343The concept of type plays a productive role in architec-
ture, however, when it is understood in such a way that within
it, a certain constructive-spatial structure is coupled formulai-
cally with a specific spatial experience through aesthetic and
experiential concentration. Through this coupling, typology
goes beyond morphology. In this context, a type is not neces-
sarily represented by the building as a whole, but perhaps
through individual characteristic spatial combinations. The
arcade, for example, represents a form of transition between
inside and outside, the atrium, a specific relationship of the out-
side interior, and the > gallery a certain interpenetration of up-
per and lower. Types that express fundamental human concep-
tions of space and figures of action in primordial gestures, so to
speak (archetypes), possess a special and highly generalizable
potential for meaning that can be actualized again and again.
Most types developed historically out of customary us-
ages, craft skills used in building, and regional roots, but
their specific original meanings have become overlaid mul-
tiply through the course of history by changes of function,
and have meanwhile devolved towards a kind of open-ended
historical significance. Today, type is identified primarily with
a characteristic spatial figure and an associated and typical
form of spatial experience that characterizes, for example, the
type of the columned hall, the rotunda, or the patio. In this
sense, the type must be opposed to the type of utilization; it
is not a functional programme. Instead, it characterizes an in-
cisive schema, one that demonstrates a high degree of adapt-
ability and openness precisely through the union of a certain
gestalt potential with a characteristic structure of movement,
a > capacity that makes it possible to attach continually new
realizations and meanings to the framework provided by this
distinctive stamp. Aldo Rossi mentions the Palazzo della Ra-
gione as a favourite example, a type one encounters in Padua
and other towns in northern Italy. With its open > portico
at ground level and the large vaulted hall above, and by af-
fecting a union between the two components, with their con-