--- product_id: 1705458 title: "A Pattern Language: Towns, Buildings, Construction (Center for Environmental Structure Series)" price: "£42.34" currency: GBP in_stock: true reviews_count: 13 url: https://www.desertcart.co.uk/products/1705458-a-pattern-language-towns-buildings-construction-center-for-environmental-structure store_origin: GB region: United Kingdom --- # A Pattern Language: Towns, Buildings, Construction (Center for Environmental Structure Series) **Price:** £42.34 **Availability:** ✅ In Stock ## Quick Answers - **What is this?** A Pattern Language: Towns, Buildings, Construction (Center for Environmental Structure Series) - **How much does it cost?** £42.34 with free shipping - **Is it available?** Yes, in stock and ready to ship - **Where can I buy it?** [www.desertcart.co.uk](https://www.desertcart.co.uk/products/1705458-a-pattern-language-towns-buildings-construction-center-for-environmental-structure) ## Best For - Customers looking for quality international products ## Why This Product - Free international shipping included - Worldwide delivery with tracking - 15-day hassle-free returns ## Description You can use this book to design a house for yourself with your family; you can use it to work with your neighbors to improve your town and neighborhood; you can use it to design an office, or a workshop, or a public building. And you can use it to guide you in the actual process of construction. After a ten-year silence, Christopher Alexander and his colleagues at the Center for Environmental Structure are now publishing a major statement in the form of three books which will, in their words, "lay the basis for an entirely new approach to architecture, building and planning, which will we hope replace existing ideas and practices entirely." The three books are The Timeless Way of Building , The Oregon Experiment , and this book, A Pattern Language . At the core of these books is the idea that people should design for themselves their own houses, streets, and communities. This idea may be radical (it implies a radical transformation of the architectural profession) but it comes simply from the observation that most of the wonderful places of the world were not made by architects but by the people. At the core of the books, too, is the point that in designing their environments people always rely on certain "languages," which, like the languages we speak, allow them to articulate and communicate an infinite variety of designs within a forma system which gives them coherence. This book provides a language of this kind. It will enable a person to make a design for almost any kind of building, or any part of the built environment. "Patterns," the units of this language, are answers to design problems (How high should a window sill be? How many stories should a building have? How much space in a neighborhood should be devoted to grass and trees?). More than 250 of the patterns in this pattern language are given: each consists of a problem statement, a discussion of the problem with an illustration, and a solution. As the authors say in their introduction, many of the patterns are archetypal, so deeply rooted in the nature of things that it seemly likely that they will be a part of human nature, and human action, as much in five hundred years as they are today. ## Features - Oxford University Press USA ## Technical Specifications | Specification | Value | |---------------|-------| | Best Sellers Rank | #9,361 in Books ( See Top 100 in Books ) #1 in Urban & Land Use Planning (Books) #1 in Architectural Criticism #2 in Architectural Drafting & Presentation | | Customer Reviews | 4.7 out of 5 stars 1,040 Reviews | ## Images ![A Pattern Language: Towns, Buildings, Construction (Center for Environmental Structure Series) - Image 1](https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/61DirDeK3tL.jpg) ## Customer Reviews ### ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Review *by D***R on November 22, 2025* ### ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Review *by J***S on June 29, 2009* ### ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Review *by B***N on August 28, 2004* ## Frequently Bought Together - A Pattern Language: Towns, Buildings, Construction (Center for Environmental Structure Series) - The Timeless Way of Building - The Oregon Experiment (Center for Environmental Structure Series) --- ## Why Shop on Desertcart? - 🛒 **Trusted by 1.3+ Million Shoppers** — Serving international shoppers since 2016 - 🌍 **Shop Globally** — Access 737+ million products across 21 categories - 💰 **No Hidden Fees** — All customs, duties, and taxes included in the price - 🔄 **15-Day Free Returns** — Hassle-free returns (30 days for PRO members) - 🔒 **Secure Payments** — Trusted payment options with buyer protection - ⭐ **TrustPilot Rated 4.5/5** — Based on 8,000+ happy customer reviews **Shop now:** [https://www.desertcart.co.uk/products/1705458-a-pattern-language-towns-buildings-construction-center-for-environmental-structure](https://www.desertcart.co.uk/products/1705458-a-pattern-language-towns-buildings-construction-center-for-environmental-structure) --- *Product available on Desertcart United Kingdom* *Store origin: GB* *Last updated: 2026-05-17*