Vintage Architecture, the 5 Architectural Orders Business Card

Five Architectural Orders by Giacomo Barozzi da Vignola, 1562. This vintage illustration Renaissance Era architecture image comes from the first of Vignola's two books which helped formulate the canon of classical architectural style. Regola delli cinque ordini d'architettura ("Canon of the Five Orders of Architecture"), presented Vignola's practical system for constructing columns in the five classical orders (Tuscan, Doric, Ionic, Corinthian and Composite) utilizing proportions which Vignola derived from his own measurements of classical Roman monuments. The clarity and ease of use of Vignola's treatise caused it to become in succeeding centuries the most published book in architectural history.