1st ProofTitle: BA: Architectural Design
Job No: PD0710-67/4028Chapter 3 final (3.4)_.qxd:layouts to chapter one 7/24/10 11:07 AM Page 132
Development and detailThe design projectWhat’s the best way you’ve found to retain conceptual
clarity in a project like the opera house?
Kjetil Thorsen
By a new word we have invented: simplexity. Maintaining
conceptual ideas is to put up a set of rules that everyone
follows up to a certain point. We had an intention in the
Opera never to have more than three materials meet in a
detail. If you use a material, use it to its largest extent but try
to reduce the use of any other materials. The form might be
complex, but the way you solve the form might be simpler.
Craig Dykers
Certain parts of the project may have to be diminished in
one way or another to allow other parts to grow, depending
on where you’re putting your emphasis. If you don’t think
through that idea wisely in the very early stages of the
project, the whole thing can fold because there’s simply
not enough traction in all the different materials and choices
to allow the project to move forwards.
Kjetil Thorsen
Also not trying to put all your ideas into every project.
Limiting yourself to the development of long-term design
issues is more important and that gets easier as you mature.Project: Norwegian National
Opera and Ballet
Location: Oslo, Norway
Architect: Snøhetta
Date: 2008
above:
Main theatre with the stage curtain
designed by artist Pae White to give
a three-dimensional appearance to
a flat woven textile.
right:
Plan and long section of the opera
theatre set in its immediate context.Text
1st ProofTitle: BA: Architectural Design
Job No: PD0710-67/4028Chapter 3 final (3.4)_.qxd:layouts to chapter one 7/26/10 7:38 AM Page 132