Architectural Analysis
| Organizational
Layout Circulation Proportion and Scale Ordering Principles |
Engineering Analysis
Organizational Layout
| Organizational layout is the way that spaces of
a building can be related to each other. Rooms of a building are
usually related by function, proximity, or a path of movement. When
looking at the Rolla Public Library, the main part of the building
is very different from the addition, making the organizational layout
somewhat hard to determine. The first thought is that the building is organized symmetrically. This is apparent with the location of the large spaces and few smaller spaces located on the north and south sides. Also, the windows on the north and south side are symmetrical, as well as how the windows are repeated on the front side. The building looks as if it is a mirror reflection. But then looking at the addition, this idea does not fit at all. The addition follows more of an adjacent spaces approach, with no symmetry involved. |
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| After contemplating the organization more, spaces
linked by a common space became obvious. Our book, Architecture:
Form, Space and Order by Francis D.K. Ching, defines this as, "two
spaces which are separated by distance can be linked or related
to each other by a third, intermediate, space." There is one
large central room that all the other rooms of the library are linked
to. This idea applies to the building as a whole, both original
and new parts.
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| It is interesting that the building does not have a more adjacent spaces approach to the organizational layout because that is very common in government buildings due to the good use of space. However, the spaces linked by a common space method does make sense because of the current building use. As it is a library, the people can find most information in one centralized space, and all of the smaller rooms are linked to this space so that it may be easy to find what one is looking for. |