A Pattern Language

A Pattern Language: Towns, Buildings, Construction is a 1977 book on <a href="/facts/Architecture/FccThs8G">architecture</a>, <a href="/facts/Urban_design/Bbhb9ykJ">urban design</a>, and community <a href="/facts/Livability/37ljmgAH">livability</a>. It was authored by <a href="/facts/Christopher_Alexander/Hrd2muer">Christopher Alexander</a>, <a href="/facts/Sara_Ishikawa/dVLUUGGP">Sara Ishikawa</a> and <a href="/facts/Murray_Silverstein/2hAWmEBC">Murray Silverstein</a> of the Center for Environmental Structure of <a href="/facts/Berkeley%2c_California/WBVjzd5l">Berkeley, California</a>, with writing credits also to Max Jacobson, Ingrid Fiksdahl-King and Shlomo Angel. Decades after its publication, it is still one of the best-selling books on architecture.
The book creates a new language, what the authors call a <a href="/facts/Pattern_language/U0Xbp7nx">pattern language</a> derived from timeless entities called patterns. As they write on page xxxv of the introduction, "All 253 patterns together form a language." Patterns describe a problem and then offer a solution. In doing so the authors intend to give ordinary people, not only professionals, a way to work with their neighbors to improve a town or neighborhood, design a house for themselves or work with colleagues to design an office, workshop, or public building such as a school.

A Pattern Language open-in-new

A Pattern Language