Engineering and Architecture (English)
I am quite sure that, if you are an architect, you may have often heard the following question: What is the difference between an engineer and an architect?
In any project of important size, it is essential to work with an architect and an
engineer.
In ancient times, the profiles of an
architect and an engineer were found in the same person. It was not until the
Hellenistic ages that the figure of the architect became recognised as
independent from the engineer. It was during the Greek antiquity that the most
ornamental elements in architecture started to be considered apart from the
functional structure calculation. Indeed, it is at this exact moment that the
concept of “style” in architecture appears for the first time in history,
represented by the Doric, Ionic and Corinthian orders from Greek temple
columns.
Some centuries later, during the
Roman Empire, the figures of architect and engineer continued entwined in the
same individual. It is in this time that the engineering field develops
further. Aqueducts, theaters and stadiums, still preserved today, are the best
witnesses to the impressive knowledge acquired by the Roman engineers. All
those structures were built with neither re-enforced concrete nor steel.
The key moment in the history of
architecture is the Gothic, which evolves from the Romanic. Whereas the
structures in the Romanic churches were bulky and heavy in order to raise
higher buildings, the Gothic cathedrals had slimmer and more efficient
structures in order to allow more natural light to shine through the
building.
The relationship between engineers
and architects in the design of a building is very similar to the relationship
Steve Wozniak and Steve Jobs had when they were working on the first Apple. Wozniak
was the brains of the team, the person capable of creating a new operating
system and making everything click. Steve Jobs was the soul of the team and the
visionary. Jobs was capable of identifying people’s needs even before they knew
they had them. Whilst Wozniak understood the mechanical needs, Steve Jobs
understood the people’s needs better.
While the engineer is responsible for
doing the calculations needed to maintain the integrity and safety of a
building, the architect is responsible for designing the best space which can
fit the client and context requirements.
The most complex aspect in any architectural project is finding the balance
between art and technology. When you verge towards one pole, forsaking the
other, the result is not optimal.
Not much long time ago, the international architect Renzo Piano made this
statement during the opening of his last project, the “Shard” in London: “This
crisis is bad for the people but good for construction, because it will be more
honest, more moral and wiser.”
I share this opinion, but why, during bonanza times, has construction not
been more moral and honest? This is probably because it departed too much from
the border line between technology and art, getting closer to the latter.

Nevertheless, it is during crisis times, when clients want to invest in the
strictly necessary verging towards the most “engineering” and functional pole, that
the most artistic and social side of architecture is forgotten. The result is a
kind of architecture which does not respond to social and urban dialogue, failing
to arouse the values that the good architecture must inspire.
Therefore, beauty relies on the overlap of these two worlds: engineering
and architecture. In other words: a functional architecture with soul.
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