ABSTRACT
Material and structure are basic terms in architecture, easy to describe and permanently used in the debate about architecture. But how do we offer our students a way to understand the meaning of tectonics? According to Eduard Sekler, structure as an abstract term is materialised with construction, but only tectonics has the potential to make the two legible. In other words: the raw and innocent material needs a structural idea in order to develop a consistent form, but with the tectonic approach, the architect is able to inscribe meaning into it. Designing does not stop at the point where manufacturing begins, moreover it almost never ends until the last member of the construction is set into place – this perpetual aspect is a main concern in the cultivation of a tectonic approach in architecture. The cultivation of working in full scale in the University of Liechtenstein as well as in European workshops in the last ten years tried to contribute to the discourse about tectonics in the teaching of architecture in Europe.
