The aperiodic grid

There comes a time in the evolution of a building form when we must forget the context, the plan, even turn our back on these things, and focus only on the pure beauty of the structural order, the building as a thing of beauty in itself.
That means that for a time we become almost irresponsible, we forget practical matters temporarily, and we focus on the structural order — walls, columns, beams, vaults — as a three-dimensional object which evokes feeling through its geometric order alone, almost as if it were pure sculpture. It is the arrangement and shapes, of the structural order alone, which comes to the fore — and we focus on the question, whether this structural order, in itself, is beautiful enough to move us, as a whole, purely by virtue of its geometric force.
This is focused on beauty. It is brutal, only because, to do it, we must forget our responsibilities and the subtleties of site and function, and enter the play of pure forms with as much emphasis on feeling, art, and structure alone as we can.
This geometric substance that I call the brutal order comes, in fact, from the need to allow a certain regular rhythm of members to arise within an irregular envelope, because it is fitted to irregular circumstances. In the sequence of development, once we have a rough idea of plan, shape, size, and volume, we must then “grow” from this rough idea a regular packing of columns, walls, beams and structural bays which is regular enough to be a sound engineering structure, to have good horizontal behavior, good disposition of loads. And, inevitably, from this need, we will arrive at a system of rectangular bays, more or less regular, yet imperfectly so — more or less repeated — yet fitted to the irregularities of the site, variation of room size, and quirks of individual position. This cannot be done by an additive process. It can only be done — as a practical matter — by trying to cover the whole plan as accurately as possible with a nearly regular grid, squeezed, distorted just enough to cover the peculiarities and necessities of plan.
The work starts with the attempt to find grid lines (not spaced with perfect regularity, but spaced to fit the usual imperfections of plan) pushed into slight variations that fit the irregularities, so that the grid as a whole has an overall simple coherence. The resulting regular-irregular, tartan-like grid is what I call the “aperiodic” grid.
The gist of the process, what I call the formal or brutal process, lies in the use of very simple geometry, first introduced with force, after one makes sure that the inspiration has arisen from the place, and from the introduction, then, of just enough syncopation into the order, so that it truly fits the necessities of site and place and time, without doing violence to them.

#book/The Nature of Order/2 The process of creating life/15 Emergence of formal geometry#