Types & Rites
MF / 2019
From Undergraduate Florence Abroad Semester with Lawrence Sprague
This precedent study investigates the relationship between architectural typologies and the ritual behaviors they enact. The process began with an exploration of existing Italian types and how they stage ritual action. In this case, the study was based on the Piazza San Marco in Venice, and how it informed thousands of years of ceremonial processions as ritual performances from the mundane to the sacred permeate the typologies which exist there. Taking these into account, the rituals were projected onto a site-less library proposal. A key ritual of the library typology was identified: sorting (books, people, knowledge) and a mechanical system of slides, funnels and conveyors which reinforce these rites was designed accordingly.