The tallest chimney in the world is the one at the Ekibastuz power station in Kazakhstan. It reaches 1377 feet, or 420 metres and tapers from 144 feet (47 metres) at its base, up to 47 feet, or 14 metres at the top. This is the world’s largest coal-fired plant which came into operation in 1991.

Image via Wikipedia

Image via Wikipedia

Second in the list of the world’s tallest chimneys is the one at the International Nickel Company, Cooper Hill, Sudbury, Ontario, Canada. The Inco superstack at the Inco copper cliff smelter is 1250 feet (381 metres) tall.

Next is Homer City Generating Station Unit 3, at Minersville, Pennsylvania, USA. This is a coal-burning power station owned by Edison International and the largest of its chimneys reaches a height of 1216 feet (371 metres).

Kennecott Copper Corporation, Magna, Utah, USA, is part of the Rio Tinto group. It operates the largest open mining copper mines in the world and was formed in 1898. The name Kennecott was first used in 1936. The tallest chimney reaches 1215 feet (370 metres).

The Mitchell Power Plant at Moundsville, West Virginia, USA comes in as the fifth tallest chimney stack in the world. This power plant was built in 1971 and at that time the smokestack was the highest in the world but that claim to fame has now been superceded and although it is 1206 feet (368 feet) high, it is now the fifth tallest in the world.

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At number six comes the Zasavje power station at Trbovlje, Slovenia which was built in 1974. It reaches 1181 feet (360 metres) and close behind in the list is the Endesa Termic at La Coruna, Spain which reaches a height of 1169 feet (356 metres) and is the second tallest chimney in Europe.

Number eight is at the Syrdaya Power Plant in Uzbekistan. The chimney at unit five is 1148 feet (350 metres) tall. It was built in 1975 and has four other chimneys almost as tall.

Next is the Turuel Power Plant in Spain. This is a lignite fired power plant a series of chimneys. The tallest of which is 1125 feet (343 feet). It has three ovens and 350 megawatt capacity.

At number ten is the Plomin Power Plant in Croatia which reaches a height of 1115 feet (340 metres). This coal fired power station is coal fired and has two boilers which can generate 330 megawatts of electricity, which is 13% of Croatia’s requirements.

Image via Wikipedia

A fact widely unknown is that the first windmills actually were mounted on top of a single pivoting base, so that the entire building was moving around in order to ensure that the windmill blades were properly aligned with the wind. Windmills, where only the top section was used to turn the blades in the direction of the wind, were only invented in Europe in the 15. century. There were different types of windmills in use. The first models went back to the Persian idea (which probably built the oldest windmills at all, but no proof of how the complete design looked are left today) are of using a vertical shaft with blades or sails attached. Although this type of mill was easy to construct, it had one major disadvantage. With vertical windmills, a big part of it has to be shielded, so that the wind can catch properly (aerodynamic drag force). That means on the other hand, that a large part of the available power is actually lost.

Image via Wikipedia

The design of windmills using the horizontal axis was geared up to the water mill or water wheel design. The power of the rotating blades was transferred from the horizontal to the vertical axis by using cog wheels from wood or stone, and the power of vertical rotation was directly used to move grind stones, which were milling the grains. Apart from grain mills, the second most important application was water transport driven by wind energy. Today, you can still find some of these small-scale wind mills used for pumping water into garden and field irrigation systems on the island of Crete in the Mediterranean Sea.

Starting in 1390, the Dutch set out to enhance the windmill design by using a tower as the main building, to which a horizontal axis windmill with four blades was attached to the top section. They also incorporated floors in the building, so that different sections were created for grinding, for storing raw and ground grain, and in order to accommodate the people who worked there; in most cases this was the miller and his family.

Image via Wikipedia – image credit

These windmills were improved over a period of about 500 years. Aerodynamic lift was added and the shapes of the rotor blades were improved in order to get the most out of wind power and to ensure a stable running. Improvements to the leading edge and to the gravitational centre were also made and finally lead to ever increasing efficiency. 

These mills were the driving force of economic development before the industrial revolution. The range of applications became as versatile as it gets. In the saw mill, for instance the entire sawing process was driven by the mill. Other examples were complete processing lines for tobacco and spices.

There was only one important application missing until the 20th century. This was the century in which wind was put to the generation of electric power.

Image by SarahDeer via Flickr

With the declining reserves of fossil fuels worldwide came the challenge of finding alternative sources of energy and of putting them to use in economically reasonable ways. The conversion of solar energy was one of the easiest options, since solar cells were already widely developed in the eighties and nineties, and only had to be optimised and incorporated into bigger but manageable systems. With other forms of energy, like with wind energy, there were issues in terms of efficiency right from the beginning, and a single wind mill for energy generation put out there in the landscape would at most have caused a smile on most peoples faces.

 But the wind generator principle was known and an intensive process of optimisation and trials followed. The materials for the blades were refined and the size of components was reduced, until the wind mill as we know it today was finally ready for the market. The idea of wind farms hugely improved efficiency of wind generating systems, since costs were reduced. A multitude of wind mills lined up in certain patterns can optimise the impact of wind, and thus the energy produced from it, where strong and mostly steady wind is present, the building and development costs for the site per generator were minimised, and the cable routing became more a task that could be handled like any other cable routing project – systematically.

Wakamatsu wind farm in Kitakyushu, Japan – image credit

 Despite all euphoria, a few problems remain: In some areas people strongly oppose the erection of wind farms because they seem to dwarf famous buildings or ruin the views in otherwise beautiful landscapes. There is also the issue of noise generated from the blades turning in the wind, which is why they need to be placed in some distance to urban areas. Because of their height, they are also not suited near airports and low altitude flight paths. But all in all, wind farms become more and more wide spread and will help human society to progress in the process of substituting fossil with renewable energy sources.

Born in 1852, Edward Prior studied under Richard Norman Shaw and the experience fostered a lifelong respect for building processes and craftsmanship.  He established his own practice in 1880 and although the buildings he produced over the next thirty years were few, the majority are highly accomplished and marked by his rigorous intellect.  In common with William Morris and his followers, Prior aimed to unify the arts and the crafts and free architecture from stylistic revivalism.  These ideals are enshrined at St. Andrew’s, a building widely known as the ‘Cathedral of the Arts and Crafts Movement.’ 

The building is pervaded by a restless interlocking of forms.  The body is cruciform, but the robust transepts shrug off perfect symmetry.  Unusually, the massive tower is not placed above the crossing, but sits astride the chancel, which nevertheless punches through the tower and obtrudes at the east, where its gable is surmounted by a gaunt cross.  Such bold massing is typical of Prior’s work, and would later earn him the epithet of ‘rogue-architect’.  Surprisingly, however, there is no spectacular entrance, only two humble porches with lean-to roofs that confer a certain modesty on all who enter. 

In the nave windows, sinuous Gothic tracery is replaced with brutally angular forms.  The deliberately raw and stark quality of the church speaks eloquently about the nature of its materials: the local magnesian limestone is crystalline but porous, making it unsuitable for decorative treatment.  By extolling these properties, the forms of the church seem to have evolved almost organically from the materials.  A central tenet of Prior’s thinking was the concept of texture.  To Prior, the myriad textures of materials expressed the generative and also degenerative forces of nature.  The large nave windows are filled with clear glass arranged in minute, irregular panes.  This means that the nave is transfused with scintillating light that plays across the stonework and emphasizes its coarse texture to startlingly tactile effect. 

In accordance with Arts and Crafts notions of honest construction, vestigial buttresses on the exterior indicate that the heavy walls and roof are, in fact, supported from within.  Inside, the nave arches double as internal buttresses, emerging immensely thick and heavy from the walls but tapering inwards to form vast transverse arches which vault across the entire space, creating a cavernous interior.  The arches are abruptly cut off at head-height and come to rest upon short hexagonal piers, which create tunnel-like passages beneath.  The coupled columns beneath the arches are based on those of the Saxon church of St. Peter nearby, which Prior studied when he visited the site.  In his 1922 publication, Eight Chapters on English Medieval Art, Prior wrote that English culture acquired its distinctive character in the rudimentary stonework of Saxon churches and he clearly viewed Monkwearmouth in terms of its pre-Norman past. 

Beneath the rugged stonework, the church conceals an innovative structure of reinforced concrete.  Iron stanchions are embedded in the base of the walls and four iron rods run up through the arches.  Exposed concrete purlins run laterally along the ceiling.  This skeletal framework allowed Prior to supersede the nave-and-side-aisle plan of most churches, achieving the unimpeded flow of space that is crucial to how the church functions.   The underlying structural frame brings us to an apparent contradiction at the heart of St. Andrew’s.  The use of iron and concrete seems incompatible with the Arts and Crafts ideal of craftsmanship that candidly expresses its construction, but it was typical of Prior to arrive at an individualistic interpretation of current principles.  To his mind, reinforced concrete was ‘only the simple straight forward elementary science of building,’ and he asked, ‘Is this not an ideal for a great church to aim at, that it shall be the best building of its time?’

Embodying an ideal of collective labour, St. Andrew’s houses work by many of the leading members of the Arts and Crafts Movement.  Ernest Gimson (1864-1919) designed the ebony lectern inlaid with mother-of-pearl and silver.  In the chancel, the wrought iron crosses and candlesticks were executed by Gimson’s blacksmith, Alfred Bucknell.  These are lacquered to prevent rusting, but the surfaces are pitted with the marks of the maker’s tools.  Dedication panels were created by Eric Gill (1882-1940), who went on to found the Guild of St. Joseph and St. Dominic in 1921. 

Together, the church and its fittings express a theme of redemption through work.  This of course is a central tenet of the Church, but one which is thoroughly compatible with Arts and Crafts precepts.  The rough stonework and stark, angular tracery speak of the ‘hard labour of quarrying and cutting stone.’  In selecting the stone, Prior avoided the mechanised quarry nearby at Fulwell in favour of a more distant quarry at Marsden, because this was still ‘worked by quarrymen with their usual tool – the scutcher, a broad bladed pickaxe.’ Similarly, the glass was made by hand to Prior’s own recipe and streaks in the surface of each pane show that it bears ‘the impress of the loving hand’ of the craftsman.  St. Andrew’s is a paean to the virtues of simple craftsmanship. 

The nave and chancel are connected in typically forceful manner: arches spring diagonally from the base of the tower and fuse it with the transepts, creating cave-like recesses that house the organ and Lady Chapel.  The high chancel is hollowed out of the base of the tower.  After the starkness and severity observed elsewhere, the chancel bursts with colour in the form of a lavish mural painted on the walls and ceiling.  This is a pictorial retelling of Genesis and the forms radiate from a central globe of alabaster, representing the sun.  The mural was executed in egg tempera by Macdonald Gill – brother of Eric Gill – to a design by Prior, although a number of assistants were employed. 

The foreshortened chancel has the almost magical effect of bringing the altar deceptively close to the congregation.  A typically somnolent tapestry by Edward Burne-Jones serves as a reredos.  Based on the artist’s Star of Bethlehem (1897), this was executed in Morris’s workshop at Merton Abbey.  The wood panelling in the chancel is much more precise and refined than that in the nave and here the bare stone floor is robed with William Morris’s lavish carpet, coloured with vegetable dyes instead of the harsh chemical tones common at the time.  Overall, the rough-hewn, laboriously-executed nave is transcended by the splendour of the chancel: the implication is that heavy labour is rewarded in Heaven.  Stained-glass windows by Henry Payne depict this theme in allegorical terms: a workman is shown having his burden lightened as he gazes upon Christ, and the window of the Lady Chapel bears the inscription, ‘Come unto Me all ye that labour and I will give you rest.’

St. Andrew’s anticipates many ideas that became axioms of the Modern Movement.  Structural virtuosity, the valuing of form over applied decoration, and the aversion to stylistic revivalism are characteristic, while the concern for truth-to-materials and structural honesty are the principal lessons that Modernists learned from their Arts and Crafts forebears.  Reflecting on his technical innovations, Prior predicted that ‘the application of cement fortified by iron to structure is, in my opinion, going to be a revolution . . . an entirely new range of expression may be opened up.’  There is a tendency to regard Arts and Crafts as a regressive movement, grounded in moribund traditions, and Modernism as a revolution without historical precedent.  By highlighting the inherent rationalism of Arts and Crafts, and its little-known engagement with modern technologies, St. Andrew’s reveals that the movement was in many respects a dynamic and progressive force, yet one that retained its faith in nature, individual creativity and spirituality.

Royan church from the South. All photos by author. Copyright: Francois Hagnere

Gillet and his collaborators Marc Hébrard, Bernard Lafaille and René Sarger create a church whose architecture is not only innovative but audacious. In 1947, the magazine “L’Architecture” was devoted to contemporary Brazil. This certainly had a great influence on the architects of the new Royan.  The famous seaside resort has been the hub of experimentation and consideration that conduced to an uncommon and modern scenery. The face of the town is characteristic of an approach of Architecture called “Tropicalization” due to the peculiar attention paid to the treatment of the relation between the inside and the outside of buildings. The architect Ferret, a former student of Le Corbusier, opens the town to the “air-light-sun” concept, keywords of the Athens Charter. The reflection is also based on “architecture de-materialization” according to the Modern Movement theories and Le Corbusier’s “five points”.

The apse of Royan church.

The 1950 trinitarian triumphal arch facing the beach is intentional in this respect and a figure of Tradition. The concrete church of Royan was inspired by the great Gothic cathedrals and the inside is so eerie that it is not without a certain emotion that one enters this huge building that imposes admiration and respect. The proportions are perfect and so much accurate. For, as André Malraux used to say: “By entering this concrete cathedral, keep quiet, here everything is dash, rigor, ruggedness and severe beauty”. The nave (35 m high) is an ellipse (45 m long and 22 m wide), mandorla-shaped and can accommodate 2000 persons. It is flanked by an ambulatory, a gallery and a triforium. The construction, from a module: the triangle, symbolizing the Trinity, forms the principle of organization by creating a scenic atmosphere of volumes and effects between shade and light.  

The choir traditionally looking East.

The 24 V-shaped pillars measure 10 to 12 cm thick. The organ has 3600 pipes. The roof in “horse saddle”, a technique used for the first time in 1951, is only 8 cm thick, it is a mere feat of valor. The parabolic vaults reach 36 m and 28 m in the center. The spire is 56 m high. The stained glass windows are geometrical and abstract and a few on the North aisle are figurative. Henri-Martin Granel created the high vertical windows of the Stations of the Cross. The majestic central window in the choir is in Baccarat crystal. It is a free interpretation of Saint-John’s Apocalypse by Claude Idoux. The glass surface in the whole church is almost 500 square meters.  The church of Royan unquestionably is the greatest religious edifice of the XXth century. It was blessed in 1958 and listed only in 1988.

The majestic nave at Royan church.

 The sumptuous window of the choir in Baccarat crystal by Claude Idoux.

To the West, the grand organ.

The use of V-shaped pillars designed by Bernard Lafaille give an outside façade decorated with resets creating colossal grooves between which the windows appear as dark strips. This aesthetic effect is associated with the rough concrete and irregularity of the building shape: ellipse and roof inclined on 2 sides, thus producing a masterpiece of very innovative lyrical brutalism.   

 The nave and spire from the South.

On the North side, looking towards West.

The nave towards East.

The spire.

The “ader”, Association de Défense de l’Eglise de Royan, with their dynamic President Madame Marie-Pierre Quentin, acts  in favor of the safeguard of this contemporary jewel of architecture, a precious witness of the fifties. Donors are more than welcome to restore and help maintaining the church. All details can be found on their site: http://www.notre-dame-royan.com

Guillaume Gillet, architect of the “Trente Glorieuses” was “Premier Grand Prix de Rome” in 1946. President of the “Académie d’Architecture” from 1970 to 1973, he also built 10 prisons in the ’60s. He traditionally was buried inside the church in the North aisle. He who spent 5 years in the Nazi camps was very inspired. Did the silhouette of the ruins of Châalis Abbey, where he was born, impressed him that much that he devoted himself to religious architecture to offer us such a pure and fair vision of the Divine?

Holy-water basin, Church of Notre-Dame, Royan.

Please check out my related article: http://quazen.com/arts/architecture/the-secret-of-le-corbusier/

The church of Taillant as seen from the South. All photos by author. Copyright: Francois Hagnere.

The  unpretentious church of Taillant dates back to the the XIth century and has kept its authentic and symbolic aspect. Its was once dedicated to Saint-Martin and is a true witness of Early Romanesque Style. The nave is in rubbles and presents two small windows. Primitive openings can be observed in the wall with a strange drafting. The nave is covered with tiles. The West façade is reduced to essentials, the portal of the XIIth century offers an arch-moulding decorated with an unusual motif of rope, that will be found much later in Manoeline architecture.  On the fronton, the sculpture of a horse is reminiscent of the  Ancient Cult of Epona. The square tower  is in hewn stone like the polygonal apse presenting half-columns, a delicate frieze, carved capitals and modillions. The curiosity resides in the apse roof, like a ship hull, which is covered with flat paving stones as in the South of France. From a distance this roof is quite impressive. In the small cemetary, on the South and West sides of the church, is found a masonic grave. 

West façade of Taillant church. Unusual motif of rope above the portal.

The apse of Taillant church with half-columns, delicate frieze and carved capitals.

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The nave in rubbles and tower in hewn stone as seen from the South.

The horse on the fronton is reminiscent of the Ancient Cult of Epona.

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Masonic grave in the cemetary, South of Taillant church.

Tha amazing roof of the apse, Taillant church.

Sitated in the midst of the natural world, in a wooded vale, the monastery is executed in reinforced concrete. The building does not have the lightness and ethereal quality of Le Corbusier’s early work.  Instead, the form is a regular repeating grid with a strong horizontal emphasis and the concrete is left exposed, making it deliberately harsh and rugged. 

The monastery is built on two-levels.  Halls for study, work and recreation occupy the upper-level, along with the library.  On the lower level are the refectory and a cruciform cloister leading to the church.  Part of the building is raised from the ground on piloti. Each cell is acoustically-isolated to permit meditation.  It was not possible to build a traditional cloister due to the slope of terrain. Instead, a system of corridors connects the component parts.  The loggias crowning the building form brises-soleil. 

The panes of glass on the exterior form the ‘undulatory glass surface’ desired by Le Corbusier.  He used a similar feature in his Secretariat building at Chandigarh, India.  In constrast, the garden-court of the cloister features fenestration of vertical concrete slats reaching from floor to ceiling.  These are perforated with glazed voids and separated from each other by ventilators: vertical slits covered with metal mosquito netting.

A chapel stands alongside. This is an abstract composition with the bare minimum of religious symbolism.  The interior has immensely thick walls, which evoke the massiveness of medieval architecture.  The walls are pierced with horizontal slits, which allows shafts of coloured light to penetrate the interior, giving an undeniably spiritual atmosphere.

The contrasts of this building are fascinating.  We associate religious architecture with the Gothic style and religious iconography; Le Corbusier’s monastery is relentlessly modern and uncompromising, but somehow this seems appropriate.  The raw concrete suits the strict religious doctrine it was built for.  La Tourette has become a site of pilgrimage for architectural students.

Keble College was founded in 1870 as a memorial to the theologian John Keble. Keble was a prominent member of the Oxford Movement, which sought to reinvigorate the Anglican Church by introducing elements of the Catholicliturgy.   As a result, Keble College placed considerable emphasis on theological teaching.

The principal founder of the college was Edward Pusey, one of Keble’s colleagues in the Oxford Movement.  Immediately after Keble’s death in 1866 it was decided that his memorial would be a new Oxford college bearing his name.  The foundation stone was laid in 1868 by the Archbishop of Canterburyon John Keble’s birthday, the 25th April.  The college opened in 1870 and originally accomodated thirty students.  The college chapel was opened on the 25th April 1876.

The architect William Butterfieldwas a High Churchman and produced a vigourous work of ‘Muscular Gothic’.  Between 1850 and 1870 the Gothic Revival entered its High Victorian phase.  The architecture of this period was very strong and muscular, and expressed Britain’s pride and confidence.  Indeed, the architectural historian  Nikolaus Pevsnerdescribed the design as ‘manly’. Keble has a relentlessly patterned exterior, achieved with the use of structural polychromy, in which colour is embedded in the materials rather than applied to the surface.  The College is executed in a visually stunning array of red, blue, and white bricks.  Due to the relentless patterned banding, the aesthetic is often referred to as the ‘streaky bacon style’.  The use of structural polychromy has its origins in the Venetian architect championed by John Ruskin.

This was a completely new version of Gothic; we could not accuse it of copying mediaeval examples.  This kind of architecture was despised in the early 20th century when Modernism was in vogue.  In his pioneering book The Gothic Revival: An essay in the history of taste (1928) Kenneth Clarke described Keble as ‘the ugliest building in the world’.  To our eyes, however, the style is quintessentially Victorian. 

Keble was not universally admired within the University.  In particular, it aroused the ire of students at neighbouring St John’s College, from which Keble had purchased the site. The students of St John’s founded a secret society, whose initiation ritual involved stealing brick from Keble College and presenting it to the society’s elders.

Keble College owns the original of William Holman Hunt’s painting The Light of the World (1853).  This famous Pre-Raphaelite work is hung in the side chapel.  The picture was originally hung in the Royal Academy, but was given to the college as a gift. Hunt intended the painting to be hung in the main chapel but Butterfield rejected this idea.  In response, Hunt painted another version of the painting, which is now in St Paul’s Cathedral in London.

There is a popular legend – probably apocryphal – which states that a French visitor, upon seeing the college exclaimed, C’est magnifique mais ce n’est pas la gare? (‘It is magnificent but is it not the railway station?’). This is a play on Field Marshal Pierre Bosquet’s memorable line, referring to the Charge of the Light Brigade, C’est magnifique, mais ce n’est pas la guerre (”It is magnificent, but it is not war”).

Le Corbusier – Image source: http://images.stanzapub.com/readers/2009/08/29/lecorbusier_1.jpg

LE CORBUSIER’S SECRET

Charles-Edouard Jeanneret-Gris, aka Le Corbusier, was born in La Chaux de Fonds (Switzerland) in 1887 and died in Roquebrune Cap-Martin (France)  in 1965. He is the main representative of the “Mouvement Moderne”. In the 1920s, the great architect invented the unit of housing. Having devoted his life to researches on collective dwelling, architecture would influence human behavior according to le Corbusier. From this principle, he creates the “Modulor” in 1943, inspired by his master Auguste Perret. This harmonic measuring system for the insides of the buildings is based on the measurements and proportions of a 1m83 man with his arms crossed and 2m26 with his arms upwards. This range of harmonic dimensions, at a human scale, is universally applicable to architecture. It is also a proportions scale connected to the Fibonacci number, a sequence of numbers in which each term is equal to the sum of the previous 2: for instance: 1-1-2-3-5-8-13-21-34-55-89…”86, 113, 183, 226″ are measures characterizing the occupation of space by a standing typical man of 1m83. 226 cm = extremity of fingers when the arm is upwards. 183 cm = top of the head. 113 cm = navel. 86 = hand rest. The ratio of the consecutive 2 terms in the Fibonacci sequence tends to the Golden Ratio. These values are used to build a place where it will be good to live in. Le Corbusier first takes man into account: “man, this animal that must be able to snort in the space of his house”. His creed was: ” nature is mathematical, the masterpieces of Art are in accordance with Nature. They express the laws of nature and use them”.

The “Modulor” will be protected by a patent and falls into the public domain in 1947 upon Le Corbusier’s own initiative. Two books were published in 1948 “Le Modulor” and “Le Modulor 2″. Printed all over the world, they were enthusiastically adopted by the new generations of architects. It made peace between the “foot-inch” and metrical system, by introducing the decimal system for all calculations. Le Corbusier applied his measures in 5 of his “Cîtés Radieuses”: Marseilles (1947-51), Rezé (1953-55), Briey (1957-59), Firminy -(1965-67) and Berlin (1956-58).

The Fibonacci number was well known in ancient India and was used in metrical sciences. The Fibonacci Sequence appears in nature like in the sunflower. The “Maison Pigeon” in Rochefort (France) was inspired by Le Corbusier. It unfortunately was destructed one year ago. Please check out my related articles: “A House Typical of the ’50s”  and “Typical House of the ’50s destroyed”.

Le Modulor by Le Corbusier- Image source: http://images.stanzapub.com/readers/2009/08/29/modulormodulor2_1.jpg

Zürich – Le Corbusier Center – Image source: http://images.stanzapub.com/readers/2009/08/29/zc3bcrichseefeldcorbusierheidiwebermuseumimg1552_1.jpg

The courtyard on the roof of the “Unité d’habitation” in Firminy, France, by le Corbusier.

Image source: http://images.stanzapub.com/readers/2009/08/29/courdel27unitc3a9d27habiation_1.jpg

Building by le Corbusier in Stuttgart, Germany.

Image source: http://images.stanzapub.com/readers/2009/08/29/corbuweissenhoflores_1.jpg

Villa Savoye by Le Corbusier.

Image source: http://images.stanzapub.com/readers/2009/08/29/villasavoye_1.jpg

Monument to Fibonacci (Leonardo da Pisa) by Giovanni Paganucci in the Camposanto di Pisa, Italy.

Image source: http://images.stanzapub.com/readers/2009/08/29/leonardodapisa_1.jpg

Let September come. Exact to write, let September 19, 2009 come. A tower will appear to greet you. You may visit the site (Neue Kunst am Ried“, Wald-Ruhestetten) in the southern Germany.

It is not a tower with which you are acquainted. It is a baubotanical tower, the first successful baubotanical tower made of living trees.

White Willow

This tower will be as high as five meters with a plinth area of eight square meters.  And this is a gift from no other country save Germany which is proud of sustained green movement on her soil. Remember please, Germany has produced the first-ever green party in the political arena. 

White Willow Foliage

Hundreds of two-meter tall White Willow plants have been used to form the frame of the building. A good number of them have been planted in the earth and the rest has been rooted in some plant holders plugged in temporary steel scaffolding. The scaffolding will be removed when the plants will grow and will be stronger. Plants of the same species have been used. When the growth of the plants will be found as has reached the mark of satisfaction the scaffolding will be removed. Plants of the same species have been used only. Plants will come out and gradually build up beautiful green wall surrounding the structure and this way the structure will be solid enough to hold the building. 

Diversity of Plants

The Research Group Baubotanik at the Institute of Theory of Modern Architecture and Design (University of Stuttgart) under the leadership of Prof. Gerd de Bruyn, the director of the institute, has succeeded in constructing such a baubotanical tower. The building has been designed and built in collaboration with the world famous sculptor Cornelius Hackenbracht (Neue Kunst am Ried, Wald-Ruhestetten).

What a grand spectacle will the tower be! What a never-thought-of design of eco-architecture on the surface of the earth! What a marvelous blending of aesthetics, ecology and architecture we shall have!

White Willow Illustration

After Henry VIII’s Dissolution of the Monasteries, his troops used the remains of the Priory as a naval store. Elizabeth I remodelled the fort, reinforcing it and providing artillery emplacements. When James I became king, he unified the Scottish and English thrones, and the need for the castle declined.

In the 19th century the castle was used as a look-out for coastguards.  It became a tourist attraction for architects and antiquarians.  The innovative Scottish designer Charles Rennie Mackintosh made a sketch of the castle in 1901.

In 1901 the buildign was purchased by Edward Hudson, owner of Country Life magazine, which published innumerable articles on English country house and rural themes. Hudson commissioned the notable architect Sir Edwin Lutyens to refurbish the castle in an Arts and Crafts idiom.  According to legend, Hudson and Lutyens discovered the building while touring Northumberland and climbed over the wall to explore inside.

The castle is accessed by a steep climb around the rocky base of the hill. The entrance hall is divided by heavy stone pillars evoking an ecclesiastic interior.  The dark red-brown stone contrasts with the whitewashed plasterwork. The kitchen is spartan in design, but dominated by a large stone fireplace. In the scullery is a mechanism used to operate the portcullis.  Throughout the castle, Lutyens used a variety of materials including stone, brick, slate and wood to create vivid colours and textures, signifying a rustic, modest life-style. The interiors are thoroughly homely and domestic, despite being housed in a castle.

The dining room lies within the remains of the Tudor fort. The vaults roof is functional, supporting the gun battery above. A large chimney contains a bread-oven.  In this room Lutyens used Gothic Revival traceried windows. The end walls is painted in a rich Prussian blue, which contrasts with the red-brick floor.  The long gallery was created by Lutyens as an echo of the grand galleries in Elizabethan and Jacobean houses. The upper gallery leads onto the upper battery with its spectacular views along the coastline.

Lutyens’s friend and collaborator Gertrude Jekyll designed a walled garden (1906-12) in the grounds of the castle.  This had originally been the garrison’s vegetable plot.  The garden was restored to Jekyll original plan between 2002 and 2006 (the plan it is now in the Reef Collection at the University of California.

Lindisfarne Castle has been in the care of the National Trust since 1944.  The castle was featured in Roman Polanski’s film of Macbeth (1971), in which it represents Glamis Castle.