In 1926, Walter Gropius presented a housing density diagram that calculated the spacing between buildings in proportion to their height, ensuring that each housing block would receive an appropriate amount of light. Shortly thereafter, in 1931, Adams, Lewis, and Orton argued that the beauty of the Manhattan skyline was due to the 'mass effect': a collection of buildings of varying heights, forms, and facades located in close proximity to one another (Koolhaas, 1994).
While the former image affirms the value of rationality, the latter argues in favor of a lack of rules. One defends order; the other, anarchy. Both express the debate between planning and freedom. Architecture has typically leaned toward the former, as both its tools (design and previsualization) and its objective (the definition of order) make it difficult for its products to contain the unpredictability of the latter. In fact, if such spontaneity has come to be discussed in architecture, it is because someone has encountered it elsewhere—as when Rudofsky observes vernacular constructions or when Turner proposes Peruvian shantytowns as a model.
