ABSTRACT
Tool of architectural representation in the 1980s played a central role in shaping architectural design. They were, however, not “objects,” “things,” or “materials” with their own independent causal historical agency. Rather, they were manifestations of symbolic meanings entangled with language, history, and culture. This chapter addresses the development of collage practices in the design studio at the University of Cambridge as an illustration of this point. It explores how practices of photocopying, cutting, transferring, and blending images embodied the philosophical ideas that Dalibor Vesely had brought to bear upon architectural education. Such material techniques had their own constraints and historical conditioning, most notably in terms of the historical appearance of the photocopier, yet these constraints were never simply determined by material history, but were mastered and worked through in meaningful ways that related the architectural design student to broader philosophical ideas and a broader sense of moral and ethical purpose.
