Sunken City is a section of parkway just east of Point Fermin Park in San Pedro that nature has reclaimed for its own. In the early 1920s Sunken City was a collection of high-end beach bungalows, a section of Paseo Del Mar Street and a charming walking trail very similar to the Cliff Drive section…
Early in his career as an architect Christopher Alexander began to notice that certain buildings, plazas, and parks had a transcendent quality. They were more interesting to look at, and felt better to be a part of, than many other buildings. There was a vibrancy and presence to this structures that set them apart. But…
This is the fourth part of an extensive four part essay by Christopher Alexander, exploring the deep fundamentals of architecture, especially what gives a building a transcendent feeling of being “alive.” In this fourth book introduces a second aspect of living structure, and that’s the essence of the “Self.” When a building or a work…
This is the third part of an extensive four part essay by Christopher Alexander, exploring the deep fundamentals of architecture, especially what gives a building a transcendent feeling of being “alive.” In this third book he presents practical examples of projects that he has participated in. He shares experimental processes and methods. At the heart…
This is the second part of an extensive four part essay by Christopher Alexander, exploring the deep fundamentals of architecture, especially what gives a building a transcendent feeling of being “alive.” In this second book he goes into more detail about the unfolding process and how certain changes of form will preserve the inherent structure…
This is the first part of an extensive four part essay by Christopher Alexander, exploring the deep fundamentals of architecture, especially what gives a building a transcendent feeling of being “alive.” In this first book he explores this quality of life, and how it can be found in everything from forests to minerals. For example,…
Between 1972 and 1981 patients having the same type of gall bladder surgery were studied to see whether or not natural settings had an impact on recovery. Twenty three patients had a window with a view of nature. Twenty three patients had window with.a view of a brick wall. Those with the view of nature…
Anne-Laure Le Cunff observes that the French have a phrase cultiver son jardin intérieur – or caring for your interior garden. It’s a way of saying that the mind is like a garden. There is more to the comparison than simple metaphor. The garden is one of humanity’s oldest creations. And there seems to be…
The goal of architecture (and presumably other aspects of human creation) should be to create life. Alexander makes a distinction between creating life and preserving nature which is generally accomplished by leaving areas untouched, such as in wildlife preserves. Nor is it simply trying to make structures that are compatible with nature. He gives the…
We tend to see a garden, even a vegetable garden, as being a little slice of nature. But a garden is entirely a man-made structure. The choice of plants to add to the garden, and the choice of the plants and animals to keep out of the garden, are all done by design. When done…
When our desire moves us to make something, we begin to naturally start assembling bits and pieces into a kind of order. It doesn’t matter what we are working on, a piece of writing, a painting, a piece of furniture. There is an ordering process that is common to all creative works. The easiest place…
In the Gospel of Matthew Jesus tells a story about the Kingdom of Heaven. The Kingdom is like a tiny seed. It starts small and then grows into a tree, spreading its branches to give shelter to the birds. I’ve been thinking about this parable a lot recently. Kingdoms typically spread by force and conquest.…
If you like trees and love exploring, check out the site Monumental Trees. Here is an archive of some of the biggest, the tallest, the gnarliest and the oldest trees in the world. Monumental Trees catalogs extraordinary trees and provides lots of tree-facts in the process. I’ve written previously about the mysterious Grove of the…
You’ve heard of urban sprawl. Chances are you’re quite at home with it. But you might not be aware of how fast it spreads – an acre of land is lost to human development every 2-1/2 minutes according to the website Disappearing West. An interactive map of disappearing open space gives a county-by-county view of…
I pretty much take it as fact that human beings have not evolved to run on concrete. It kinda makes sense that scrambling over boulders and swinging from trees are better exercise for micro-muscles than are gym machines. And I can mostly accept that our digestive systems have not evolved to handle processed foods. But…
