Sense of Scale: A History of Full Size Drawing in Architecture

This is a book project that addresses the history of architectural drawings known as ‘1:1’ or ‘full-scale’. For centuries, critical details, components or joints were commonly drawn on building surfaces or on large sheets, without a scale reduction, and the practice only recently ended following the rise of digital drawing. Although occasionally discussed in the literature, this project assembles, for the first time, a historical account of full-size drawing in architecture, from antiquity until the wide-spread adoption of CAD in the early 1990’s.

It seems architects are losing their sense of scale, with symptoms such as flattened buildings facades, poorly proportioned floor plans, and over-sized details and building assemblies. Simply put, our tacit knowledge of spatial and material relations, once central to an architect’s craft, needs to be examined again. In positing a history of the now-defunct practice of full-size drawing, this book project provides an opportune critique of scale, as both a historical practice and current concept.

This book will be published by gta Verlag (ETH Zürich) in 2027 in a large-format, ambitious publication, composed of a lengthy scholarly manuscript and high-quality image reproductions.