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into each other’s neighbourhood. The bridge gathers the earth
as landscape around the stream.’ (1953/2008, 150)
Through the empathetic taking up of specific traits of a
place into an architectural > concept, its character becomes
more vivid, i.e. by being concentrated, clarified and supple-
mented. An architectural concept – regardless of whether it
concerns a > landscape, > town planning, or house – may be
derived almost entirely from the articulation of specific local
features. This may involve the sensitive further development
and accentuation of landscape formations and topographi-
cal idiosyncrasies, the alignment along pre-existing built el-
ements, the establishment of connections to existing routes,
and the linking of interior spaces and their utilizations to their
respective exteriors. A structural layout interprets the genius
loci in a commensurate way not solely by incorporating and
adopting measures, forms and materials, but also when it al-
lows local structures to become more conspicuous through
the introduction of contrasts. One element that is powerfully
expressive when it comes to manifesting its relationship to the
local context is the roof; it takes up alignments, reaches into
the space, establishes connections, fuses with the surround-
ings, or sets accents. In the form of a roofscape, it combines
with other groups to echo the surrounding landscape, exag-
gerating aspects of the topography; it can also respond mean-
ingfully to the form of the local territory, however, through a
countermovement.
A prominent positioning with broad views, of the kind
offered by the summit of a hill, becomes an incisive expe-
rience within a locality, one that crowns the summit. The
concave enclosure of a bay is experienced structurally like a
type of amphitheatre, or the tribune character of a sloping
landscape through terracing. A house like the Casa Malaparte
on Capri, which emerges from the cliffs, allows one to live
on or in the rock formation. As a threshold building, Erwin
Heerich’s Lange Galerie in Hombroich stages a delayed en-
trance to the island. Through its spatial reaction to an urban