CONCEPT
Bigness
Rem Koolhaas's thesis that beyond a certain scale a structure acquires properties of its size — properties no one designed, that were not present below
the threshold, and that invalidate the theories built from smaller systems.
Bigness is the central concept of
Rem Koolhaas's 1995 essay of the same name, collected in
S,M,L,XL: "Beyond a certain scale, architecture acquires the properties of Bigness." The claim is precise and radical. A large building is not merely a small building made bigger; it crosses a threshold at which it becomes a different kind of thing entirely, governed by laws that did not operate below the threshold and that no architect intended. Four specific properties appear: the building's interior and exterior decouple, so that what happens deep inside becomes independent of and invisible from the facade; the program becomes so vast that no single architectural gesture can encompass it and the building can no longer present a single coherent image to the world; the building's impact becomes independent of its quality, meaning that sheer scale gives it consequences regardless of merit; and the building constitutes its own context, no longer part of any urban tissue but answerable to