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| Vers
une architecture and Villa Savoye A comparison of treatise and building |
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| 10 - Miscellaneous Observations | |||
| Fig. 10.04 shows the
delineation between public and private space in the Villa
Savoye. It is the public spaces that have the most
interest to them. With the exception of the master
bathroom (Fig. 10.03), the remaining private spaces are
rather bland. It is in the public spaces that one
primarily experiences the movement through spaces, the
proportions and massing, and the interaction between
inside and outside. It is interesting to note that the bedrooms do not have access onto the main first floor roof garden. It is a very deliberate choice that Le Corbusier has made, and one that would not be required in terms of either the client’s brief, or the cost of construction. It almost appears that Le Corbusier provided these spaces because he had to (it is after all a house), and that given the choice, he would have excluded them. Peter Carl makes the following interesting observation: The horizon is both the most distant boundary – the limit where sky and ‘sea’ are at once joined and separated – and optically dependent upon individual location. This fusion of universal and particular in a joining-separating boundary recalls the balance point, the reconciling unity of two differences, in the Platonic thematics of ratio; and for this reason the horizon is a key element of the mediative structure of Le Corbusier’s space.19 I have previously noted the use of horizontal windows as a means of structuring the view of the horizon. On Villa Savoye, the roof garden has a series of horizontal ‘windows’ (ie openings with no glazing in them). Le Corbusier could of course have omitted the window wall entirely at this point, using only a railing. However, one would not experience the intellectual control and ordering that is imposed by experiencing the horizon through the horizontally framed openings. |
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| Fig 10.01 Villa Savoye (from Ouevre Complete) | Fig 10.02 - Villa Savoye, living room (from Ouevre Complete) | Fig 10.03 - Villa Savoye master bathroom | |
| Fig 10.04 - Diagram showing public and private spaces | |||
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