ArchiBasics Press

Basic Tools for Creative Thinking

Home Page

Publications

ArchMedia Order Form

For Educators

About ArchiBasics

Contact Us

Books

These classics by Edward T. White are as relevant today as ever, and newly republished, mostly in a convenient 9" x 7" landscape paperback format. More titles are being prepared. 

These books describe the process and techniques of visualizing architectural predesign and design information in the dual sense of converting that information into graphic images and of seeing or understanding the information better. The central thesis is that our ability to draw needs, requirements, and early design  concepts is just as important as our ability to draw final building design solutions and that, in fact, our diagramming skills profoundly influence the quality of our building designs.


Building Meaning

Edward T. White

This book explores and explains building image analysis. Like "Site Analysis" and "Space Adjacency Analysis", it provides a way to pay special attention to a particular type of design issue - in this case the issue of building image or environmental message. This can help a designer responsibly handle large amounts of design information in a systematic way, allow designers and clients to communicate better about the nature of the design problem to be solved and the reasons for design decisions, and make design processes more effective and efficient. © 1996. Paper, 9" x 7", 344 pages.  $32.95

Click here to order


Site Analysis

Edward T. White

Contextual analysis is a predesign research activity which focuses on the  existing, imminent, and potential conditions on and around a project site. It  is, in a sense, an inventory of all the pressures, forces, and situations and  their interactions at the property where a project will be built. © 2004. Paper, 9" x 7", 164 pages.  $29.95.

Click here to order


Space Adjacency Analysis

Edward T. White

One of our major responsibilities as architects is to design buildings that  support the activities of the users of the facilities. Our building designs  should positively reinforce and facilitate the performance of the operations  that they house. A facility should go beyond simply containing activities and  should actually contribute to the productivity of our client's organization. ©  1986. Paper, 9" x 7", 204 pages.  $29.95

Click here to order


Concept Sourcebook

Edward T. White

Architecture students seem to graduate with a relatively small vocabulary of architectural forms for responding to project needs. This is not because the forms are unavailable but because students have had little experience and because current methods for acquiring them are very inefficient. As a result, some professional designers handle different projects with similar building forms that have become comfortable and familiar. This book presents a theory of concepts and concept formation based on a vocabulary for five categories of design: Functional Grouping and Zoning, Architectural Space, Circulation and the Building Form, Response to Context, and Building Envelope. As a whole, they are meant as a catalyst for project concept formation.  © 1975. Paper, 9" x 7", 200 pages.  $24.95

Click here to order


Ordering Systems

Edward T. White

The introductory design experience has always been an especially important one for the student. It offers an initial way of understanding design and so largely forms the context for making sense of subsequent design experiences. This book works with students where they are  rather than demanding some fundamental change of values before beginning the study of design. And it introduces design not as some mystique which only the blessed possess but as a system of operations that anyone can and, in fact, does use daily. Profusely illustrated and hand-lettered in Prof. White's signature style, this little volume provides an indispensable introduction to a very complex discipline. © 2003. Paper, 9" x 7", 104 pages.  $22.95

Click here to order.



Path • Portal • Place

Edward T. White

Inspired by a year living and teaching architecture in Florence, Italy, this book addresses the goal of keener environmental knowing, pointing out a way to see urban settings in more penetrating ways to evolve a personal urban alertness that moves us to finer levels of making sense of spaces.  Emphasis is on the areas between buildings where urban life happens. The book has three sections, on urban environments, public space, and learning to appreciate, and is profusely illustrated with the author's signature hand sketches.  © 1999. Paper, 9" x 7", 126 pages.  $19.95

Click here to order


Presentation Strategies for Architects

Edward T. White

People in any discipline depend on being able to make effective presentations, which are more dependent on pre-presentation thinking than on traditional presentation activities (writing text, preparing graphics, etc.). Don't fail to get a key commission because the key concerns of the selection committee weren't understood. This profusely illustrated book explores the essential characteristics of strategic planning for presentations, a crucial consideration regardless of whether the audience is a teacher, a government review board, a community organization, or a private client. © 1976. Paper, 8.5" x 8.5", 116 pages. $19.95.

Click here to order


Travel Drawing: Engaging the Spirit of Place

Edward T. White

This book is about the rituals of travel drawing. About how visual journaling processes can help engage and explore place spirit at locales where we sketch. About how ways we draw may deepend our intimacy with and reverence for place. When enacted mindfully, drawing is an opportuity to fuly feel the joy and satisfaction of crafting well and of commiting fond, vivid memories, in detail, to memory, something no camera work can do as well. © 2004. Paper, 8.5" x 8.5", 252 pages. $44.95.

Click here to order


The Piazzas of Florence

Edward T. White

Nine piazzas are selected here for analysis, chosen from Florence's many wonderful urban spaces. They are chosen for their variety of configurations, contained activities, and moods, for their instructive value and explanatory power, for their mix of successes and shortcomings, because they are some of the town's largest, most important, most intensely used exterior public places. The piazzas are not treated historically but described as they are today, as contemporary, living, architectural configurations, as public spaces in a present-day urban environment that may offer us design wisdom applicable to today's project challenges. It is a terrific, superbly illustrated, comprehensive study of what makes urban spaces so important to community life. © 2006. Paper, 7" x 9" landscape format, 294 pages. $46.95

Click here to order


ArchiBasics
Email: Info@ArchiBasics.com