Notes on Chapter 5

Patterns of Space


There are two sorts of places those that set our inner forces loose or free and those that constrain them.
A place that is “alive” in Christopher Alexander’s terms is one that conforms to instinctive desires for comfort.

Work and Family

Desires
Children need to feel they belong
Children learn by imitating adults
Children desire to be like their parents and want to see and them in their work
Parents desire to educate their children
Conflict
Women desire to be maternal, do not like being only at work may feel masculine
Men have to deal with children when most tired
Resolution
Design a city that resolves the separation of work and family.

Court yard

Desires
To be under the sky
Sun
Shelter
Flowers/plants
A view onto a larger space
Privacy
Familiarity
Openness
Dislike enclosed spaces
People like gradual transition between inside and outside

To design a courtyard that meets these fundamental desires. If you can you will have created a place where people can feel alive.

A certain amount of stress is necessary to live
Stress resolution is what life is about
And necessary for the creation of quality

The presence of this quality without a name gives the object “goodness”. Natural things have this but it is not dependant on human usefulness – that is natural things have intrinsic value.