An Uncommon Bench: A Small Building by Architect Christopher Alexander and Associates

Each act of building needs to have a positive effect on its surroundings; to complete them, preserve their structure, make them better, by creating strong centers in them and next to them. Each new building is more alive when it ...

In architecture, as in other things, the "right" sequence is of vital importance. It is a generative sequence of progressive differentiations, which allow space to unfold in the right order. Each differentiation acts on the product of the previous ...

In the last two centuries "modular" design has produced identical apartments, arranged in typical apartment blocks. The same is true for mass-produced furniture. Uniqueness, which expresses personal needs and whiches, and which springs from the need to adapt and connect ...

A three-tiered masonry public bench and centerpiece, on the Fort Mason pier, overlooking Alcatraz Island. It was built within three weeks as part of the "Spirit in Design" workshop, beginning on 24-Mar-1984 following an announcement in "CoEvolution Quarterly". The main intent ...

Interview by carpenter and contractor Pete Retondo, who was part of the group in the San Francisco workshop that built the Fort mason bench. The interview had been published in “The Co-Evolution Quarterly” in the Fall 1984 issue, under the ...