Structural Element

The individual architectural forms that carry and transfer load through a building: the arch, the vault in its several forms, the dome, the column and the pilaster, the buttress and the flying buttress, and regional load-bearing assemblies such as the Chinese bracket system dougong. Belongs here: any named structural form that a building actually incorporates as a load-bearing or load-transferring piece, whatever the era or building tradition. Does not belong here: the raw substances such elements are built from, grouped under material, or the broader constructional strategies such as the cantilever or the space frame that an element may be deployed within, grouped under structural principle.