Today it is complexity studies, with their starting point in physics, that define the current approach to the concept of complexity. They have established a new connection between the natural sciences and information technology and have thus become a central premise of computer-based approaches to design.

As models and paradigms, patterns have been helping to orient architects since the Middle Ages. But patterns are also the basis of the history of ornament, an aesthetic phenomenon that links all times and cultures at a fundamental level. Ornament - and hence pattern as well - was abolished by the avant-garde in the first half of the twentieth century, but the notion of pattern has taken on new meaning and importance since the 1960s.

Complexity research has ultimately shown that even highly complex, dynamic patterns may be based on simple behavioral rules, and that has allowed the...

Muster im Sinne von Vorlage und Modell bieten den Architekten seit dem Mittelalter Orientierung. Muster sind gleichzeitig auch die Grundlage der Geschichte des Ornaments, einem asthetischen Phanomen, das alle Zeiten und Kulturen auf essentielle Weise miteinander verbindet. Nach der Abschaffung des Ornaments und somit auch des Musters durch die Avantgarde in der ersten Halfte des 20. Jh.s gewinnt der Musterbegriff seit den 1960er Jahren neue Bedeutung. Die Komplexitatsforschung konnte schlielich zeigen, dass auch hochkomplexe dynamische Muster auf einfachen Verhaltensregeln beruhen konnen...