Colour Strategies in Architecture

This practice-led research portfolio includes the book Colour Strategies in Architecture, original artworks and the design of nine installations of an exhibition that toured 10 venues. The research offers new insights into the strategic use of colour in architecture through field investigation of a series of buildings designed between the 1920s and the present day, by six architectural practices. New research methods have been established to make ‘close readings’ through observation of the colours used in the buildings, followed by an interdisciplinary discursive analysis of the palettes, location and extents of the colour. The fieldwork observations and documented palettes were synthesised with research from texts and photographic records. The proposed strategies are intended to be transferable into architectural design practice to promote a greater integration of colour within the design process. The use of hand-paintings and collage as part of a visual research methodology is suggested as a technique that embeds the development of new knowledge through making and designerly analysis. The method of production of these images became an inherent part of the research. The images are therefore both the research, and one of the means through which the research findings are communicated to the audience. Colour Strategies in Architecture has been published as a second edition in German, Farbstrategien in der Architektur.