the implications of this knowledge through personal interpretation and dialogue in the classroom. Questions and opinions will always be welcome in order to foster a classroom environment open to discussion and interpretation and will count towards participation. 

The course is organized into two modules and it is based on hands-on learning where the city itself acts as the classroom. The first module presents crucial issues for detailing and its representation developed through an analysis of brick as a material and the editing of architectural magazines as case studies. The second module concern sustainability, specifically social sustainability, in its wider discourse understood through a context-specific approach. A cross-scale approach diving into Scandinavian and European contemporary case studies will be deployed. 

The practical in-class workshop "PIMP MY BUILDING!" will be divided into two assignments: the first one is meant to represent, approach, and problematize the state of the art of the assigned building; while, the second one is meant to propose a “pimped” version of the same building using sustainable strategies.

Both assignments will be realized through a combination of in-class work and homework. Students are asked to develop the outcome as a teamwork. Teams made of 2-4 students will produce one single outcome for each assignment; however, it is the individual contribution to such outcome that will be graded.

The collection of each team-based outcome will generate a collective class-outcome useful to analysis Danish architecture of the 20th century. Such semester-outcome is collective and developed by all the students and will constitute part of an ongoing compilation on Scandinavian detailing, authored by the students of the current and future semesters and edited by the instructors. 

Expectations

Students must be well-prepared for each class, and participate actively in discussions. The course often requires reflection on the relationship of solutions to students’ backgrounds and own design works. The students should be eager to learn out of their comfort zones how to represent architecture through vectorial drawings in a professional manner but also how to communicate their projects in future occasion of dissemination (as portfolio, publications and so on). Students are expected to participate actively in the presentation sessions through constructive criticism and dialogue.

Field Studies and/or Study Tour

Two field study visits will be organized:

• The "Danish detailing tour" in Copenhagen to selected prominent buildings, among the others also the chosen case study that students will analyze and pimp in the new sustainable version; 
• The second field study will be organized in a prominent sustainable contemporary practice and projects in Copenhagen, encouraging learning by meeting some Danish practicers;

In addition to that, a seminar in relation to sustainability titled with guests from practice and a "brick" excursion in which it will be encouraged learning by experience with sketching on-site;

Evaluation

Faculty will evaluate students on their ability to understand the technical concepts presented as well as interpret them meaningfully. The execution of the case study drawings as well as detailing the students’ own work and participation are primary focuses in evaluations. Coherency and precision of in-class presentations of case studies and own studio work will also be taken into account. The outcome of the Asn 1-2 is a collective work in which the contribution of each student is essential, therefore, the student’s ability to contribute to the class effort will be taken into account for the participation grade.

Grading

Assignment	Percent
Pimp my building: State of the Art  (Asn 1) / Each team needs to represent a number of details about an assigned case study	40%
Pimp my building: Future Strategies (Asn 2) / Using the materials of the Asn 1 each team will re-elaborate new sustainable details	40%
Participation / Demonstrating active individual participation both in class and on field studies	20%

Academic Regulations

• Please make sure to read the Academic Regulations on the DIS website. There you will find regulations on: 

  • Course Enrollment and Grading  
  • Academic Expectations and Honor Code 

DIS - Study Abroad in Scandinavia - www.DISabroad.org