Less is Less, More is More
“Less is More” is used to denote achieving a greater effect with the least material.
It is also used to mean achieving a greater result with the least effort.
In architecture, you can observe that most of the minimalist approach design live up to the mantra of “less is more”.
In its effect, it denotes a significance:-
*Absence and Presence
Less also means signifying the absence of a lot of things, which in turns make you feel the presence of the things that should be there in the first place.
It could result in a kind of an emotional feeling, a reminiscent, or even a feeling of emptiness that justifies the “more” part of the idea.
But if you look closely, the term “Less is More” is generally contradicting rhetoric.
When less is more, in inversion,
more is less, eventually,
more could mean more,
and less could mean less.
Some architects later went further and even came up with the mantras like “Less is Bore” (to denote that the less part as the manifestation of the laziness in developing a design and the less effort in the materialization which actually make one feel uninspired), and “Less is a Whore” (probably to mean doing less as something trendy to follow to get business).
So, with the four propositions, it comes to the conclusion that whenever you design a building with “Less is More”, it shouldn’t really just boil down to one possibility that the effect of “less” immediately means more, but the objective reality that:-
*Fewer things, least effort, less impactful design, a least effective result
*Fewer things, least effort, greater impact design, a highly effective result
*More things, more effort, less impactful design, a least effective result
*More things, more effort, greater impact design, a highly effective result
The underlying meaning like the absence-presence proposition should be worth taking note of and you should never really live up to the idea of “less is more” as your only mantra of all the things that you do in a life filled with endless possibilities.