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The most obvious characteristic of Classical architecture is the use of columns, which since the early Renaissance have been systematized into five Orders:. Tuscan, the most elemental and simple.
An order in architecture is a certain assemblage of parts subject to uniform established proportions, regulated by the office that each part has to perform. Coming. These elements of classical architecture include specific Moldings and assemblages of moldings called an Order. An Order is an accepted way of assembling a.
Every great treatise on architecture includes a plate showing how the Five Orders compare. Because each of the Orders has recognizable features critics assume that all an architect has to do is to lift the details of whatever chosen Order out of a book and add it to the set of construction drawings.
It cannot be done! You cannot copy: you find if you do you are caught, a mess remains….. It means hard labour, hard thinking, over every line in all three dimensions and in every joint; and no stone can be allowed to slide. If you tackle it in this way, the Orders belong to you and every stroke, being mentally handled, must become endowed with such poetry and artistry as God has given you.
The Renaissance architect Giacomo Barozzi da Vignola, or Vignola, in his book, Canon of the Five Orders of Architecture puts the proper proportion of pedestal to column to entablature at This was a simplification of the various descriptions of the orders used by previous writers, and its simplicity made it popular.
Most classical architects following Vignola would use these basic proportions. Comparison of Moldings and Columns Click on Graphic to learn about moldings from the master, Brent Hull The moldings used in Georgian homes like Gunston Hall would be sized to fit into this scheme of proportions borrowed from the classical orders.
Main article: Ionic order. The Orders are not a set of hard and fast rules, on the contrary they are liberating, they are like the words and grammar of a language allowing meaningful communication. For this reason Folio publications of ancient architectural treatises or indeed other publications across a wide arena of subjects were often limited to a small print run and have become a great arena for connoisseurs and collectors. The Classical orders of architecture might have become lost to history if it were not for the writings of early scholars and architects. Main article: Doric order. Peter Eisenman in his the End of the Classical had succinctly illustrated this point in his comparison between the meaning and the message 27 fig.
The cornice moldings correspond to the cornice of the entablature. These homes often had a picture rail, and it would be place to correspond to the taenia, a small projecting drip molding separating the architrave from the frieze.
Somewhat below waist level there would be a chair rail, placed at the level of the top of the pedestal. Down by the floorboards we find the base molding at the level of the base of a classical pedestal. The shapes of all these moldings tended to replicate their corresponding part of the column, so the cornice molding will usually have a profile similar to what you could find on the cornice of a Greek temple.
This system enforced a certain amount of proper proportion onto a room. Even a room that was not itself well-proportioned would have a well-proportioned pattern on its walls. The breaks added visual interest to the wall, but this could have been done with these visual stops put anywhere.
By placing them in a pattern that is pleasing the whole room becomes more harmonious. It is common in modern houses for the chair rail to be placed too high. This is either done from ignorance, or because a higher rail better meets the back of a chair. So there may be a practical reason for its placement, it still makes the room seem awkward, rather like the man who has his belt over his belly. It holds his pants up better, but we all think he looks a little foolish.
Or, more commonly today, his pants are below his rear end, which is both awkward and impractical. This whole system of classical orders, borrowed from the Greeks, tends to be multiplied throughout a classical room. The moldings around windows, fireplaces and doorways will bear this imprint.
Today, for the sake of clean lines, simplicity and cost our moldings have been stripped away or reduced to thin strips. I will not argue that this is always wrong, merely that something is lost.
A modern house could make up for this in multiple ways. It could have a two-tone paint job, replicating the division that a chair rail introduces. The white paint of a ceiling could be brought down onto the wall at a level matching a proper cornice, or even to the level of the picture rail. But typically this is not done. Walls are bare, or the visual breaks are lacking in coherence. I have not done justice to this topic so I am going to point you to the best resource I know with regard to the use of moldings in classically proportioned rooms.
This is an audio webinar with a powerpoint presentation accompanying it, put on by Brent Hull. To Top of Page - Classical Orders. To Divine Proportions - Mathematics and Proportions. Close Help. Entering your story is easy to do.
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