On Left and Right: Chirality in Architecture

Chirality of an object is the property of potentially having a left-form and a right-form: a pair of hands is a classical example. Spiral elements in buildings are well known, and their spirality renders them chiral, yet we are unaware of a routine reference to the following basic question: Having designed a building which is chiral, which form should be constructed - the left-handed or the righthanded one? Whereas in natural science the investigation of handedness effects is central and appears in many of its branches, in architecture, which relies heavily on shape, form and symmetry, considerations of chirality - a key structural descriptor - are non-existent, although asymmetry and twisted shapes have been commonly used. The aim of this paper is to familiarize architects with the language and concept of chirality, and to describe the intimate, relevant link between chirality and architecture.