Function

In modern architecture, pilotis are ground-level supporting columns. A prime example is Le Corbusier's Villa Savoye in Poissy, France. Another is Patrick Gwynne's The Homewood in Surrey, England.

Beyond their support function, the pilotis (or piers) raise the architectural volume, lighten it and free a space for circulation under the construction. They refine a building's connectivity with the land by allowing for parking, garden or driveway below while allowing a sense of floating and lightness in the architecture itself. In hurricane-prone areas, pilotis may be used to raise the inhabited space of a building above typical storm surge levels.

Le Corbusier used them in a variety of forms from slender posts to the massive brutalist look of the Marseilles Housing Unit (1945-1952) with a range of bases, inclusions and surfaces. This was part of Le Corbusier's idea of machine-like efficiency where land, people and buildings would work together optimally.

Australian architect, the late Harry Seidler incorporated pilotis in the Brutalist-style private residence, Harry and Penelope Seidler House at Killara in Sydney when it was built in 1966-67.

References

• Article: "Pilote, die" in: Pevsner, Honour, Fleming: Lexikon der Weltarchitektur, München 1987
• historial.org/us/renseign/doss7-5.htm
• trp.dundee.ac.uk/research/glossary/pilotis.html
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