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Le Corbusier (1887-1963) was not afraid to advertise his achievements in a wide range of media: painting, drawing, lithography, collage, sculpture, and tapestry, not to mention architecture and urbanism. But about one branch of his... more
Le Corbusier (1887-1963) was not afraid to advertise his achievements in a wide range of media: painting, drawing, lithography, collage, sculpture, and tapestry, not to mention architecture and urbanism. But about one branch of his activity he always remained strangely silent. Between 1906 and 1916, and again from 1936 to 1938, Le Corbusier took hundreds of photographs. He published very few of these, and maintained that photography was a stultifying activity, good only for lazy people. The book 'Le Corbusier Secret Photographer' by Tim Benton complements earlier research on the photographic output of Le Corbusier. The work attributes prints and negatives held in different photo collections,  it analyses the photographic equipment owned and used by Le Corbusier, and it assesses Le Corbusier's artistic development in the field of photography and movies over time.
The Whitney Museum’s move to its new building in Manhattan’s Meatpacking District, designed by the Renzo Piano Building Workshop, returns the Whitney to its roots; in 1918 Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney and Juliana Force opened the Whitney... more
The Whitney Museum’s move to its new building in Manhattan’s Meatpacking District, designed by the Renzo Piano Building Workshop, returns the Whitney to its roots; in 1918 Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney and Juliana Force opened the Whitney Studio Club on West 4th street, and in 1931 the first Whitney Museum opened in three rowhouses a few blocks to the south on West 8th Street. The new 20,000-square-metre building at 99 Gansevoort Street fulfils the need for more exhibition space, and adds a much needed collection of public, educational and curatorial spaces that have become so important to the operation of contemporary museums.
Renzo Piano’s buildings usually stand up to the closest scrutiny, but like many architects, he has suffered the indignity of poor execution that characterises the US construction industry.
In ‘Urban Literacy’, Delft University associate professor Klaske Havik interrogates the relationship between literature and architecture, arguing for a literary approach to architectural education, research and design practice. The book... more
In ‘Urban Literacy’, Delft University associate professor Klaske Havik interrogates the relationship between literature and architecture, arguing
for a literary approach to architectural education, research and design
practice. The book sits firmly in the phenomenological discourse, framing itself in the context of the philosophy of Merleau-Ponty, Heidegger and Bachelard, yet it is mostly based on a particular reading of Henri Lefebvre. Havik takes Lefebvre’s triad of social space: the conceived’, the ‘perceived’ and the ‘lived’ to argue that architecture should appeal not just to our visual senses but to the full complexity of our multi-sensory experience of space. Architects don’t usually design with the ‘lived’ experience in mind, Havik contends, whereas literature abounds with rich descriptions of architectural space, sensory experiences, time and memory. This poetic potential, she argues, should be applied to architectural design to fill this lacuna.
Reviews of monographs by the architects Kengo Kuma, Luc Deleu, Bernard Tschumi, and HHF Architects. In order to compete with the web, the genre of the architectural monograph needs to offer more substance over image. Bernard Tschumi – Red... more
Reviews of monographs by the architects Kengo Kuma, Luc Deleu, Bernard Tschumi, and HHF Architects. In order to compete with the web, the genre of the architectural monograph needs to offer more substance over image.
Bernard Tschumi – Red is Not a Color
Rizzoli, 776pp
Kengo Kuma Complete Works
Thames & Hudson, 320pp
HHF Architects Archilife, 336pp
Luc Deleu – TOP Office: Orban Space
Valiz, 420pp
Book review of two books that examine the life and legacy of
the master architect Palladio.
In late 2010, Kenneth Frampton celebrated his eightieth birthday with a one-day conference at the Graduate School for Architecture, Planning and Preservation at Columbia University. The conference was, typically, an act of resistance... more
In late 2010, Kenneth Frampton celebrated his eightieth birthday with a one-day conference at the Graduate School for Architecture, Planning and Preservation at
Columbia University. The conference was, typically, an act of resistance against the prevalent culture of commodification and globalisation and focused on architecture as practice. To this end, five offices were endorsed by Frampton and invited to speak about their work and motivations: Stanley Saitowitz, Brigitte Shim & Howard Sutcliffe,
Rick Joy, John & Patricia Patkau and Steven Holl. In addition to eschewing the prevalent tendency to perceive architecture as a fashionable and expendable consumer product, Frampton thus also decided to put the cult of personality into perspective
and to present Canadian practice on an equal footing with that in the US. The review argues that the work of the offices presented lacks the necessary political bite to address the forces of globalisation and commodification.
The celebrated Finnish architect Juhani Pallasmaa was born in 1936 and came to notice as a theorist with the publication of ‘The Eyes of the Skin (1996): Architecture and the Senses’. The book is a phenomenological account that offers... more
The celebrated Finnish architect Juhani Pallasmaa was born in 1936
and came to notice as a theorist with the publication of ‘The Eyes of the Skin (1996): Architecture and the Senses’. The book is a phenomenological account that offers architecture as a multi-sensory experience as an alternative to the current emphasis on visual spectacle. In doing so Pallasmaa reminds us that one of the tasks of architecture is to address the deeper existential questions within us.
Pallasmaa’s book under review, ‘The Embodied Image – Imagination
and Imagery in Architecture’ develops this discourse. It argues that, in
our world of mass communication and consumption, the human imagination is diminished by the continuous bombardment of images. Thrown at us for commercial and ideological purposes, it dulls our senses, conditions us, and fragments our understanding of the world. The resulting alienation can be countered, according to Pallasmaa, by recuperating the image as a bearer of poetic content and meaning so it can inspire our mental imagery and imagination.
The review ends by posing the question if the embodied experience of two projects by Rem Koolhaas (OMA) and Steven Holl are, by this reading, really so qualitatively different.
The 'Art-Architecture Complex' by the art historian Hal Foster argues that the global styles of contemporary high architecture offer inauthentic spectacle in place of visceral experience. Thomas Wensing meets him to ask what went wrong,... more
The 'Art-Architecture Complex' by the art historian Hal Foster argues that the global styles of contemporary high architecture offer inauthentic
spectacle in place of visceral experience. Thomas Wensing meets him to ask what went wrong, and what architecture can learn from art.
The Beach Beneath the Street wavers between historiography and a call to action. McKenzie Wark sets the tone immediately, poignantly describing our epoch as a time which offers only ‘spectacles of disintegration’, a time in which we are... more
The Beach Beneath the Street wavers between historiography and a call to action. McKenzie Wark sets the tone immediately, poignantly describing our epoch as a time which offers only ‘spectacles of disintegration’, a time in which we are asked to choose between one of two possible doom scenarios: ‘capitalism or barbarism’. Within this rather bleak world view Wark proposes to go back in time, specifically to the period of the Situationists, in an attempt to reassess this historical
moment and ignite new possibilities in the here and now.
The revolutionary Spangen social-housing complex (1919-1921) in Rotterdam, by Michiel Brinkman, has recently been immaculately restored (2012). The project pioneered “street in the sky” deck access, an idea that famously inspired Alison... more
The revolutionary Spangen social-housing complex (1919-1921) in Rotterdam, by Michiel Brinkman, has recently been immaculately restored (2012). The project pioneered “street in the sky” deck access, an idea that famously inspired Alison and Peter Smithson’s design of the 1950s Golden Lane housing project in London. The Spangen estate, or Justus van Effen complex, is a rectangular four-story brick urban block, centered around two large courts. Concrete balconies give access to the duplex apartments on the top floors. In its heyday, the project offered many shared amenities, like a public bathhouse located between the two courtyards. A communal spirit was further promoted by making the decks publicly accessible; large cargo lifts allowed tradesmen to reach tenants’ front doors.
This is a review of facsimile editions of two architects' sketchbooks, Eduardo Souto de Moura and Wang Shu. One factor in the staying power of the sketch is its immediacy, another is its physicality. In a world in which we increasingly... more
This is a review of facsimile editions of two architects' sketchbooks, Eduardo Souto de Moura and Wang Shu. One factor in the staying power
of the sketch is its immediacy, another is its physicality. In a world in which we increasingly interact through various technological interfaces, in which architecture is mostly created virtually – before it has to interact with the messy reality of the site – the sketch can be seen as an intimate and individual protest against the prevailing norm. The two sketchbooks, Eduardo Souto de Moura – Sketchbook No. 76, and Wang Shu– Imagining the House, are examples of an architectural process in which hand-drafting still has a place.
This is the closing show (2015) of a 14-month initiative in which interdisciplinary teams of local practitioners and international architecture and urbanism experts have been invited to produce tactical interventions for six rapidly and... more
This is the closing show (2015) of a 14-month initiative in which interdisciplinary teams of local practitioners and international architecture and urbanism experts have been invited to produce tactical interventions for six rapidly and unevenly growing global metropolises — Hong Kong, Istanbul, Lagos, New York, Mumbai, and Rio de Janeiro.
The six different proposals are responses to the specific nature of the different locations but all favour ‘tactical urbanism’ over more traditional top-down planning activity. Tactical urbanism is about small-scale, often temporary, urban interventions that challenge existing power structures. Pedro Gadanho, the curator of Uneven Growth, posits tactical urbanism as a critical tool against failing official policies and institutions. The interventions are intended to foster public debate and enable activist architects and communities to engage with urban problems in a more immediate way.
With Le Corbusier Secret Photographer, Tim Benton has produced an immaculately researched and well-written book that highlights the development of Le Corbusier’s photographic output. Benton can be rightfully called a Corb expert, and his... more
With Le Corbusier Secret Photographer, Tim Benton has produced an immaculately researched and well-written book that highlights the development of Le Corbusier’s photographic output.
Benton can be rightfully called a Corb expert, and his output is prolific: in 2013 he published Le Corbusier’s Pavilion for Zurich and co-authored the massive Le Corbusier Le Grand, and, in 2007, published The Villas of Le Corbusier and Pierre Jeanneret 1920-1930.
It is well known that the Swiss architect had an ambivalent attitude towards photography: on the one hand, he relied heavily on professional photography to promote his built work and support his discourse but, on the other, he said that he abandoned photography quickly in his career. Like the cubist painter Amédée Ozenfant, he clearly saw photography as a means to an end. Neither shied away from doctoring images of grain silos to make them more purist, so it comes as little surprise that Le Corbusier was not entirely truthful about his relationship to the medium:
he owned many, often professional, cameras over the years and he photographed regularly.
The Future of the Skyscraper is a collection of essays, edited by SOM architects, of people outside or obliquely related to the profession of architecture to think and reflect on skyscraper design. This approach is appealing, since the... more
The Future of the Skyscraper is a collection of essays, edited by SOM architects, of people outside or obliquely related to the profession of architecture to think and reflect on skyscraper design.
This approach is appealing, since the consequences of building skyscrapers with respect to their ecological, material and energy footprints are so large that the decision of their construction ought to be a larger societal question and a shared, public responsibility. In the most positive scenario this building type can help to solve problems of an increasingly urbanised and overcrowded planet: they can make cities denser, function as carbon sinks, generate energy and be used for rainwater retention and urban agriculture. If their explosive, and largely unregulated, growth is left unchecked, however, they will continue to be used to reinforce inequality and class divisions by creating privatised, heavily secured havens for the few, will continue to deplete resources, will create micro climates and heat islands, and last, but not least, will remain a massive contributor to CO2 emissions and thus speed up the process of climate change.
President George W Bush officially acknowledged the existence of the CIA Detention and Interrogation Program in 2006. Established immediately after the attacks of September 11, it consisted of a worldwide network of secret prison... more
President George W Bush officially acknowledged the existence of the CIA Detention and Interrogation Program in 2006. Established immediately after the attacks of September 11, it consisted of a worldwide network of secret prison facilities, the so-called black sites.

Spaces of Disappearance is an attempt at a reconstruction or representation of this classified incarceration network of the early years of the so-called War on Terror by way of maps, diagrams, photographs, witness statements and redacted government and legal memos. It aims to not only reveal the physical nature and experience of these spaces of disappearance, but also to lay bare the political spectacle, the bureaucratic edifice of obfuscation and secrecy, and to show the architectural logistics of the network. Ultimately the book is an attempt to challenge the claims to US sovereign power which supported or attempted to justify these abuses.

In 2014 the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence released the report on the CIA’s Detention and Interrogation Program (also known as the ‘Torture Report’). No one has been held accountable or brought to justice. Secrecy and obfuscation continue to surround the programme.
The book Megastructure Schiphol — Design in Spectacular Simplicity charts the design development of the airport, and reveals how Schiphol is both international in its orientation and as a result of the landscape and public-infrastructure... more
The book Megastructure Schiphol — Design in Spectacular Simplicity charts the design development of the airport, and reveals how Schiphol is both international in its orientation and as a result of the landscape and public-infrastructure planning tradition
of the Netherlands. The various aspects of Schiphol’s design, such as its growth over time, spatial impact and day-to-day operations, are effectively communicated through
so-called visual essays, data visualisations, while the essays give more detailed historical, political and economic background information.
This is a review of the monograph on the work of the Austrian architects Riegler Riewe, situating the work in the local history and architectural context. Eva Guttmann replaces the currently predominating and simplistic account, in which... more
This is a review of the monograph on the work of the Austrian architects Riegler Riewe, situating the work in the local history and architectural context. Eva Guttmann replaces the currently predominating and simplistic account, in which Riegler Riewe’s work is mainly understood in opposition to the Graz School, for a more complex view in which the work is explained as the result of differing circumstances and a variety of ideas. After the introduction by Guttmann, the book starts off with an interview by Otto Kapfinger with Riegler and Riewe. The focus is on the early influences and impressions in their work, such as the post-war modernists surrounding Ferdinand Schuster, relatively unknown local architects such as Josef Klose, and the highly tectonic work of Heinz Bienefeld.
In Reclaiming Gotham: Bill de Blasio and the Movement to End America’s Tale of Two Cities, journalist Juan González documents de Blasio’s rise to power and places it in the context of ‘the maturing of a new grassroots urban political... more
In Reclaiming Gotham: Bill de Blasio and the Movement to End America’s Tale of Two Cities, journalist Juan González documents de Blasio’s rise to power and places it in the context of ‘the maturing of a new grassroots urban political revolt in America’. Juan González’ is one of
the anchors of Democracy Now, the main progressive news programme broadcast in the USA.
This is a riveting travelogue that narrates the stories and lives of activist architects, politicians and radical communities in pursuit of a more dignified existence for the inhabitants of barrios, barriadas, villas miserias and favelas... more
This is a riveting travelogue that narrates the stories and lives of activist
architects, politicians and radical communities in pursuit of a more
dignified existence for the inhabitants of barrios, barriadas, villas miserias and favelas across South America.
McGuirk visits radical communities, for instance Túpac Amaru in Argentina, he meets with the squatters occupying the Torre David, an empty and unfinished office building in the centre of Caracas. He explores the projects and picks the brains of several activist architects, including Alejandro Aravena of Elemental and Alfredo Brillembourg and Hubert Klumpner of Urban Think Tank.
In Project Japan, Rem Koolhaas and Hans Ulrich Obrist revisit what is arguably the last Utopian movement in architecture, the Japanese Metabolists. In 2005, in the realisation that the members of this diverse group of architects,... more
In Project Japan, Rem Koolhaas and Hans Ulrich Obrist revisit what is
arguably the last Utopian movement in architecture, the Japanese
Metabolists. In 2005, in the realisation that the members of this diverse group of architects, designers, and artists were soon to pass away,
Koolhaas and Obrist embarked on a series of marathon interviews with
them to document the group’s contribution to architecture.
The strength of both the Metabolists and the book is that the existential questions of birth, growth, renewal, destruction and death are never far away, that it is especially important to use our powers of imagination to imagine more peaceful, just and harmonious futures.
This exhibition and catalogue are the result of a cooperation between the Jewish Museum New York and the Centre Pompidou in Paris, it sheds a comprehensive light on the complete oeuvre and achievements of architect and interior designer... more
This exhibition and catalogue are the result of a cooperation between the Jewish Museum New York and the Centre Pompidou in Paris, it sheds a comprehensive light on the complete oeuvre and achievements of architect and interior designer Pierre Chareau. Pierre Chareau is to this day mainly known for the Maison de Verre in Paris, a universally recognised modernist masterpiece (1928–1931), designed with the Dutch architect Bernard Bijvoet.
The Seagram Building in Manhattan (1954-58), by Ludwig Mies van der Rohe and Philip Johnson, is one of those rare pieces of architecture which has come to define an era. For Mies van der Rohe the achievement of the Seagram Building was... more
The Seagram Building in Manhattan (1954-58), by Ludwig Mies van der
Rohe and Philip Johnson, is one of those rare pieces of architecture
which has come to define an era. For Mies van der Rohe the achievement of the Seagram Building was the resolution of years of theoretical and exacting architectural investigation.
The influence of the Seagram Building stretches beyond that of a single work of a modernist master, however. Its significance is also felt in the way it changed planning legislation and became associated with the fragmentation of the urban realm, through the spread of the generic modernist combination of tower, plaza and artwork.
Owen Hatherley’s 'A New Kind of Bleak – Journeys Through Urban Britain', is an animated narration of Hatherley’s travels through the UK, away from world heritage sites and conservation areas into what is arguably the day-to-day reality of... more
Owen Hatherley’s 'A New Kind of Bleak – Journeys Through Urban Britain', is an animated narration of Hatherley’s travels through the UK, away from world heritage sites and conservation areas into what is arguably the day-to-day reality of how cities present themselves to their inhabitants.
The message of Hatherley’s materialist critique of the UK's urban and exurban landscapes is that it is deeply regrettable that both the socialist
and modernist projects have been abandoned in favour of the neo-liberal
myth of unfettered wealth creation through free trade, deregulation and
speculation.
This is a review of the first monograph of the Dutch architecture practice MVRDV; it is a reflection on the practice’s built work from the 1990s up to 2012. The book is edited by Ilka and Andreas Ruby, two self-confessed admirers of... more
This is a review of the first monograph of the Dutch architecture practice MVRDV; it is a reflection on the practice’s built work from the 1990s up to 2012. The book is edited by Ilka and Andreas Ruby, two self-confessed admirers of MVRDV, and it offers a mainly image-based tome and relaxed read. The article describes the context in which the work came about, the so-called SuperDutch era of relative economic prosperity and favorable cultural policy.
Municipal Dreams: The Rise and Fall of Council Housing, is a well-written, humane and even-handed appraisal of the successes and failures of municipal and national housing programmes in the UK from the 1890s to the present. The... more
Municipal Dreams: The Rise and Fall of Council Housing, is a well-written, humane and even-handed appraisal of the successes and failures of municipal and national housing programmes in the UK from the 1890s to the present. The introduction to the book starts out by documenting the strain of causes and failings that led to the Grenfell
Tower disaster and then proceeds to flip the script on the bankrupt ideology of neo-liberalism, which has dominated politics and economics for some 40 years now.
Council housing, as per the ideological worldview of the Conservatives and through the complicity of Blairism, truly became housing of last resort, and the stereotype of the ‘sink estate’ was born.
Boughton does not let himself be sidetracked by negative labelling, however; he repeatedly comes down on the side of the essential decency and humanity of the people living in council housing, and he  extols the achievement of the scale and quality of the public housing programme. The question is not so much whether the state should
guarantee the housing rights of all its citizens, but how to enforce the
fulfillment of that duty in perpetuity.
The Spectacle of Disintegration — Situationist Passages out of the 20th Century is Ken McKenzie Wark’s third book on the Situationist International, after The Beach Beneath the Street and 50 Years of Recuperation of the Situationist... more
The Spectacle of Disintegration — Situationist Passages out of the 20th
Century is Ken McKenzie Wark’s third book on the Situationist International, after The Beach Beneath the Street and 50 Years of Recuperation of the Situationist International. The new book discusses the later work of the group and focuses on the material practices as well as the critical theory. Thomas Wensing spoke with Ken McKenzie Wark at his office in Manhattan.
The book Maison d'Artiste : unfinished De Stijl icon, edited by Dolf Broekhuizen, is organised in three parts: an examination of the cultural-historical significance of the Maison d’Artiste; essays focusing on the design intent of Van... more
The book Maison d'Artiste : unfinished De Stijl icon, edited by Dolf Broekhuizen, is organised in three parts: an examination of the
cultural-historical significance of the Maison d’Artiste; essays focusing on the design intent of Van Doesburg and Van Eesteren as well as their place in the historical avant-garde; and finally, a section that explores the dilemma of authenticity and arguments for a faithful realisation of the Maison d’Artiste.
Hugh Maaskant (1907-1977) was a staunchly modernist architect who, with several others, personifies the reconstruction effort of the Netherlands after the Second World War. Maaskant was a self-made man, and to this day he is associated... more
Hugh Maaskant (1907-1977) was a staunchly modernist architect who, with several others, personifies the reconstruction effort of the Netherlands after the Second World War. Maaskant was a self-made man, and to this day he is associated with bigness; his out-of scale architecture and penchant for expressive concrete structures truly befitted his larger-than-life persona.
Provoost is part of Crimson Architectural Historians, a collective based in Rotterdam. Crimson’s stance to architectural history is activist and operative. One of the stated aims of the book is to take the work of Maaskant ‘from the dated politicised critique that obscured it’ and to restore it to its rightful place in the history of Dutch modernism.
Although Maaskant did not regard himself to be overly political, that may not be said of his work. As late as 1993 the heavy-handed monumentality of some of Maaskant’s late-modern buildings was typified by Joseph Buch as ‘rather dubious’. In answer to these critiques Provoost borrows the term ‘consensual modernist’ from Sarah
Williams Goldhagen to indicate that Maaskant rallied behind the existing political and economic systems, in this case parliamentary democracy and capitalism, as a way to achieve social betterment and positive personal transformation.
This is a momentous exhibition covering 500 modern works from more than a dozen South American countries. It celebrates the 60th anniversary of Henry Russell Hitchcock’s 1955 MoMA show ‘Latin American Architecture since 1945’ and was... more
This is a momentous exhibition covering 500 modern works from more than a dozen South American countries. It celebrates the 60th anniversary of Henry Russell Hitchcock’s 1955 MoMA show ‘Latin American Architecture since 1945’ and was organised over a period
of five years by curator Barry Bergdoll, head of the department of architecture and design, together with a team of experts and contributions from research teams across the South American continent. Its focus is on the post-war period until 1980, an era of  unprecedented urbanization and modernisation, and coincides with the application of development theory, or developmentalism, by most Latin American governments.
This book is a review of the Work of Kiyonori Kikutake, a Japanese modernist and metabolist architect. Japanese metabolism, an architectural movement founded in 1960 by Kenzo Tange, which included members such as Kiyonori Kikutake, Kisho... more
This book is a review of the Work of Kiyonori Kikutake, a Japanese modernist and metabolist architect.
Japanese metabolism, an architectural movement founded in 1960 by Kenzo Tange, which included members such as Kiyonori Kikutake, Kisho Kurokawa, and Fumihiko Maki, was concerned with natural growth and the development of society as a process.
The book achieves a balance in the coverage of Kikutake’s built oeuvre and of his unrealised aquatic futurism. It explicitly does not level the charge that these future worlds are unrealistic but instead encourages
the reassessment of Kikutake’s ideas within the context of the increased
occurrence of natural disasters through climate change.
A Genealogy of Modern Architecture by Kenneth Frampton is the fruit of decades of teaching activity and gestation. The class on which this book is based was originally more succinctly called Comparative Critical Analysis of Built Form,... more
A Genealogy of Modern Architecture by Kenneth Frampton is the fruit of decades of teaching activity and gestation. The class on which this book is based was originally more succinctly called Comparative Critical Analysis of Built Form, and was taught at the Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation of Columbia University from 2004 to 2008.
The 14 comparisons of some 28 buildings that make up most of the
book are divided into programmatic categories: Houses and Pavilions;
Housing; Office Buildings; Civic Buildings; Concert Halls; Museums; and Stadia, and are laid down in diagrams, photographic and orthographic representations, and in written text.
The analyses are richest, most compelling, and indeed exciting, when modernist works of different persuasion are set against each other. The comparison of the Schröder House by Rietveld to Maison Cook by Le Corbusier, and the Casa del Fascio by Terragni to the Gothenburg Law Courts of Asplund come to mind, or neo-plasticism versus purism and fascism versus social democracy.
Italomodern 1 and Italomodern 2 are extensive surveys of modern architecture in northern Italy from 1946 to 1976. The authors — Vienna-based architect Martin Feiersinger and his brother, artist and photographer Werner — started this... more
Italomodern 1 and Italomodern 2 are extensive surveys of modern architecture in northern Italy from 1946 to 1976. The authors — Vienna-based architect Martin Feiersinger and his brother, artist and photographer Werner — started this collaborative project in 2004. Although these volumes are an excellent survey of post-war Italian architecture, the books could have documented the ideological positions of the architects in more depth.
The book Architecture and Structuralism — The Ordering of Space is intended as Hertzberger’s definitive text on structuralism, and is at once a synopsis of his earlier books, such as Lessons for Students in Architecture I & II, as well as... more
The book Architecture and Structuralism — The Ordering of Space is intended as Hertzberger’s definitive text on structuralism, and is at once a synopsis of his earlier books, such as Lessons for Students in Architecture I & II, as well as an effort to enrich and bring his theoretical framework up-to-date.
After decades of passionate collecting, the Deutsches Architektur Museum curated an exhibition on architectural models, for which the book Das Architektur Modell – The Architectural Model is the catalogue. The first impression of the book... more
After decades of passionate collecting, the Deutsches Architektur Museum curated an exhibition on architectural models, for which the book Das Architektur Modell – The Architectural Model is the catalogue.
The first impression of the book is one of inspiration and sheer visual
delight, testament to the quality and substance of the museum’s collection.
of 1,240 models by 419 architects.
Book review of Brinkman & van der Vlugt Architects by Joris Molenaar. Brinkman & van der Vlugt, under the direction of van der Vlugt, became one of the leading and most prolific modernist architectural practices in the Netherlands... more
Book review of Brinkman & van der Vlugt Architects by Joris Molenaar.

Brinkman & van der Vlugt, under the direction of van der Vlugt, became one of the leading and most prolific modernist architectural practices in the Netherlands before the war. With the unique combination of a progressive clientele and talented staff (most memorably the communist Mart Stam from 1926-28), it set out to create a string
of remarkable buildings, and aimed to transform the future of Rotterdam.
The English language monograph Brinkman & van der Vlugt Architects – Rotterdam’s City Ideal in International Style, focuses specifically on the role played by the office’s
attempt to redesign Rotterdam along modernist lines.
Book review of Aesthetics of Sustainable Architecture, edited by Sang Lee.
Book Review. Adhocism – The Case for Improvisation by Charles Jencks and Nathan Silver was first published in 1972 and, according to its front flap, ‘was part of a spirit that would define a new architecture and design era’. In suggesting... more
Book Review. Adhocism – The Case for Improvisation by Charles Jencks and Nathan Silver was first published in 1972 and, according to its front flap, ‘was part of a spirit that would define a new architecture and design era’. In suggesting that adhocism is an attitude or a movement, Jencks and Silver try to give adhocism the weight of architectural theory, which is contradicting the essence and fluid nature of experimentation
and spontaneity in design.