ROBERT CHARLES VENTURI

1. LIFE AND TIME

BIRTH June 25, 1925 FAMILY wife architect, planner,

author, educator Denise Scott Brown.

partner in the firm since 1969.

collaborator in the evolution of architectural theory and

design for the past 30 years.

1. LIFE AND TIME

EDUCATION graduated summa cum laude from Princeton

university in 1947 and received M. F. A.

there in 1950. furthered his studies

as a Rome prize Fellow at the American academy in Rome from 1954 to 1956.

1. LIFE AND TIME PROFESSION

a. Philadelphia based architect who worked under Eero Saarinen and Louis Kahn.

b. A writer, a teacher, an artist and philosopher, as well as an architect.

c. In the past three decades since, he has lectured at numerous institutions including Yale, Harvard, UCLA, Rice and the American Academy in Rome.

2. PHILOSOPHY Famous for his response “less is a bore,” to modernist

Mies van Der Rohe’s dictum, “less is more.”

“architecture is evolutionary as well as revolutionary. As an art it will acknowledge what is and what ought to be , the immediate and the speculative.”

He strongly believed that architects can try to ignore the honky- tonk elements in a building or even try to abolish them, but they will not go away. Architects do not have the power to replace them.

3. WORKS

VANNA VENTURI HOUSE ,1961

chestnut hill, Pennsylvania

POSTMODERN IN STYLE

VANNA VENTURI HOUSE

An explicitly classical building in the substance of its plan and form and in the ornament of its elevation.

The inside spaces are complex both in shapes and inter-relationships.

In contrast, the outside image is simple and consistent. The front creates an almost symbolic image of a house.

The front and back elevation are classically symmetrical with strong centralities.

The front elevation is a classical pediment.

VANNA VENTURI HOUSE

Some people say that the house looks like a child’ s drawing of a house- representing the fundamental elements of shelter- gable roof, chimney, door and windows.

VANNA VENTURI HOUSE

Plan is symmetrical, but the symmetry is distorted at times to accommodate the particular needs of the spaces.

GROUND FLOOR PLAN

FIRST FLOOR PLAN

VANNA VENTURI HOUSE

VANNA VENTURI HOUSE

VANNA VENTURI HOUSE

Models for the proposed scheme

3. WORKS

■ TUCKER HOUSE, 1974

Westchester county, new York

TUCKER HOUSE This was a house to look ordinary at first glance,

but to extra ordinary at the second and while living in it.

A small house with big scale: its few parts are big and the form is simple, bold and symmetrical.

Recessive in color and shingle texture, sitting among the trees on its lush.

Semi rural site.

Building is tall and a wooden object.

FRONT ELEVATION

TUCKER HOUSE The façade appears

to dominated by a gable.

Windows in the shingled walls are placed only to reflect interior demands.

SECTION

TUCKER HOUSE PLANNING a hall which doubles as the

dining area, a kitchen, a bedroom, and a bathroom arranged to serve both the bedroom and the public spaces.

a staircase, wider at the

bottom, rises against one wall of the house, turning at the top to open into an extra ordinary wider living space.

The fireplace structure echoes the shape of the house.

GROUND FLOOR PLAN

FIRST FLOOR PLAN

TUCKER HOUSE

VIEW OF LIVING FROM THE FIRST FLOOR

LIVING ROOM

3. WORKS

GUILD HOUSE 1961

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

GUILD HOUSE

GROUND FLOOR PLAN

GUILD HOUSE

FIRST FLOOR PLAN

GUILD HOUSE

FRONT ELEVATION

GUILD HOUSE

Small urban site. A 6 storey building which houses 91

apartments of varying types for elderly tenants who desired to remain in their old neighborhood.

Conventional architectural elements, to accommodate budget constraints.

GUILD HOUSE

MATERIAL

The brick, an expensive red clay. The scale of windows also differs

according to their distance from the street. Interior spaces are complex to suit the

varying programme of he apartment house.

OTHER WORKS The firm's addition for the

Oberlin College art museum (shown above) is decked with a playful red and white checkerboard pattern. Tucked in a rear alcove is an oversized wooden column with an enormous "Ionic" capital.

There is a playful retro look to the Celebration, Florida bank building designed by Robert Venturi and Denise Scott Brown. Molded to fit the shape of the street corner it occupies, the bank resembles a 1950s-era gas station or hamburger restaurant.

Postmodern addition to the Oberlin College art museum in Ohio, 1977Venturi, Scott Brown and Associates

4. CHRONOLOGY OF WORKS 1962. The Vanna Venturi House, Chestnut Hill, Philadelphia,

Pennsylvania 1972. Trubek House, Nantucket Island, Massachusetts 1973. Brant House, Greenwich, Connecticut 1973 to 1976. Allen Art Museum Addition, Oberlin, Ohio 1975. House in Tuckers Town, Bermuda. 1975. Tucker House, Mount Kisco, New York 1983. Gordon Wu Hall, Princeton, New Jersey 1994: Bank building in Celebration, Florida

Selected Awards: 1990. AIA Medal of Distinction, The Pennsylvania Society of

Architects 1991. Pritzker Architecture Prize 1992. National Medal of Arts, U.S. Presidential award

THANK YOU