When Andrew Witt discusses the increasing tendency towards automation in design, he begins by distinguishing between architectural knowledge and instrumental knowledge—as “an intrinsic understanding by the architect of formal organization principles” (39) versus “the procedures to successfully operate a certain type of technology” (41). Drawing on Early Modern drawing machines and crafting techniques, he invigorates the often complementary and at times symbiotic relation of advances in design and instrumental knowledge. As he traces how the latter can encapsulate knowledge on engineering and building constraints within machines, one may read such interdependencies of curvature and carpentry across history (59–63) as a blueprint for how technology and craftsmanship can concur, based on mutual understanding and inspiration.
