Customer Reviews

Points + Lines: Diagrams and Projects for the City

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This book contains some of the more useful thoughts published on diagrams to date. Although many architects frequently refer to diagrams as a methodology, Stan Allen has made them one of the focal points of his work. This book and his lectures often excite controversy over the way in which architects use diagrams. Diagrams have a kind of potential energy which can be interpreted in a number of ways to generate a piece of architecture. The book Points + Lines introduces ideas with which every student should be familiar and which each architect should address. Stan Allen makes a refreshingly clear delivery of his ideas in a contemporary architecture culture of overcomplication, vacant formalism, and thoughtless commercial production. We can only hope that the author's relatively young age will privelege us with the production of more written work.

This book addresses a universal question in regards to understanding and, more importantly, presenting an abstract, yet more comprehensible reference between architecture and other contextual elements. Stan Allen proposes that they are all fractions of a common system, the most complex order of `the city' in this case. He has eloquently woven various aspects of these manifold connections through his writings, and validated them in extremely stimulating diagrams. The results are projects that are filters for seeing figures of architecture in exchange with the background of the city. Architecture is complicated; not by itself, but because it is a component in a complicated network. This condition in the city can be manipulated by (and through) architecture--in the form (and force) of a point, other times of a line, but most of the time both.

Stan Allen is a rare architect today in that he maintains both a theoretical and built practice. Points + Lines contains a series of articulate, clearly written essays, loosely paired with projects that explore his theoretical position on architecture and its relation with the contemporary city. This book which is essentially a monograph of architectural writings and projects that confirm the viability of an architecture that encompases both theory and practice simultaneously.

I got this book since I was attendding my first semester in graduate school. The book helps me find ways to communicate thoughts and ideas in architecture. I did research parallel to the architectural design process. Diagrams and text from the book was articulately showing a possibility to use the information for exchange. Diagrams and drawing techniques help me to weave the complex thoughts, information and propose further the other potential dimensions.

This book addresses a universal question in regards to understanding and, more importantly, presenting an abstract, yet more comprehensible reference between architecture and other contextual elements. Stan Allen proposes that they are all fractions of a common system, the most complex order of `the city' in this case. He has eloquently woven various aspects of these manifold connections through his writings, and validated them in extremely stimulating diagrams. The results are projects that are filters for seeing figures of architecture in exchange with the background of the city. Architecture is complicated; not by itself, but because it is a component in a complicated network. This condition in the city can be manipulated by (and through) architecture--in the form (and force) of a point, other times of a line, but most of the time both.

In Points and Lines the boundaries between theoretical approach and architectural project are blurred in favor of a critical practice of architecture. Allen's book supersedes mere speculation, addressing truly operative architectural ideas. The set of projects indeed prove the interest of the essays included in this book: the emphasis on the need for a fixed infrastructure, and the potentials embedded in them as collective and social space, beyond public or private categories, the possibilities of diagrams and maps that question traditional architectural representation, etc. Allen's projects explore the performative aspects of architecture, but do not avoid a careful formalization.

I got this book since I was attendding my first semester in graduate school. The book helps me find ways to communicate thoughts and ideas in architecture. I did research parallel to the architectural design process. Diagrams and text from the book was articulately showing a possibility to use the information for exchange. Diagrams and drawing techniques help me to weave the complex thoughts, information and propose further the other potential dimensions.

I got this book since I was attendding my first semester in graduate school. The book helps me find ways to communicate thoughts and ideas in architecture. I did research parallel to the architectural design process. Diagrams and text from the book was articulately showing a possibility to use the information for exchange. Diagrams and drawing techniques help me to weave the complex thoughts, information and propose further the other potential dimensions.

Stan Allen�fs �gPoints and Lines�h explores architectural design methods after post modern and deconstruction. His architectural and urban design in the book clearly show the contemporary problems and his unique approach to the problems. Although many of the theoretical issues are implicated, they are expressed through his design process. In addition, his comprehensive research out of architecture gives us fresh viewpoints. Therefore I think, the book is useful not only for architects and students, but also for people who are interested in cultural issues generally. Even in Singapore whose culture is different from the US, many architects and students are enjoying this book.

Stan Allen is one of the self-styled theorists who see architecture and urbanism as an abstract set of geometries, Allen fails to understand that most cities are living organisms and that relationships and form are pointless without comprehending the viltal, human function. Anyone who has experienced the great urban spaces of Italy or Paris will know that urban design is not a graphic exercise. Allen's lacks the mental facility to adress this component of design and his diagrams are more ignorant that one can imagine. This book is rubbish of the very worst sort. - Recommend you read Jane Jacobs 'Life and Death of Great American Cities' instead.