Inarchitecture, apilaster is both a load-bearing section of thickened wall orcolumn integrated into a wall, and a purely decorativeelement inclassical architecture which gives the appearance of a supporting column and articulates an extent of wall. As an ornament it consists of a flat surface raised from the main wall surface, usually treated as though it were a column, with acapital at the top,plinth (base) at the bottom, and the various other column elements. In contrast to a Classical pilaster, anengaged column orbuttress can support the structure of a wall and roof above.
In humananatomy, a pilaster is a ridge that extends vertically across thefemur, which is unique tomodern humans. Its structural function is unclear.[1]
A pilaster is foremost a load-bearing architectural element used widely throughout the world and its history where a structural load is carried by a thickened section of wall or column integrated into a wall.
It is also a purelyornamental element used inClassical architecture. As such it may be defined as a flattened column which has lost its three-dimensional and tactile value.".[2]
In discussingLeon Battista Alberti's use of pilasters, which Alberti reintroduced into wall-architecture,Rudolf Wittkower wrote: "The pilaster is the logical transformation of the column for the decoration of a wall.
A pilaster appears with acapital.[3] andentablature, also in "low-relief" or flattened against the wall. Generally, a pilaster often repeats all parts and proportions of an order column; however, unlike it, a pilaster is usually devoid ofentasis.
Pilasters often appear on the sides of a door frame or window opening on thefacade of a building, and are sometimes paired with columns orpillars set directly in front of them at some distance away from the wall, which support a roof structure above, such as aportico. These vertical elements can also be used to support a recessedarchivolt around a doorway. The pilaster can be replaced by ornamentalbrackets supporting the entablature or a balcony over a doorway.
When a pilaster appears at the corner intersection of two walls it is known as acanton.[4]
As with a column, a pilaster can have a plain or fluted surface to its profile and can be represented in the mode of numerous architectural styles. During theRenaissance andBaroque architects used a range of pilaster forms.[5] In thegiant order pilasters appear as two storeys tall, linking floors in a single unit.
^Wittkower, Rudolf (1940). "Alberti's Approach to Antiquity in Architecture".Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes.4 (1/2: Oct., 1940 - Jan., 1941). London: Warburg Institute: 3.doi:10.2307/750120.JSTOR750120.S2CID195049595.
^A useful phrase to identify a section of pilaster without a capital, with only its fluting to identify its relation to a column, is "pilaster strip".
^Ching, Francis D. K. (1995).A Visual Dictionary of Architecture. Van Nostrand Reinhold Company.ISBN0-442-02462-2, p. 266.
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