Gothic Research Library
Studio Fall 2019 | Lars Spuybroek
In collaboration with Kaila Andino

Situated on Harvard’s campus, this research library emerges from an analytical study of Gothic tracery- specifically the J, C, and S curves that structure rose and lancet windows. Through extensive cataloging and classification of these curves by symmetry, proportion, and tangent relationships, my partner and I developed a family of idealized S-curves that became the generative system for the building.
These curves informed a series of screening elements that then translated into a columnar language. Shifting the columns from a standard orthogonal grid produced a hierarchy of expanded rooms, circular voids, and cross-floor sightlines that shape the building’s interior experience. This distributed field of curves also influenced the overall massing and window placement on the facade, embedding the logic of tracery into both the structural rhythms and the spatial character of the library. The result is an environment where historical geometric systems are reinterpreted as contemporary organizational devices.