proportions

=Proportions=



**Proportion** is the relation between elements and a whole, is a correspondence among the measures of the members of an entire work, and of the whole to a certain part selected as standard.

In architecture the whole is not just a building but the set and setting of the site. The things that make a building and its site "well shaped" include the orientation of the site and the buildings on it to the features of the grounds on which it is situated. Light, shade, wind, elevation, choice of materials, all should relate to a standard and say what is it that makes it what it is, and what is it that makes it not something else. Architectural practice has often used proportional systems to generate or the forms considered suitable for inclusion in a building. In almost every building tradition there is a system of mathematical relations which governs the relationships between aspects of the design Generally the goal of a proportional system is to produce a sense of coherence and harmony among the elements of a building.

Sacred Proportions

Among the Gothic, Renaissance, Egyptian, Babylonian, Arab, Greek and Roman traditions; the harmonic proportions, human proportions, cosmological/astronomical proportions and orientations, and various aspects of sacred geometry were all applied as part of the practice of architectural design.

In the design of European cathedrals the necessary engineering to keep the structures from falling down gradually began to take precedence over or at least to have an influence on aesthetic proportions

One aspect of proportional systems is to make them as universally applicable as possible, not just to one application but as a universal ideal statement of the proper proportions. There is a relationship between length and width and height; between length and area and between area and volume.

Vitruvian Proportion



Vitruvius described as the principal source of proportion among the orders the proportion of the human figure. According to Leonardo's notes in the accompanying text, it was made as a study of the proportions of the (male) human body.

Renaissance Orders

The Renaissance tried to extract and codify the system of proportions in the orders as used by the ancients, believing that with analysis a mathematically absolute ideal of beauty would emerge. Brunelleschi in particular studied interactions of perspective with the perception of proportion (as understood by the ancients)

Le Modulor



Based on apparently arbitrary proportions of an "ideal man" (possibly Le Corbusier himself) combined with the golden ratio and Vitruvian Man, Le Modulor was never popularly adopted among architects, but the system's graphic of the stylised man with one upraised arm is widely recognised and powerful