loor plans in his tower designs in the Johnson Building at Racine and elsewhere. Rudolph preferred to double up his columns in many of his designs since, set in pairs, they gave greater visual strength and direction than a static single column. At Dharmala, these twin columns are cross-braced at their base in a manner somewhat similar to the diagonal bracing on Norman Foster’s famous Hong Kong Shanghai Bank. At ground level, the entrance area with its many open levels and balcony walkway not only creates a sense of spaciousness appropriate to this headquarters building, but the stepped back offices surrounding the atrium create a cool, breeze-filled shaded open space It was however in the Far East that Rudolph, perhaps interlaced with balconies and walkways. The effect illustrates Rudolph’s ability to create well- proportioned human space inside the building contained by the office tower above whose dual columns thrust upwards through this entrance.
The space of the courtyard increases at each level like an inverted cone which allows natural light to stream in reflecting off the white tiled finishes. The use of these white tiles throughout the project – on columns, walls, spandrels and balconies – protects the concrete from mold growth in the humid climate and is a solution often used in the country. It also creates a feeling of cool, pristine white elegance and the small tiles give a friendly scale and texture to this otherwise large building. The multi-leveled terraces and vine-filled balconies, the waterfalls and water channels all with sloping spandrels help to unify and create the human scale characteristics of this elegant Late-Modern headquarters. It is a well-conceived design handled with the mastery of experience, exemplifying how a Late-Modern building fits in with its surroundings by means of a design language derived for its context, it creates human scale internal spaces, is impeccably detailed and uses sound technology and good materials. It is, of course, also generated from sound functional and structural requirements. In all the Dharmala building is a convincing testament to Rudolph’s life-time work and a confident reaffirmation of the design principles which he evolved and always held so dear.
The architectural drawing techniques developed by Paul Rudolph are unique, vibrant in their manual execution and a trademark for which he is now justly famous. They concentrate on the sequence of producing presentation drawings; from conception to sketch to final design with drawings that encompass plans, elevations and, particularly, sections that bring a quality of three-dimensional representation to the design process. His single-point perspectives imposed on an accurately drawn section are an immaculate way of portraying the internal space and character of a building at these formative stages. By illustrating the scheme realistically with as much detail, texture and shadows as possible, his techniques attempt to bring the building prematurely to life, to assist both the designer and the client to visualize the building while it is still only a drawing. Rudolph describes these intricate graphical illustrations in the introduction to the book which features only the presentational drawings of his designs, Paul Rudolph, Architectural Drawings.
Rudolph explains the complex interaction between sketches, renderings and the design process: ‘Buildings which have been designed but were never built still exist for me, if for no one else’. (14) Sketches, he said, were the most direct line between the architect’s imagination and the tangible. Renderings are prepared when the ideas have become crystallized and because the clients’ insatiable desire to ‘see what the building looks like’ must be met. He was alive, however, to the limitations of these illustrations, pointing out that they only show the building from one view and at one point in time. Design drawings have a life of their own, he said. In explaining his presentation techniques in this manner Rudolph displays a Beaux Arts approach to the process, where the desig