Fundamental Concepts of Architecture : The Vocabulary of Spatial Situations

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By means of staggered spatial layers that are perceptible

as > thresholds, it is possible to generate tension in ways that

heighten meaning. While the path is clearly prescribed when

the threshold lies along an axis towards the centre, it may be-

come unpredictable or even labyrinthine when openings are

offset. In such cases, one may find the threshold leading to the

next spatial layer only after partially circumambulating the

incorporated body. The circling of the centre in a cautious ap-

proach represents a strategy for retarding movement en route

between outside and inside.

Literature: Ungers 1983

> accessibility and exclusivity, cell, furnishing, spatial struc-

ture, territory, residence

You only know ‘that you are dealing with architecture when

it is possible to enter and exit it, and when this possibility of

entering-and-then-exiting is capable of altering circumstanc-

es,’ claims the systems theoretician Dirk Baecker (1990, 83).

To enter and to exit are among the fundamental operations of

interplay between > inside and outside, separation and con-

nection (> screening). In contradistinction to > views into and

out of a building, and to other > openings that serve a rather

secured and guarded relationship to the outside, ingress and

exit are active operations, with all of the associated conse-

quences of surprise and risk.

Like such operations, ingress and exit are characterized

not only by the overcoming of a boundary, but also by the am-

bivalence and contradictory character of these two directions:

inside, and back outside once again. They are implicated with

a far-reaching symbolism of often existential significance.

Ingress and exit are actions for which the same architec-

tural element is generally intended, namely the > door – an

element that functions simultaneously as entrance and exit.

Individual area

Ingress and exit