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Urban DesignSquare in Space & Time

Krishna chand ch


Urban Square

Urban Square:

• Urban square is an open public space used for

community gatherings

• The first urban formations appeared 6000 years ago

• City squares were established at the cross roads of

important trade routes

• Major places of worship were placed on squares, also

used as markets

• Served as an opportunity to exercise the power of

rulers with military processions and parades

The public space


Urban Square

Function of Squares:

• Creates a gathering place for the

people

• Providing them with a shelter

against the traffic

• Freeing them from the tension of

rushing through the web of street

• Represents as a psychological

parking place within the civic

landscape

Very ‘heart’ of city


Urban Square

Reasons for development of Squares:

‘Life in public’

• Climatic conditions

• Societal structure and psychological attitude of people

• led to a form of public life – and life in public

• Made street and square the natural locale for

community activities and representation


Urban Square

Factors that formulate the Square:

• On the relation between the forms

of the surrounding buildings

• On their uniformity or their variety

• On their absolute dimensions

• On relative proportions in

comparison with width and length

of the open area

• On the angle of entering the

streets

A hole or ‘w

hole’


Urban Square

Squares – A part of living organism

‘A Living organism

’

• A Square is never completed

• Some may vanish, be destroyed. Others may be

replaced and new ones added

• A square, an accumulation of important buildings in past

may have developed into comprehensible form now

• Elements of square such as

surrounding structures,

monuments are subjected to

flux of time


Urban Square

Reasons for changes in Square

‘A Living organism

’

• Physically through the erection of new buildings & the

alteration or destruction of old ones

• Through a modification of the building line

• Psychologically, through the different way in which each

generation experiences


Urban Square

The Archetypes

‘Three elements’

• Square consists of three space

confining elements

• Surrounding structures, floor and

the imaginary sphere of the sky

above

• Elements are decisively defined by the two-dimensional

layout of square

• These three factors that produce final three

dimensional effect may vary in themselves


Urban Square

Classification of Squares

‘Five types’

• Closed Square – Space self contained

• Dominated Square – Space directed

• Nuclear Square – Space formed around a centre

• Grouped Squares – Space units combined

• Amorphous Square – Space unlimited

• Squares doesn't represent only one pure type, but very

often bears the characteristics of two of these types


Urban Square

Closed Square:

‘Closed’

• It is a complete enclosure interrupted only by the streets

leading to it

• Primary element of any closed square is its layout of

regular geometrical form

• The repetition of identical houses or house types, facing

the enclosed area

• Spatial balance of the square will always be achieved

by the equation of horizontal & vertical forces


Urban Square

Closed Square:

‘Closed’

Place des Vosges,

Paris, France


Urban Square

Closed Square:

‘Closed’

• Each façade fulfills a dual function

• On the one hand, it is part of an individual structure; on

the other hand, it forms part of a common urban spatial

order

• Continuity and context of the framing structures were

achieved by the Colonnade, arched arcades

• Yet, the inner courtyard with in a complex monumental

structure is not a square from the town planning view


Urban Square

Closed Square:

‘Closed’

Colonnade in Agora - Priene Arcade in Place des Vosges


Urban Square

The Dominated Square:

‘Dom

inated’

• Characterized by one individual structure or a group of

buildings towards which the open space is directed

• Surrounding structures are related to them

• Dominated building may be a church, a palace, a town

hall, an architecturally developed fountain, a theatre

• Usually the direction of a main street which opens into

the square establishes the axis towards the dominant

building


Urban Square


‘Dom

inated’

Notre Dame Cathedral, Paris St. Peter’s, Rome

Place de l’Odeon,

Paris


Urban Square


‘Dom

inated’

• Compels the spectator to move toward and to look at

the focal architecture

• Dominant square produces a directive of motion

• The dominated structure need not necessarily be

voluminous

• Very often it is merely a gate or an arch which may

dominate a whole square

• A fountain may also dominate a square it if constitutes

an entire front in with architecture, sculpture and water


Urban Square


‘Dom

inated’

Piazza del Popolo, Rome

Fountain dominating the Square,

Fontana di Trevi, Rome

Pariser Platz,

Berlin

Squares subordinate to the

Street –gate axis


Urban Square


‘Dom

inated’

Dominating element may also be a VoidMaria Theresien strasse, Innsbruck

Dominating element is a broad riverPraca do Comercio, Lisbon

Subordinating Square to the continuous axisPiazza Vittorio Veneto, Turin


Urban Square

The Nuclear Square:

‘Nuclear’

• Nuclear Square consists of a nucleus, a strong vertical

accent – a monument, a fountain, an obelisk

• It is powerful enough to charge the space around with a

tension that the impression of the square will be evoked

• It will tie the heterogeneous elements of the periphery

into one visual unit

• Dimensions of nuclear square are restricted as the

visual effect of the central monument is naturally limited


Urban Square

The Nuclear Square:

‘Nuclear’

Donatello’s equestrian figurePiazza del Santo in Padua,

Italy

Nelson’s columnTrafalgar square, London


Urban Square

Grouped Squares:

‘Grouped’

• In Grouped Squares, Individual squares may be fused

organically and aesthetically into one comprehensive

whole

• Each unit - the individual square, represents an entity,

aesthetically self sufficient and yet part of a

comprehensive higher order

• A sequence of squares, different in size and form,

develops in only one direction, thus establishing a

straight axis


Urban Square

The Grouped Square:

‘Grouped’

Sequence of Squares developed in a straight axis

Imperial Fora, Rome


Urban Square

Grouped Squares:

‘Grouped’

• Or, in a non-axial organization, a smaller square opens

with one of its sides upon a larger square, so that the

individual axes of each square meet in a right angle

• Or, a group of three or more squares of different

shapes and proportions surround one dominant

building

• Or, two individual squares fall into a coherent pattern

although they are separated from each other by blocks

of houses, thoroughfares


Urban Square

The Grouped Square:

‘Grouped’

Non-axial organization of SquaresPiazza and Piazzetta in Venice


Urban Square

The Grouped Square:

‘Grouped’

Squares around one Dominant buildingPalazzo Podesta in Bologna, Italy


Urban Square

The Grouped Square:

‘Grouped’

Two seperated squares with coherence

Piazza d’Erbe and Piazza dei Signori


Urban Square

The Amorphous Square:

‘Am

orphous’

• Amorphous is formless, unorganized, having no

specific shape

• It does not represent aesthetic qualities or artistic

possibilities

• However, if it shares some elements with the

previously analyzed squares it may appear like one of

them

• New York’s Washington square is not a closed square.

Its dimensions are so large


Urban Square


‘Am

orphous’

• Proportions of many of its surrounding structures are so

heterogeneous, so irregular, even contradictory

• Location and size of the small triumph arch are so

dissimilar to all the other given factors

• Unified impression

cannot result

• Disproportion in scale

destroys all aesthetic

possibilities New York’s Washington Square


Urban Square


‘Am

orphous’

• Place de l’Opera in Paris could not become a

“dominated” Square in spite of the monumental façade

of the imposing opera house

• Width of the Boulevard des Cupucines is running

through its off centre

• Presence of small structures like the entrance to the

Metro, scattered all over the area ruin any special effect

• These examples are “squares” from surveyor’s

viewpoint, although without any artistic impact


Urban Square


‘Am

orphous’Boulevard and Metro ruin Dominated SquarePlace de l’Opera in Paris


Urban Square

‘Thank You’

Thank You

References: The Square in space and time, Paul Zucker, Time-Saver Standards for Urban Design