Modular Coordination and Systems of Proportions

Efforts to reduce waste and avoid non matching systems in the building industry have resulted in a number of propositions regarding modular coordination and systems of proportions. The idea of modular coordination offers a guideline where in different building elements such as windows and walls, or different materials such as wood and brick, can be manufactured in coordination with each other. The assembly of these elements and materials would be streamlined and avoids having to modify them onsite.
Modern machinery that mass produce parts of buildings often dictate the limits in dimensions and sizes of parts, but the idea was to have a standardized system of proportions that would allow for a more efficient way to assemble them together as a whole.
The idea of having standard sizes brings into discussion the ‘freedom’ of a designer to be creative and original. The argument was that standardization would result in works that were at best banal and undifferentiated. The designer, only having to pick and choose from a catalogue of standard sizes and materials would inevitably have a design lacking expression, and would end up looking like any other. This results in the “weakening of the individualist element of our environment.”
The argument for standardization is that the artist can be more expressive if his freedom of expression is more dependable, in that the relations and outcome are clear and known. A ‘proper’ type of standardization is proposed, stating that a distinction can be made between standardization of the end product and standardization of the means.
…TO BE CONTINUED