CONVERSATIONS WITH FORM: A WORKBOOK FOR STUDENTS, BY N. JOHN HABRAKEN

Review

Dutchman N. John Habraken, award-winning Puerto Rican Andres Mignucci and American Jonathan Teicher are the authors of Conversations with form: a workbook for students of architecture. The subtitle – a workbook for students of architecture – is indicative of its content, which presents a series of exercises, well accompanied by field observations and several paradigms where the theory is applied.

Readers are invited to become familiar with the use of sequences of movements for an orientation of the progress of the form under construction, in a practical vision that is useful on a daily basis. The complexity of the models and examples increases as they move through the samples, focusing on future architects’ core competencies to achieve success in everyday work, highlighting the added value of teamwork and the experience of others. Conversations with form is a tool to optimize the expertise and know-how of future architects, supported in numerous image records, such as photographs, old postcards, vintage engravings or Google aerial views.

Franco Mancuso, of the Faculty of Architecture of the University of Venice, and one of the professionals presenting the book (together with Charles Correa and Josep Maria Montaner) states that it is an original and stimulating book that resorts to learning by doing. It is intended for architects and also for engineers and all citizens involved in transforming the built environment, emphasizing design as a good way to interpret the processes that shaped historic cities and their contemporary expansion.