Taken from an adult education course pamphlet on the use of stone in architecture and construction offered by the Republic of Turkey Ministry of National Education’s Directorate General for Lifelong Learning, this illustration bears the title: “Types of Stones According to the Processing Degree.” Prepared mostly for the education of builders and apprentices, the document depicts an extracted and cut stone's journey to be refined to shape a construction material. This journey consists of several steps: first the stone is roughly processed , then gradually, it is thinned out of its “shapeless” or “natural” form to transition into a smooth and practical geometric shape.
How much do we pay attention to the nuances of this process and the definitions that come with that? IMSAD, Association of Turkish Construction Material Producers, gathers an index of sectors involved in the building's construction period where “rough” and “fine” structures are the first two definitive headings residing with climate, electricity, landscaping, and services.1 The rough structure depicts the “naked” state, emphasizing the tectonic aspect of the structure, such as the hewn stone found in this figure.●1 The steady accumulation is under the “rough” structure, from foundation-seismic reinforcement to concrete touring mounts and gypsum use. “Finished” structure, on the other hand, embodies materials such as tiles, glasses, sound or heat insulations, and paint.
Architects are often tempted to give more attention to the building and the materials at their finished state, and roughness is considered nothing more than a steppingstone in the process. In fact, rough cleaning is very different from fine cleaning, and rough calculation is nothing like fine calculation. What possibilities would arise if we understood roughness not as a process, but more as another degree of a finished state?
