There is no exact formula or single recipe for initiating an architectural project. However, during the conceptual stage, architects rely on a range of mechanisms or strategies that help us give form to the ideas we seek to materialize. It is important to emphasize that these mechanisms are not design ideas in themselves, even though they are often confused with them during the creative process.

Ideas, in the architectural context, are a set of intentions that generate a central concept from which the entire project unfolds. They arise from an understanding of the architectural program, functional needs, the aesthetic values of a society or an individual, as well as the analysis of the physical—natural and artificial—conditions of the site where the work is located. Mechanisms, on the other hand, are the tools that allow those ideas to be constructed and give shape to the concepts. In other words: mechanisms are the means, and ideas are the end.

As Campo Baeza points out, architectural mechanisms are formal strategies used to achieve specific spatial results: they are not ideas, but operations that translate ideas into matter. For example, a double-height space connected to another through a vertical shift does not constitute an architectural idea; it is simply a mechanism that materializes the idea of a diagonal space.

Analogous to literary devices—metaphor, alliteration, or hyperbole—which a writer or poet employs to effectively express their ideas, architectural mechanisms are tools designers use to project with mastery and precision a vision to be materialized. These may appear as simple actions—such as the 84 verbs compiled by Richard Serra in his Verb List(1967)—or as more complex strategies involving spatial concepts such as order, proportion, or light. In many cases, they even translate into pragmatic decisions that respond to technical needs, solving constructive, aesthetic, and functional problems with common sense.

What makes these design operations valuable is their timeless and universal nature: they can be applied to any project, in any place, and at any moment in time. The Farnsworth House by Mies van der Rohe and the Casa Malaparte by Adalberto Libera exemplify this. Although they respond to different ideas and were conceived in distinct contexts, both rely on the same architectural mechanism: the horizontal platform. For Mies, the central idea was the lightness with which the house should rest on flood-prone land, while also emphasizing the transparency characteristic of his tectonic language. For Libera, by contrast, the idea was radical: to fuse the dwelling with the rock on which it stands, through a massive stereotomic podium that underscores the horizon and establishes a tension between sky, sea, ground, and human being.

Mies van der Rohe. Farnsworth House. 1950 | Plano, Illinois, EE.UU.

Jørn Utzon. Drawing of a Maya platform. 1949 | Yucatán, México.

This architectural device, described by Kenneth Frampton and used since ancient civilizations—Egyptian, Persian, Greek, or Mayan—made it possible to build temples, pyramids, and ritual spaces that connected people with their immediate surroundings and with the sacred. The horizontal plane, as defined by Baeza, is enhanced through perspective. If a large, horizontal rectangular plane rises before us, we perceive it as a trapezoid; if the plane is placed lower, the trapezoid becomes more pronounced; but if it is elevated to coincide with eye level, it disappears, leaving only a straight line. This is precisely what happens in the Farnsworth and in the Malaparte: by positioning the horizontal plane at eye level, the ground becomes a line, and the whole acquires either unparalleled lightness (Farnsworth) or monumental force (Malaparte). In both cases, the mechanism transcends itself and is translated into extraordinary, memorable, and universal projects.

Adalberto Libera. Malaparte House. 1943 | Capri, Italia.