CORREAL ENVIRONMENT
Frederick J. Kiesler believed life was composed of interacting forces and developed the concept of "correalism," which "expresses the dynamics of continual interaction between man and his natural and technological environments."1 These three environments (human, natural, technological) were constantly in flux and co-reality was the manifestation their relationships. Kiesler believed that the technological environments consisted of a system of tools that responded to human needs, which in turn were in response to the natural environment. However, as the natural environment constantly changed, so too did these needs of the human environment, which affected the output of tools of the technological environment. To correspond with these changes, Kiesler proposed that the objects that composed the environments experienced "heredity," that biological, social, and technological traits were passed down to future generations and constantly evolving.
In order to translate his views of correalism to architecture, Kiesler theorized the design potential through the lens of correality with "biotechnique" and "continuous construction," a design and construction method that derives "from the evolutionary potentialities of man" and attempted to imitate the continuous properties of nature by "[aiming] at the reduction of joints, making for higher resistance, higher rigidity, easier maintenance, and lower costs." Throughout his career, Kiesler turned to biotechnique and continuous construction as his "repeated answer to the architectural crisis of authenticity."2 Projects such as his Space House, Endless House, and Mobile-Home-Library hint at an attempt at translating his theory to practice; however, the extent of which he was able to do so has been questionable. For instance, the reasoning for displaying mostly textures and ornamental aspects of his Space House when publishing it in Architectural Record has been called into question if his agency was to promote a "a continuous unit overcoming the four-fold division of column, roof, floor, wall," which he believed was "a conversion of compression into continuous tension."3 Still, Kiesler's correal environment provides a productive model where one is able to derive an actual theory for a design and construction technique based on a worldview that was not necessary trending at the time.