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Discussed the overlap of architecture and urban design.

For each post write at least 50 words response, agree, disagree, question, add thoughts etc.

History of Planning Response (Based on the movie ) : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cag7q8QlHY4

The film was made in 1939 and is a plea for American cities to adopt urban planning techniques to better develop their cities. The film features a lot of very vivid and photography and video as a means to be able to get their message across to the viewers. They narrator talks about how the church and the town hall were the first important structures that were developed in the city which is a theme that can be seen in the history of planning and the development of any city or town. The narrator also discusses the harmony between the agriculture and the city and the balance that it created, even stating “we never let our cities grow to large to manage”, this is very similar to what I have witnessed by living in Sri Lanka where they try their best to ensure that the growth of certain areas never come to the point where they will harm the agricultural development of the country. The industrial revolution seems to affect the city in the movie drastically and the film uses very strong imagery to depict, it shows us the damage of there being no forms of zoning or corporate responsibility so the industrial factories being built right next to the residential areas of the city causes a large amount of damage physically and psychologically to the city, this is similar to all countries that went through a similar industrial revolution such as England. The film overall depicts some of the first problems that arose with no planning control during economic growth and its good to know that due to planners like this ideas such as zoning and other planning control ideas came into play to make life better in the future.
Urban Design Response :

In unit 3, we discussed the overlap of architecture and urban design. In certain situations, architecture boils down to urban design. When the context of the area is respected and not changed because of a building the architecture forms into urban design. In this situation, the details of how the street aligns with the building, the way the floor is incorporated with the building, and the relationship between the style of design of the overall space with the newly designed building all affect how this new architectural addition can transform into urban design.
The issue of foreground and background buildings was also addressed in this unit. No architect would want to be told that his or her design was going to be used as a backdrop for the main focus of the city. Everyone wants their work noticed and celebrated but if everyone’s designs were put on a pedestal the entire concept of being in awe of the designs that are on the pedestal would be diminished. Every architect wants the job to create a building for the foreground because they want the freedom of expression and the attention of the audience, which is the public in this scenario.
The concept of unified diversity was very interesting to me because it is not something you automatically realize when you think of the architecture and design of a city. Obviously there is always a certain style to the design of the buildings in a city, but what is not as obvious are the subtle changes that are made in order to keep the style interesting to the public eye. When keeping with the context of the design in a city, the architects use similar scale and massing, materials, and detailing to preserve the same style.

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