Domus 1061 October 2021

Next, in the Essays, architecture critic and historian Irénée Scalbert writes about how buildings designed by architects need to be seen, need to be looked at and admired, and yearn to be photographed and publicized. Next, Valter Scelsi writes about the work of Swiss master Peter Zumthor. “What the classicism of the architect evoked by Zumthor suggests to us is twofold: on the one hand, the work of composing a work can be seen as a simple inference, on the other hand, it can be understood as something that acts through a form of resonance, a sort of progressive involvement”.

The first part of the Architecture section is dedicated to the work of Amateur Architecture Studio. Introducing the studio, Professor David Leatherbarrow decides to analyze the National Archives in Hangzhou as one of the best expressions of their work. Here the movement along the boundary lines between hills and bodies of water unites the different buildings that make up the National Archives. In fact, on the site, these two natural elements alternate and, articulated and accentuated by the buildings, now seem, in retrospect, to have provided the project with its primary structure.