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One of the best examples of color planes is the Doge’s Palace in Venice (c. 1340). The building defies the logic of construction by putting the heaviest mass of walls above the lightest array of slender columns, making the palace look like it is floating atop a skirt of lace. The beige color of the more solid part contrasts with the off-white of the lacy underskirt. The designer used the elements of Gothic architecture, the pointed arches interwoven with four leaf clover windows, in a way no other Gothic architect had ever used them.
COLOR PLANES
The Casa del Fascio is
another breakthrough in
Italy that came in the 1930’s when an
architect named Giuseppe Terragni defied
traditional styles and designed a modern building
in a kind of cube made of shifting planes of concrete,
leaving the building looking very solid in one direction and
very open in the other. It gives an appearance a little like the
end grain of a block of wood that looks solid from the side. This
building has influenced many architects throughout the world.
