There is a science to working with existing forms and structures. It is comprised of a peculiar mixture of theory, research, and practicality — a science of “found objects.” It does not attempt to build from scratch, but takes what exists and works to transform it to something useful or relevant. The French anthropologist Claude Levi-Strauss has described it as bricolage. Practitioners are bricoleurs, which translates rather clumsily as “enlightened tinkers with what is at hand.” In an age of increasing scarcity, such a person is potentially a kind of hero, someone who can see with different eyes and utilize available resources. A lack or problem is not seen only as a burden, but an opportunity. A bricoleur can see what was, is, and can be as a splendid continuum — one that must come full circle. Whereas most developers destroy before rebuilding, restorationists rebuild to recapture former glories, and designers prefer a clean slate, the bricoleur works from the assumption that the true potential of a house, a block, a whole town, or any other existing area, has scarcely been tapped.
