The Architecture of Sound

_Captive Image_ posted a photo:

The pipe organ at St Leonard's Church, Streatham, London.
Church organs are extraordinary instruments, combining musical craftsmanship with architectural design. And this particular example makes no attempt to conceal its engineering behind elaborate Gothic ornamentation.
Instead, the pipes become the architecture.
Tall central pipes rise towards the apex of the timber roof, flanked by smaller ranks arranged in carefully balanced geometric formations. The surrounding wooden case frames the metalwork, creating a striking composition of triangles, vertical lines and contrasting materials.
The arrangement is as much a piece of visual design as it is a musical instrument.
The visible pipes form the organ's façade; the complete instrument may contain additional pipes and mechanisms concealed behind them. Each sounding pipe produces a particular pitch and tone, while combinations of pipes allow the organist to create an enormous range of musical textures.
Photographed from below, the instrument seems to reach upwards into the roof structure, its angular wooden framework echoing the geometry of the building itself.
An instrument designed to fill a church with sound, yet just as impressive when completely silent.