16 Sep 180915 – Vitruvius – 001

I have been fascinated by the writings of the Roman Vitruvius (well the translations) for 40 years and they appear to be becoming more and more relevant:

In lay terms he is saying that an architect must be a thinker and a doer, the thinking informs the doing and vice versa.

Here, centuries before the invention of technicians and technologists, Vitruvius is pointing out that the danger of knowing how to construct without the scholarship of architecture is as bad as the danger of being an artist without the knowledge of construction. The architect is only ever an architect when he/she is a scholar who knows how to build. Which is as true today as in the Roman era.

Now it gets a bit more specific. An architect needs to be an all-round polymath educated in the Arts and Sciences. In modern terms always learning too. The purpose of professional CPD.

If there is interest I will work my way through the 319 pages of the “Ten Books on Architecture”. In fact, as it is interesting to me, I might just do it anyway 🙂