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RADAR
FEATURES
COMMENT
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| DESIGN RESEARCH |
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Peter Downton. RMIT University Press, 2003. $27.50.
Is design research? Peter Downton thinks so
and in this scholarly and philosophical work
he argues the case, beginning with his first
sentence: “design is a way of inquiring, a
way of producing knowing and knowledge;
this means it is a way of researching.” Downton allows that (roughly) whatever
practitioners set out to know or learn in order
to design, or discover through the process of
designing, constitutes research. In this
sense, Dustin Hoffman conducts extensive
research – psychological, behavioural,
anatomical – for and perhaps in many of his
acting roles. This is a common use of the
term “research”, and appropriate for
analyzing practice (which is Downton’s aim),
though it is much broader than the
understanding of research in scientific or
academic contexts where what is already
known cannot be the object of research.
Downton acknowledges a distinction
between research for design, research about design and research through design, and
develops his argument accordingly. A
chapter is devoted to each of the first two
kinds of research, largely in support of his
investigation of the third kind, which is the
heart of his concern and includes the idea
of the transmission of knowledge through
designed objects. Downton takes a suitably
broad view of knowledge and knowing. He
recognizes the importance of “know-how” or skills, though I think he underestimates
“knowledge by acquaintance” – that is, the
kind of knowledge anyone who survives a
heart attack (and can remember the
experience) has but which many a world
expert on heart attack does not, never
having suffered one. The exclusive focus
on knowledge, however, seems to me
misplaced, and may be a product of the fact
that the object of research in the narrower
scientific or academic sense is the
production of knowledge. Architecture
embodies or reflects much more than
knowledge: heroic values, borrowed ideas,
metaphors, educated guesses, wishful
thinking, and ignorance can all be there,
and all can be the product of research or
inquiry in Downton’s sense, as the social
ambitions of architecture, for example,
often amply demonstrate. Jeremy
Bentham’s influential prescription for the
prison as “a mill to grind rogues honest
and idle men industrious” demonstrated
the depths of nineteenth-century ignorance
about the effects of incarceration, especially
in such a place.
Design Research is aimed at
practitioners, but is also clearly intended for
academics and students, and should attract
a diverse readership. Given its theoretical
nature, more discussion of examples would
help these readers. This is a stimulating and
rewarding book, clear, approachable and
well written, with judicious observations of
design and how we think about it.
GREG BAMFORD
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| THE ASTOR |
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Jan Roberts (ed). Ruskin Rowe Press, 2003. $60.00.
It is timely that, with Sydney at the tail end
of another apartment-building boom, a book
has been published which scrutinizes one
of the city’s finest and most influential
blocks. The Astor is one of a handful of
apartment blocks in Sydney that has
reached star status. Unlike the notorious
Blues Point Tower, or Aaron Bolot’s Wylde
Street apartments, the Astor’s status
derives in equal part from its architecture
and the pedigree of its dwellers. This publication seeks to track the building’s
career – its conception, reception,
construction and legacy.
The Astor deftly places the building in
the broader history of the making of the city
of Sydney – its urban and cultural life and
the story of its occupants. With incomparable
views and a fishpond on the roof, the
building was opened with great fanfare in
1923 by the NSW Premier, Sir George Fuller.
By virtue of its select group of tenants the
Astor captured the imagination of the city.
Contributors Scott Robertson, Donald
Ellsmore, Maisy Stapleton and Clive Lucas
trace the significance of this building of firsts
– largest reinforced concrete building in
Australia when built, first clear importation
of the New York/Chicago type upmarket
apartment genre to Australia, and the tallest
residential tower in Sydney until 1960 – in
their chapters about the apartments’
construction history, chain of influences,
interior plan and decor. These chapters
provide a clear framework for the bulk of
the book, which is largely anecdotal – the
portraits and vignettes of the building’s
occupants.
Together, the owners form a web of
interests across the arts, sciences, business
and medical professions. They include Barry
Humphries, who clearly thought he was
frowned upon by the matrons of the block;
Major Rubin, millionaire and art lover;
Lawrence Ennis, manager-in-chief of the
Sydney Harbour Bridge; Sir Hugh Denison;
and a group of progressive and feminist
women including Portia Geach, Ruby Rich,
Dame Edith Walker and Mary Alice Evatt.
These stories form a picture of the life and
times of the city, the privileged existence of
apartment living at its finest in the heart of
the city, and the rural life that was the main
abode of many who lived at the Astor.
What is missing is a chapter that places
this apartment building in a broader context
of apartment construction and living in
Sydney. The Astor was the start of an
extraordinary boom of large apartment
buildings, such as Birtley Towers, Hillside,
Borambil and the Macleay Regis. This highquality
publication certainly whets the
appetite for stories of the other grand
dames of Sydney’s residential skyline.
CAROLINE BUTLER-BOWDON
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Copyright © 2010 Architecture Media Pty Ltd
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