Age of Invention A Series by Anton Howes antonhowes.substack.com I’m a historian of innovation. I write mostly about the causes of Britain’s Industrial Revolution, focusing on the lives of the individual innovators who made it happen. I’m interested in everything from the exploits of sixteenth-century alchemists to the schemes of Victorian engineers. My research explores why they became innovators, and the institutions they created to promote innovation even further. Upstream, Downstream inventioninnovationhistoryindustry
Functionalism can be a kind of religion We are not now inclined to regard modern heating and cooling systems as representative of a spiritual realm. The physical principles involved in their operation are thoroughly understood; there is no mystery about them. They are simply functional, designed according to straightforward engineering practice to serve their intended function as efficiently and conveniently as possible. And yet functionalism itself can be a kind of religion. ...From the fifties and sixties we have inherited numerous heating and cooling systems created within an ethos of universal convenience. Machines to maintain our thermal comfort were conceived of as mechanical servants, providing for our every need while, like an English butler, remaining as unobtrusive as possible. Lisa Heschong, Thermal Delight in Architecture Humble servants function