Respose to McMorrough Reading

In his article, “Notes on the Adaptive Re-use of Program,” McMorrough addresses the use of program in today’s architecture. He views program as a starting point of a project. “It’s the first thing you are given to start a project in school and the thing you wait on from a client in practice.” Program can’t be avoided, it must be addressed sooner or later. McMorrough discusses how program is used early in the design process with the familiar phrase “form follows function.” It is a common approach to design which most of us have used at some point. But as McMorrough says program is typically given to us, whether we are students or practicing architects. With this thesis project, we have control over everything; it is up to us to decide what our program will be. Personally, I still haven’t decided on a definite program as of yet. I am still playing with multiple possibilities, trying to decide what program would best address my general concept of the built environment’s effect on human behavior.

Besides discussing how program is approached, McMorrough also addresses the concern of programmatic failure. The inflexibility of program or programmatic based form may, over time, result in not meeting the needs of its users and therefore causing the building to be “obsolete.” If “the time frame of obsolescence is exceedingly brief, such that initial use cannot be accommodated at all, this condition may be categorized as programmatic failure.” In order to avoid programmatic failure, it’s important to begin with a good grasp of the program and how it is related to and later exhibited in the form of a building itself. It will be good to keep this in mind, after I actually define my program.