The text presented here is not precisely as published by OUP, but modifications are minor. Illustrations are another matter. Where images used in the original book were not my copyright, I have in most cases been able to substitute links to coloured images on the web. The sources are listed under Image Acknowledgements.
When this text was submitted as part of a PhD thesis in 1996, the Notes were greatly extended. Most readers may prefer to ignore them. They have been collected at the end of each chapter, with internal links leading to them and back to the text. They are a mixture of: simple page references; additional examples or quotations to justify generalisations; and some afterthoughts.
General note, May 2003. My attempt in this chapter to provide a potted history of Western architecture caused some anguish to architectural historians. The need to condense the story almost to vanishing point resulted in sweeping generalisations and ambiguities. Also, the account reflects the view of main-stream critics of the 1970s and 80s, which is now recognised as heavily influenced by mid-century promoters of the Modern Movement. However, its purpose was merely to provide structural engineers with some idea of what was behind the demands which architects make on them, allowing for the fact that many would have taken no previous interest in architecture.
[Original text starts here.]This sketch of architectural history might be more properly called a caricature because for the purposes of this book the accent must be on the twentieth century. A number of readable books are available which present a properly balanced account and these are listed in the Notes. [Note 1.]
The earliest styles are associated with the nations and cultures of antiquity: the ancient Egyptians, Greeks and Mesopotamians.
The architecture of the ancient Greeks was adopted, modified and added to by the Romans, thus providing us with a 'Classical' inheritence which includes the 'Orders' (systems for the proportioning and decoration of monumental buildings) and the characteristic features such as podium, colonnade and pediment which adorn many of our public buildings.
Fig. 10.1. The classical orders: Tuscan, Doric, Ionic, Corinthian, and Composite, according to C. Perrault, 1676. After being shunned by the Modern Movement, they were enthusiastically adopted by Post-Modernist architects. Drawing.
Egyptian and Greek monuments were constructed of tall columns supporting stone beams which, owing to the low tensile strength of stone, were of short span and necessitated a close spacing of columns. The principle of the circular arch and the barrel-vault was known, but was not employed in monumental structures.
Fig. 10.2. Egyptian and Greek architecture were characterised by column-and-lintel construction.
The Parthenon. Goddess Athena and Hellenic Ministry of Culture. (select 'Monuments').
The Romans developed the use of the circular arch making possible a much wider spacing in colonnades and especially permitting the efficient construction of bridges and aqueducts. They employed the pozzolanic action of volcanic residues and crushed brick to obtain a cement with which to make concrete. With this they built domes and intersecting barrel vaults of relatively large span, but of considerable thickness. With the collapse of the western half of the Roman Empire many of these techniques were lost.
Fig. 10.3. Roman architecture made much greater use of the arch and dome.
(a) The Pont du Gard. Photo.
(b) The Pantheon, Rome. Essential World Architecture.
A rich tradition mainly of brick architecture flourished in Byzantium and joined in the 15th Century with the Islamic tradition to produce the typical Arab architecture of the past few centuries. However there has been little reference to Byzantine and Arab styles by present-day architects, except in commissions for Arab countries and for mosques and embassies in the West.
In the west the technique of building in stone was continued at a much reduced level of competence in the 'Early Christian' tradition. However the builders obviously sought inspiration from the remaining monuments of Rome. As society regained its stability and became more organized they were able to respond over the centuries to demands for larger buildings and more exacting requirements of space and conformation. The churches of this early period are characteristically squat and heavy with spherical domes, circular barrel vaults and arches supported by thick walls and piers.
After his accession to the throne in 771, Charlemagne instituted a policy of returning to the philosophical traditions and political organization of Rome. The architecture of this period is known as 'Carolingian'. With injections from Lombardy, this developed into the major style known as 'Romanesque', generally considered to date from the late 10th Century.
Romanesque churches are much larger and very much higher than their predecessors. They still employ the barrel vault and the circular arch supported on massive piers but there is in the later examples a striving for verticality and a more economical use of material. The arcades of the larger churches with their three stories of circular arches are somewhat reminiscent of the Roman aqueducts.
Two centuries later a number of important structural innovations came together in the 'Gothic' style. These were the pointed arch, the ribbed vault and the flying buttress. The use of masonry was much more efficient giving a lighter, more elegant structure and the architectural detailing and decoration were arranged to emphasize verticality. Much information is readily available on the civil and military (as opposed to religious) architecture of this period. However it is possible to find books on 'Gothic Architecture' which mention only churches.
Fig. 10.4. The technique of concrete construction having been lost, the 'Gothic' builders of the twelfth to fourteenth centuries developed for their cathedrals a relatively finely tuned masonry structure in which lateral thrusts due to wind and gravity were contained by careful shaping of vaults, ribs and buttresses. Saint Pierre, Auxerre.
Fig. 10.5. The pointed style of 'Perpendicular' Gothic:
(a) reflected in the Houses of Parliament, London Sullivan.
(b) picked up by Philip Johnson in his PPG Building, Pittsburgh. Sullivan.
In the fifteenth century the west 'discovered' the classical tradition once again, thus initiating the period known as 'The Renaissance'. Gothic architecture came to be considered barbaric and thus eventually acquired its present name.
The resources of society were directed in this era much more towards civil architecture: the palace and the villa. There was a return to the 'Orders', to arcades with circular arches and to domes and a hankering to return to the central-plan church in contrast to the long narrow 'basilica' form of the Gothic church. However the Orders were interpreted with a fresh elegance. The arcades were much lighter than the ancient originals. The domes were more pointed than spherical and were summounted by lanterns. However, concrete was not re-discovered, and considerable ingenuity, sometimes misdirected, was employed in attempting to ensure structural stability.
The Classical tradition was characterized by a respect for balance, harmony and order. The basic rules of geometry and arithmetic were seen as reflections of divine order and perfection. Within less than a century architects (and artists) had attained a high level of skill in the application of these principles.
Fig. 10.6. (a) Classical principles and motifs applied to the constructional needs of the Renaissance era. The Italian palace of this time was charaterised by a defensive lower storey, 'rusticated' masonry, string courses and cornice. Palazzo Strozzi. (Florence, 1489. Archt; B. da Maiano.) Palazzo Strozzi.
Fig. 10.6. (b) The theme of the Renaissance Palazzo was employed by Hoover, Berg, and Desmond for the Douglas County Administration Building, Castle Rock, Colorado. [Source.]
There then developed a period of reaction which is now defined as 'Mannerism', and which along with the Rennaisance itself is receiving particular attention from avante-garde architects today. With virtuosity assured, the Mannerists deliberately bent the rules to shock the conservative observer and amuse the more progressive. Harmony was replaced with discord, simplicity with complexity and clarity with ambiguity.
Fig. 10.7. (a) 'Mannerism': when Renaissance technique and symbolism had been thoroughly exploited, architects delighted in humorous overstatement as in this arch above a door in the Casa de los Picos, Segovia (c. 1500). [Photo: Friends of the Segovia Mint.]
Fig. 10.7. (b) 'Post-Modern mannerism': the visual impression of a voussoir arch and keystone is created in tubular steel above the gateway to the TV-am Headquarters, Camden Town, London, 1983. (Archts: Terry Farrell Partnership.) [See Sandy Brown Assocs. Select 'Projects', 'alphabetical'. Scroll down to 'TV-am'.]
After this came a complete turning-away from Renaissance classicism with the introduction of a style which has become known as 'Baroque'. This was characterized especially by convoluted shapes of both elements and buildings. Massive size and extravagantly complex decoration proclaimed the grandeur of the princes and of the re-invigorated Catholic church of the day.
In the second half of the 18th Century there came yet another return to classical principles, this time labelled 'Neo-Classicism'. This was justified in some quarters as a moral counter to the excesses of the Baroque. The accompanying research into classical ruins was far more thorough than previously. However, as in the Renaissance, architects did not simply reproduce ancient buildings, but tried to apply the principles of classicism to the building tasks and social setting of their own time. As well as representing the classical principles of order and harmony, the Neo-Classical style was enthusiastically adopted by autocratic rulers because of its association with the centralized power system of the Roman Empire.
Fig. 10.8. Neo-classical style. Altes Museum, Berlin. (Archt: Schinkel, 1830.) archINFORM.
The inevitable reaction to this was embodied in the Romantic Movement with its fascination with the mystical, its yearning for the past and its emphasis on individuality in thought. This has interesting parallels with current feelings in certain architectural circles. The Romantic Movement looked back especially to the Gothic period as representing many of its ideals.
It should be emphasized that although the various eras such as Gothic and Renaissance have been represented here entirely by their architecture, the other arts such as painting, sculpture, music, literature, philosophy and political thought are considered equally characteristic.
The middle of the nineteenth century thus saw a somewhat strange situation, with the Neo-Classical and the Romantic co-existing. To add to the confusion, the social upheaval associated with the so-called Industrial Revolution had increased the pressure for large institutional buildings such as hospitals, prisons, asylums, schools and banks, while the rapid development of technology presented completely new requirements for factory buildings, warehouses and later in the century for railway stations. Many of these were arbitrarily clad in Neo-Classical or Neo-Gothic exteriors and because of the differing political and philosophical overtones of the two styles there was bitter debate about their respective merits.
Fig. 10.9. St Pancras Railway Station, London, 1868. Train Shed by engineer W. H. Barlow. Hotel by architect Sir G. G. Scott. [Hotel: Victorian Web. Shed: 19C City.]
However, it soon became common for architects to design in whichever style suited the client and this gave rise to the practice of 'Eclecticism' which in architecture generally means to borrow from a number of styles whatever seems best to fit the requirements of a particular situation. This sometimes results in a mixture of elements rather than a pure, consistent treatment. It is not surprising that there was considerable discontent with this state of affairs. However most architects were totally committed to the styles of previous eras, believing that nothing could surpass them. [Note 2.]
They noticed however the plain, unselfconscious constructions of the engineers of the day: warehouses, factories, the interiors of railway termini and the iron bridges. It was recognized that one way to break out of the impasse of historical reference was to look for a completely new aesthetic which would result from design in the practical engineering fashion, choosing the form of the building to suit the requirements of functional efficiency, ease of construction and structural logic rather than outward appearance.
Fig. 10.10. Relatively plain and functional, 'engineer's architecture' of the Victorian era was exemplified in Britain by railway bridges, stations, factory buildings, and warehouses. Warehouses, Albert Docks, Liverpool, 1845. (Engr: Jesse Hartley.)
[The best images I have found are on the English Heritage website Images of England. It is a lengthy process to find the images using the IoE 'Simple Search' facility. If you are willing to register, you can feed in IoE numbers 213631, 213633 and 213634 to obtain the images directly.]
In the second half of the 19th century improvements in the production of steel and the development of reinforced concrete liberated building from the constraints of masonry construction. A new aesthetic was even more necessary and possible.
Throughout this period, the principles of Neo-Classicism were enshrined in the teaching of a school in Paris called the Ecole des Beaux-Arts, France being a centre of architectural theory. This was notable for its respect for classical order and symmetry (especially in plan). Being a school of Fine Arts, where painting and sculpture were taught along with architecture, there was an emphasis on the 'composition' of building mass to achieve a pleasing effect. The idea that the new materials and techniques should be incorporated in architecture was strongly resisted. The painter Ingres, President of the School in 1834, said of industry:
"Let it stay where it belongs, and not come and settle on the steps of our School, true temple of Apollo, dedicated only to the art of Greece and Rome".
Fig. 10.11. (a) In complete contrast was the Beaux-Arts tradition which persisted into the twentieth centry; symmetry was one of its major features. (b) The Beaux-Arts school was greatly concerned with beauty and symmetry of plan often at considerable disadvantage to function. (Museum Project, J.-N.-L. Durand, 1779.) Elevation. Plan.
This placed the followers of the Beaux-Arts tradition at the opposite end of the spectrum to those who saw hope for a new aesthetic in the new building materials and in machine production and its name became a term of contempt within the Modern Movement. It has recently been reinstated by 'Post-Modern' architects and commentators.
The search for new principles threw up around the turn of the century several movements counter to the gathering pressure for a functional aesthetic. Neglected by the main stream of twentieth century architectural thought, these have recently been resurrected by the avante-garde. They included 'Art Nouveau', in France and Belgium, the 'Jugendstil' in Germany, the 'Sezession' movement in Austria and the 'Art and Craft' Movement in England. These movements are often lumped together under the heading of 'Free Style'.
The first three of these movements looked to the flowing forms found in nature to inspire a new style while the last one saw hope in a return to individual craftsmanship and a less capitalist society. One of the architects of this period, Lutyens, has recently been rediscovered and adopted as a source of inspiration by the avante-garde.
For some time however many writers had been urging the efficient use of the new materials in new and appropriate structural forms. Particularly active in the second half of the 19th century was a Gothic-Revivalist, Eugene Viollet-le-Duc. At the practical level builders and architects had been gradually developing and applying the new techniques of skeletal construction in iron, steel and reinforced concrete.
These antecedents of the Modern Movement around the turn of the century and the First World War are varied and highly interwoven. A number are worth noting here as of interest to the engineer.
In Chicago the introduction of the steel skeleton and sheet glass in multi-storey office buildings and stores before the turn of the century resulted in a new style of facade which reflected the internal arrangment of the structure. This became known as the 'Chicago School'. The famous phrase 'Form Follows Function' was coined at this time and is generally ascribed to the architect Louis Sullivan. [Note 3.] Just before the First World War, the Germans made the factory a respectable subject for architects with Behren's AEG Turbine Factory and Gropius' and Meyer's factory for an exhibition run by the Deutscher Werkbund, the German equivalent of the Arts and Crafts Movement. The French architect Perret furthered the use of skeletal concrete construction which had been developed by the builder Hennebique's monolithic joint.
Fig. 10.12. In the late 19th Century, the Chicago School developed a form of facade which displayed the skeletal nature of the new iron or steel frame. Ornament was still important. Carson Pirie Scott Store. (Archt: Louis Sullivan, 1901.) Sullivan.
Fig. 10.13. The drive by architects to free themselves from historical precedent began to bear fruit in industrial buildings such as the AEG Turbine Factory in Berlin. While structure is expressed in the exposed columns and their hinged bases, and the windows are modern, the corners of the building are rusticated. (Archt: Peter Behrens, 1909.) Photo. [See also: archINFORM.]
Fig. 10.14. In this model factory for the Werkbund Exhibition at Cologne in 1914, Walter Gropius and Adolf Meyer clearly expressed the function of the stair towers and separated the administration block from the workshop. Photo.
Thus the ground was prepared for the full development after the First World War of the Modern Movement.
The period between the two Wars saw the establishment of the first phase of the Modern Movement. It was dominated by four famous architects; Gropius, Mies van der Rohe, Le Corbusier (Charles Jeanneret) and Frank Lloyd Wright.
Although the arrival of the Machine Age had been proclaimed for decades, the influence of the fine arts and the trades on modern architecture was profound. Of the four 'old masters', three had close connections with trades and crafts. [Note 4.]
The main tenets of the Modern Movement were 'functionalism' and the machine aesthetic. Functionalism was usually represented by 'articulation' which is the separation of the parts of the building that perform different functions. Thus in the Bauhaus complex, the offices, teaching areas and dormitories were each contained in a different building whose outward appearance was influenced by and therefore indicative of the type of spaces required inside for its particular purpose.
Fig. 10.15. The functions of the Bauhaus School at Dessau were expressed in three separate wings: administration, residences, and workshops. The facades reflected the different architectural requirements of each purpose. (Archt: Gropius, 1926.) archINFORM.
Fig. 10.16. New materials permitted the cantilevering of lecture theatres from the sides of buildings and the wedge shape due to the sloping floor beneath the seats became a symbol. This is seen employed in 1963 by Stirling and Gowan in the Faculty of Engineering Building, Leicester University, UK. Photo.
Staircases were often made to stand out from a building, as in the Werkbund Pavilion, and clad in glass to display and emphasize their function. The layout of buildings was planned to facilitate or regulate internal communication, something which we would now take for granted. However this represented a break with the Beaux Arts requirement that the plan should conform to certain rules of axial symmetry even if this lead to inconvenience in use. There was thus a new emphasis on the articulation of internal space which contrasted with the Beaux Arts interest in the massing of apparent solids in the composition of the exterior.
The machine aesthetic included the rejection of ornament and the use of straight lines, right angles and smooth surfaces.
Fig. 10.17. Industrialised, or 'machine' production resulted in smooth surfaces, straight edges, and sharp corners. This 'machine aesthetic' was imitated in building by architects such as Le Corbusier at Villa Stein, Garches, 1927. Photo. [See also archINFORM.]
The smooth, streamlined and serviceable forms of ships and aircraft and even of wheat silos were seen as the epitome of modern design and Corbusier defined the house as "a machine for living in". There was an expectation that the form of buildings would tend towards a single 'form type' of universal applicability, just as appeared to be happening in the aircraft industry.
Fig. 10.18. The 'form-type': tails of the Hawker Siddeley Trident and the Boeing 727. Similar configurations were developed for these aircraft, to meet similar market requirements. Development was simultaneous, but apparently independent. [Sketch.]
In some circles the machine aesthetic developed into an irrational idolization of the machine characterized by the Futurist movement in Italy. Alongside its visions of science-fiction cities this contained unsavoury psychological and political overtones, and was adopted by the Fascists prior to World War 2.
However, the functionalist machine ethic did not reign alone. A loosely defined movement known as 'Expressionism' developed in Germany before and after the First World War. This was characterized by mysticism and a rejection of bourgeois principles, and stressed the individuality of the artist. Its most obvious physical manifestations were a merging of the elements of building form into a flowing, sculptural whole, and the use of distortion to convey a particular mood. (Figs. 9.2 and 9.3.). The artist Mondriaan rejected technology and utilitarianism as suitable bases for design on the grounds that "intuition is then troubled by intelligence"!
In the U.S.A. Frank Lloyd Wright, while expressing the new attitude to space, proclaimed an 'organic' architecture. His designs included characteristic ground-hugging buildings whose appearance was dominated by horizontal planes and 'natural' materials such as local rock, brick and timber. This contrasted strongly with the 'white architecture' of the Europeans. Although the functionalist-machine-ethic required that buildings be devised purely to fit a purpose and held that an austere intellectural beauty would automatically result, the designs were in fact helped along by the architect's love of painterly styles such as De Stijl and their attachment to pure geometric forms such as the cube and cylinder.
Fig. 10.19. In visual contrast to the 'white' modern architecture of Europe was the 'organic' modern architecture of Frank Lloyd Wright in the USA. Robie House, Chicago, 1909. Galinsky.
Wright was scathing in his criticism of this 'International Style' and once asked Phillip Johnson if he were "still putting up little houses and leaving them out in the rain?" [Note 5.] In Boyd's words, he called the new style "inhuman, undemocratic and ... un-American" and believed that "it worshipped technology and neglected the poor human beings who were obliged to occupy it". (Boyd 1965, p.73)
Looking back we can now see that the machine ethic was in fact an inverted form of romanticism. A totally irrational ban was placed on pitched roofs even though flat ones are usually more expensive and much more difficult to weatherproof. At that time most of the flat roofs, the very symbol of the 'International Style', leaked badly. As Boyd wrote, while "Everything was done in the name of rationalism, realism and Functionalism, the results ... were still no more than artistic expressions of these principles ..." (author's italics). [Note 6.]
We have already seen the difficulties of clearly defining the requirements of a building and of measuring its performance and predicting the cost of different alternatives. The concept of a totally rational unequivocal design process leading to an optimum 'form-type' therefore results from a gross oversimplification of engineering and architecture and is only achievable if a vast number of arbitrary pre-constraints are placed on objectives and means. This was, in fact, just the need that the credo of the Modern Movement satisfied.
To add to this, there was definitely a new spirit in the air in the 1920s. There is a theory derived from the philosophy of Hegel which holds that each era such as the Gothic or Classical has its own particular spirit or 'Zeitgeist' and that this is expressed in the nature of its artefacts. The theory is not particularly popular in art history at the moment but a practising architect recalled:
"First the dreary repetitive quagmire of worn-out styles and dead traditions in which we stumbled in the 20s. Second the absolute release and new life which the modern movements brought. On the twin rocks of fidelity to function and honest expression of structure we found a solid footing and it was like a new life. It was simple, it was true." (Campbell, Architectural Review, Feb. 1978, p.65.)
Phillip Johnson has said:
"We were in a great time of faith in the 20s. I don't think there has been such a strong feeling of that sort since the High Renaissance; maybe the French Revolution had the same sense that classicism [the style of that period] was revolutionary and pure". (Time Magazine, 8 Jan. 1979, p.35.)
It was in such a climate of enthusiasm that the pioneers of the Modern Movement, aided by personal contact, the new photographic journalism, the publication of manifestos, lecture tours and conferences hammered out an international aesthetic code which was ironically to lead the profession into a blind alley.
However the new International Style was never without competitors. Well into the thirties architects especially in the USA continued to design in the Beaux Arts tradition. Free-Style and Expressionism lingered on. The Organic movement led by Wright continued to thrive.
The political element in the Modern Movement, with its utopian visions of good-quality mass housing for happy workers surrounded by freedom and light led to persecution by the authoritarian regimes of Hitler and Stalin. In Italy, Germany and the Soviet Union various forms of Classicism were adopted as the official style.
Fig. 10.20. The political content of Modern Movement ideals resulted in its replacement where authoritarian regimes were in power, by renewed forms of classicism, and the migration of many of its pioneers to the USA. (Zeppelinfeld, Nürnberg, 1934. Archt: A. Speer.) Archiseek.
Many of the Modern Movement pioneers including Gropius and Mies moved to the U.S.A. However this very migration was to ensure a strong development of the International Style in the post-war years.
The early years after World War II allowed a fuller rein to Modern architects than ever before and saw the perfection of the glass-box sky scraper. At the domestic level the abstract ideal was reached in the Farnsworth House by Mies van der Rohe, a design similar to, though pre-dating Johnson's Glass House. In it the machine- and purist-ethics were carried to their logical conclusions without regard for the interests of the occupant, and resulted in a legal battle between Mies and his client. [Note 7.]
Fig. 10.21. Following the Second World War the Modern Movement flourished in the USA where the 'glass box' skyscraper was developed with a minimum of ornament, following Mies van der Rohe's principle 'Less is More'. Richard J. Daley Center, formerly Chicago Civic Center, 1965. (Archt: C. F. Murphy, Engrs: Skidmore, Owings, and Merrill.) Sullivan.
In the surge of development and rebuilding the International Style was taken over by large numbers of architects who lacked the artistic sensitivity of the masters. As soon as buildings began to approach the perceived ideal 'form-type' of steel I-section and glass curtain wall, architects felt themselves reduced once again to the role of mere 'decorators', this time tastefully choosing the detailed treatment of window mullions and panels for the curtain-walling of a structure whose nature was determined by planning and engineering considerations.
Fig. 10.22. Unfortunately, many multi-storey office buildings were less elegant: a view along Park Avenue, New York. [Source.]
Inevitably this lead to a reaction against the principles of the first phase of modern architecture. The main change in theory was the abandonment of the idea that there were universal principles which could be applied to every building: the concept of the 'form type'. The new approach saw each building as a unique problem with regard to site, location and the functional needs of the occupants. Thus the old, functional principles could still guide, but the results of their application would vary significantly from one structure to another.
As we have seen, Gropius' design for the Bauhaus in the twenties had differentiated between each of the various component buildings by means of some rational expression of its purpose. Thus the walls of the dormitory block were broken by balconies; those of the workshops, where good lighting was required, were glass facades on a concrete frame. This allowed post-war designers to employ the sun-screen and the propped-cantilever projecting roof with some justification. However, any number of patterns could be used to fulfill these functions and thus there was soon a drift away from undecorated simplicity towards what Boyd called "the International Style gift-wrapped" (1965, p.81). The trend towards decoration led on to the practice of 'expressing' the purpose of a building through conscious symbolism. Thus an overseas embassy might adopt forms reminiscent of a nation's vernacular architecture; a head office might validly project some corporate image.
Fig. 10.23. Gradually architects re-introduced classical symbolism and ornament, esecially where it could be justified on functional grounds: sun canopies and screens at the US Embassy, New Dehli, 1954. (Archt: Edward Durell Stone.) Photo.
At the same time, collaboration between engineers and architects in the provision of large auditoriums and enclosed stadiums, where the structure tended to be so spectacular that it forced itself on the observer's attention, provided another justification for building highly individual structures. Although architects claimed that the form of the buildings reflected the demands of structural necessity, they made little attempt to show just why a dome, a hyperbolic parabloid, or a suspended roof had been preferred to any of the other alternatives in the first place.
Fig. 10.24. Strong structural forms provide an orthodox justification for striking sculptural effects.
(a) Congress Hall, Berlin, 1957. (Archt: H. A. Stubbins/ Engrs: Severud, Elstad, Krueger.) Galinsky.
(b) Church at Coyoacan, Mexico, 1956. (Archt/Engr: Felix Candela.)
[Smithsonian Archives of American Art.]
(c) Kresge Auditorium, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 1955. (Archt: Eero Saarinen. Engrs: Amman and Whitney.) Photo.
Whereas the logic of the first phase had somehow been inverted to demand the stuffing of all functions into a simple rectangular glass box, the 'structural school' of the second phase justified stuffing them all into a clearly defined structural entity such as a dome.
The excitement, which swept many engineers along with it, soon began to pall as the supply of interesting new forms began to dry up. It was also discovered that there are many practical difficulties involved in adapting strong structural forms to the functional needs of the interior. Restrictions on the arrangment of rooms, and problems with acoustics occur because of the predetermined shape of the envelope, while difficulties may arise in providing window openings without destroying the integrity of the structure. Waterproofing problems are common because of the large thermal movements encountered in these structures.
Offshoots of this interest in structural form coupled with the increasing tendency towards expression were the TWA terminal at Kennedy International Airport (1961) and the Sydney Opera House, (1956-1973) with their allusions to the wings of a bird and the sails of yachts.
Fig. 10.25. Sculptural forms soon became symbolic or expressionist: TWA Terminal Building, Kennedy Airport, NY, 1961. (Archt: Eero Saarinen, Engrs: Amman and Whitney.) Galinsky.
In the mid 1950s an event occurred which many saw as a turning point in modern architecture. This was the construction of the chapel at Ronchamp (1955) designed by Corbusier. Except for the austere staircase at the rear this is an entirely artistic creation; a sculpture placed on a hill top, carefully related to the surrounding scenery. At first sight the walls appear to be of extremely thick concrete supporting a massive roof. The south wall is pierced with tunnel-like apertures. In reality, three of the walls are of stone, strengthened with a sprayed concrete surface. The south wall consists of a series of thin transverse webs both vertical and horizontal, covered by sprayed concrete skins; the roof is not supported directly on the walls but on short concrete columns so as to leave a visible air gap around the top of the wall. Despite its solid appearance it consists in fact of two 60mm thick curved slabs some 2m apart, with seven thin reinforced concrete webs between them. (Le Corbusier 1957.)
Fig. 10.26. When Le Corbusier, a leading pioneer of the Modern Movement, adopted a sculptural form for the pilgrimage chapel of Notre Dame du Haut, Ronchamp, France (1955) he caused a crisis in modern architecture. Photo.
It was Corbusier who had coined the phrase "a house is a machine for living in" and done much to promote the use of rough finished ('brut') concrete after the war. His apparent defection from the machine-functional school seemed to mark the end of an era.
Fig. 10.27. Le Corbusier's earlier work had exemplified Modern Movement principles. In the 'pilotis' (ground floor columns) of the Unité d'Habitation, Marseilles, 1952, the concrete is left in its 'natural' state (brut) after stripping of formwork. Galinsky.
Around this time young architects and theorists were growing disillusioned with the business-like compromises of the older generation.
A feeling that there was a need to return to the old principles but interpreted in a new way [Note 8.], led to the development of the 'Brutalist' school in the U.K. Its leaders were Peter and Alison Smithson and their Hunstanton Secondary School set the tone. The exterior is 'Miesian', but the character is revealed in this description by Banham (1966, p.19):
"The basic framing is of partly pre-welded steel frames calculated according to the Plastic Theory ... for extreme economy. The floors and roof slabs are built up of pre-cast concrete slabs, and these are left as exposed concrete on the underside. Walls that are brick on the outside are brick (the same bricks) on the inside, fairfaced on both sides. Wherever one stands within the school one sees its actual structural materials exposed, without plaster and frequently without paint. The electrical conduits, piperuns and other services are exposed with equal frankness".
This was a return to the old principles with more ruthlessness and less (conscious) artistry than ever before. As Banham comments, it was a moralistic ethic, a campaign of 'mens sana in corpore sano', but as always, within the confines of an architect's comprehension of such (1966, p.135). Gradually the initial impetus was lost and the products became more sophisticated and stylish. However its momentum still shows up in the exposed services of modern buildings, while exposed steel I-sections have recently begun to appear in department stores in the U.S.A.
Fig. 10.28. 'New Brutalism' involved a rigorous application of these principles and was exemplified in steel and glass by the Hunstanton Secondary School, Norfolk, England. (Archts: Alison and Peter Smithson, 1954.) [For image see Open University site Modernity. Select 'Buildings Gallery'.]
Meanwhile, on the larger scene the idea of accentuating certain functional aspects of a building had gained currency as a means of ensuring individuality. The Richards Medical Research Laboratories (1960) building is generally held to be the forerunner of this type. Here the architect Louis Kahn made the laboratories glassy horizontal areas and emphasized the vertical fume ducts and stairwells as large brick pylons. Here was a way to escape from the plain envelopes of both the Miesian box and of the structural entity, whilst appearing to conform to the 'functional' rationale.
Fig. 10.29. Louis I Kahn achieved individuality of form within Modern Movement principles by expressing service towers and 'served spaces' in the extensions to the Richards Medical Research and Biology Buildings, University of Pennsylvania, Phildelphia, 1960. (Engr: A. Kommendant.) Philadelphia Buildings..
The appearance of much of this third-phase modern architecture is chunky and lumpy, paying some lip-service to the planning needs of the interior, some to the mechanical services, and much less than in the second phase, to the discipline of structural logic.
Fig. 10.30. Expression of functional spaces in concrete and masonry buildings led to a quite different aesthetic. Goddard Library, Clark University, Worcester, Mass. 1969. (Archt: John Johansen.) Sullivan..
Coupled with this was a further move away from the idea that planning of function can ever be absolute. The pace of social and technological development is so fast today that the planning of a hospital may be out of date before the building is complete. There has also been a demand from many clients for multi-purpose buildings in which it is impossible to design tightly for any one function. Under these conditions the connection between form and function must become tenuous.
A movement which began with so much revolutionary ardour was bound to end in disillusion. A younger generation could not ignore the fact that human needs had been neglected in the artist's pursuit of form and the businessman's pursuit of corporate image. The early ideal had been to transform society by the provision of 'space, sunlight and verdure', but many buildings seemed to produce alienation, and in extreme cases vandalism and crime.
Fig. 10.31. In the 1960s, a new generation of architects were confronted with the fact that early visions of sun-lit cities had not been realised in the housing projects of the early post-war years. (Contemporary City of Three Million, Le Corbusier.) [Source.]
The younger generation also noted that the revolutionary heroes were content to accept commissions from the conservative establishment. As Jencks put it, the major principles of the Modern Movement:
"consistency and Purism do not equate with integrity, but quite the reverse ... because the International Style ... is now the conventional style of the ruling class and its bureaucracy". (Jencks, 1977, p.84.)
Modern Architecture was obviously not working as intended and critics became aware of the hollowness of much of the rhetoric. It was realized, for instance that Mies' 'functional' and 'efficient' buildings were extremely expensive and contained artifices carefully contrived to give the impression of elegant simplicity. (Whether Mies himself ever seriously considered them to be functional or efficient in the engineering senses of the words is beside the point.)
Fig. 10.32. It was also recognised that the rhetoric of the machine aesthetic was somewhat hollow: superfluous 'mullions' at the corner of the Seagram Building, New York. (Archt: Mies van der Rohe, 1958.) [Sketch plan.]
Furthermore it came to be realized that the public had largely resisted attempts to 'educate' it to understand Modern Architecture and insisted on interpreting its meaning in symbolic and historical terms. The public was confused by the Miesian style which had apartments looking identical to office blocks and all sorts of activities from mass-production to religion contained in his single-storey rectangular glass and steel sheds. Intimidated by the anonymity of glass-fronted office blocks, the public cut them down to size by calling them 'cigarette boxes'. On the other hand they read into the products of the second and third stages allusions - to birthday cakes, pill boxes and other homely items - that were not intended by the architect (Jencks, 1981).
A major turning point came with the publication in 1966 of Venturi's Complexity and Contradiction in Modern Architecture. Venturi rejected the Modern Movement's search for clarity and simplicity and, as his title indicates, made a plea for communication to the observer at a number of levels with messages that could be distorted and even ambiguous. He suggested there might be a lesson for architects in the fact that the business world employed a mess of garish neon signs and bill-boards to attract the public to the centre of town and asked:
Is not Main Street almost all right?
His book provided a focus for the many young architects who had rejected the moral dogmatism of the Modern Movement and its goals of purity, orderliness and functionality. [Note 9.]
The 1960s were a period of intense turmoil and experimentation in the architectural world, as in many others. Rudolph's Yale Art and Architecture Building (1963) was vandalized and internally modified by its occupants, in revolt against its monumentality and the way in which the 'total' design imposed the architect's prescriptions on the users. In 1969 it was damaged by fire, following an explosion. (Smith, 1977, pp.109-11.)
Jencks sets the 'death' of Modern Architecture at July 15th, 1972, when portions of the Pruitt Igoe complex were blown up. [Note 10.] This project had been conceived in the best rational traditions of the Movement and included 'streets in the air' to separate pedestrians from traffic; 'sun, space and greenery' on the ground and contrived social areas such as play spaces, creches and gossip centres as rational substitutes for the traditional alley-ways, gardens and other semi-private spaces that the inhabitants had previously known.
Fig. 10.33. Le Corbusier's Unité d'Habitation, Marseilles., exemplified Modern Movement ideals with the interlocking spaces of its dwelling units. The whole building was raised on stilts ('pilotis') to minimise interruption of green space at ground level. 'Streets in the air' with community facilities were an important feature of the Unité d'Habitation. Galinsky. With the blowing-up of parts of the Pruitt-Igoe project in St. Louis in 1972 these ideals suffered a set-back.
The growing disenchantment within the profession itself was signalled by a spate of polemic books. [Note 11.] Jencks concluded that the "stadia, sports grounds, aircraft hangars and all the large-span structures traditionally associated with engineering" were "the single, unmitigated triumph of modern architecture on the level of content" (1977, pp.31, 32).
The feelings of the profession and the nature of the search for a new concept of architecture (at least in Britain) are well illustrated for those who have the time to pursue it, by a series of articles and readers' letters published by the Architectural Review in 1976 and 1977. [Note 12.]
At the end of this debate, L. Wright stated that there was "no going back" on the Modern Movement's successful revolution:
"it has changed us all irretrievably, and for the better. But it is over; and we are now moving back into more normal times. As this is so we can look around us and pick up the unintended casualties of the revolution. One of these was the bond of under standing between architects ... and their public". (Architectural Review Dec. 1977, p.324.)
The characteristics of the present [1986] climate in architectural thinking may be summarized as:
a lack of a uniting philosophy and a revolt against dogmatism, leading to a 'new pluralism';
an awareness of the conscious and subconscious symbolism of buildings;
a corresponding intense interest in the nature of the associations and allusions that will be read into them by any given cultural, regional and social sub-group of the population and hence in the familiar historical styles listed at the beginning of this chapter;
an interest in the 'urban context'; the space around and between buildings and the way a building relates to its neighbours (this in sharp contrast to the Modern Movement which treated each building as an individual artefact of modern design);
an interest in the 'democratization' of architecture, whereby the future occupants of a project are encouraged to participate as far as is considered possible in its design.
All of these characteristics have been lumped under the heading 'Post-Modern', and some critics are now re-classifying buildings and architects as far back as the 'Second Phase' under this heading. However in this book the term will be confined to buildings in which functional needs have a low priority and the emphasis is on philosophical or historial reference, Mannerist jokes and painterly composition.
Arguing that what the public rejected in the International Style was its emotional sterility, the avante-garde of the Post-Modern school see themselves in the traditional role of the Victorian artist, shocking the public out of its complacency, at once providing mystery and challenge. Peter Eisenman has built houses in which two three- dimensional reference grids are set at angle to each other. Walls, beams and columns may belong to one or the other. Conflicts thus arise in the physical sense and in relation to the expectations of the observer. Columns pass through the middle of beds and column/doors rotate on an axis but do not fully fill the frame.
Fig. 10.34. Post-Modernism. In 1966 Venturi called for "complexity and contradiction" to revitalise architecture. This approach is exemplified in Peter Eisenman's 'House III' at Lakeville, Conn. (1973) with its clashing systems of three-dimensional grids. [archINFORM.]
Somewhat more common are buildings in which the architect has combined elements reminiscent of brash commercialism (e.g. strips of neon) with allusions to historic buildings and styles which only the educated could possibly understand.
Perhaps the most publicized large example of the latter trend is Johnson's AT&T building in Manhattan. Robert Hughes has described it as follows:
Its main element is a 660-foot glass slab laced into a Beaux-Arts, Manhattanist corset of pinky-grey granite. This shaft sits on an entrance block that is an enormous pastiche of the courtyard front of Brunelleschi's 15th Century Pazzi Chapel in Florence [Fig. 10.36] ... To take a small, private Renaissance chapel and inflate it to nearly the size of the Baths of Caracalla is the kind of perversity Johnson enjoys ... and the fact is emphasised by the top of the building - the now famous 'grandfather clock' pediment with its round operculum, through which the heating system will issue clouds of steam on cold days. This is yet another historicist joke, alluding to one of Johnson's favourites from the past - Boullée, whose vast panoramas of pyramids, masonry globes and smoking crematoria are among the singular documents of the Industrial Revolution. [akin to Fig. 10.37]
(Quotation: Time magazine, 8 Jan. 1979, p.39.)
Fig. 10.35. Post-Modernism. In the AT&T Building, New York (1983) Sullivan. Philip Johnson satisfied the layman by clothing the 'box' in the familiar form of a Chippendale cabinet while appealing to the congnoscenti with references to the Pazzi Chapel at ground level and to eighteenth century visionary projects at the top.
Fig. 10.36. The Pazzi Chapel, church of San Croce, Florence. (Archt: Brunelleschi.) Florence.
Fig. 10.37. Project for Workers' lodgings. (Archt: C.-N. Ledoux, 1736-1806.) Elevation.
Jencks has identified various sub-categories of Post Modernism depending on the particular historical references employed. Examples include 'Post Modern Classicim' and 'Post-Modern Free Style'.
Fig. 10.38. Post-modernism. Classical reference with a vengeance at the Palace of Abraxas apartments, Marne-la-Valleé, near Paris. (Archt: R Bofill, 1983.) Photo.
The more pragmatic majority of architects are scornful of these developments. Many, especially of the older generation, are still firmly committed to the basic principles of the Modern Movement, and feel that these were betrayed by practitoners and especially by the media, so that what is 'dead' was not Modern Architecture at all. [Note 13.] In fact these people are already proclaiming the 'death' of Post-Modernism!
There are indeed several more conventional streams of thought in current architectural philosophy. The logical progression from the third phase of the Modern Movement has been dubbed 'Late Modern'. The energy crisis has had a considerable effect on pragmatic architecture. For a time glass was considered highly unsuitable as a cladding material, but with the development of reflective glass and new methods of fixing, it has once again become a very popular material.
Fig. 10.39. Reflexive Architecture. Late Modernism. Alongside the Post-Modern, the concept of 'Less is More' survives in the reflective building. The energy problems of the glass curtain wall are lesesened, and because the building tends to 'disappear', camouflaged in the reflections of its surroundings, the principle of reductionism is upheld. Willis Faber & Dumas Office, Ipswich. (Archt: Norman Foster, Engr: Anthony Hunt Assocs.) Photo.
Atriums are common in large urban buildings, justified on grounds of energy conservation and the provision of pleasant urban space (they are often open to the public). The economics of multi-storey building construction (basically the vertical mass-production of storeys) impose a fairly strict regularity on the upper parts of these buildings, but architects are taking the licence to clad them in shining glass like jewels, and to put in kinks or slice off the tops to break the monotony.
The need for energy conservation has affected planning of buildings as explained in Chapter 5. In many cases it has replaced Structure as the main technological determinant of form. A pragmatic respect for energy conservation is nowadays often combined with a vernacular or historic style intended to provide the public with a familiar and friendly architecture.
Fig. 10.40. Post-Modern vernacular. One means of giving modern architecture a friendly face: an administration building clothed in the familiar sloping roofs of English suburbia. Hillingdon Civic Centre 1977. (Archt: Andrew Derbyshire of R. Matthew, J. Marshall & Partners.)
Photo: Looking at Buildings. (Click on 'Advanced Search', enter 'hillingdon', and clear all ticks except 'Image Title'.
Fig. 10.41. Post-Modern 'white architecture'. Reproduction of the nineteenth-century galleria with its glazed barrel-vault have become a hallmark of Post-Modern buildings. Here they are used with a smooth finish which recalls the 'white architecture' of the interwar period in Europe. AT&T Long Lines Eastern Regional HQ, Oakton, Virginia (c.1981). (Archts: Kohn, Pedersen, Fox.) [Source.]
The desire to satisfy this perceived need has led some architects to look to psychology and sociology to understand people's reactions to the buildings around them. There is also a great interest in trying to understand conscious and subconscious 'meanings' in architecture as they are considered to form a 'language' through which the architect can 'communicate' to the general public. All these approaches retain the assumption that the architect has the ability and the professional responsibility to determine what the public needs and to provide what he knows is best for it.
In contrast are the ideas of architects who set themselves to activate and lead the future occupants in their design of the building. Two major examples of this approach are the Byker Wall (1974) in Newcastle, England, and the Medical Faculty Buildings (1969-74) at the University of Louvain near Brussels. (See, e.g. Jencks 1977, pp.91, 95.) This type of building is characterized by a multiplicity of materials; concrete, steel, timber, brick and and a lack of formal unity (sometimes described as a 'mess') which is in sharp contrast to the visions of the Modern Movement. The building is experienced as highly complex in both its functioning and its symbolism, serving the complex interwoven needs of its different users and communicating differing meanings at different levels depending on the visual code of the observer.
Fig. 10.42. Another reaction to public disenchantment with Modern Architecture has been participatory architecture in which the architect relinquishes some of his power and incorporates the individual proposals of those who will use the building. (Medical Faculty Building, University of Louvain, 1974. Archts: Lucien Kroll and Atelier.) [Photos: Atelier Kroll.]
A movement which is particularly strong in the U.K. and which might have some appeal for the engineer is 'High-Tech' (short for 'high-technology'). It has flourished in the field of factory design and has probably helped to establish the potential role of the architect in this area. Its major characteristics have been to provide for flexibility in use: for modification and extension of the building. This has been achieved by the provision of large areas of floor free from columns with roofing supported from repetitive, structurally independent units. These have tended to be either portal frames composed of trussed members of triangular cross-section, or steel masts from which the roof is suspended by cables or rigid ties. Cladding is usually of demountable metal sandwich panels so that a window, a solid wall, a door or even a complete toilet unit can be substituted to suit the user's needs. Services are highly accessible, either contained in a wide wall cavity running around the perimeter of the building or exposed overhead.
Despite the pragmatism there are two definite styles associated with High-Tech. One results in a box-like envelope with a shining skin, the most obvious elements being a curved transition from wall to roof, bright colours, and a machine aesthetic reminiscent in many cases of coach bodies. The other emphasizes a 'sticks-and-string' structure, reminiscent of early Victorian engineering with roofs suspended from masts or triangulated towers by ties and open-work trusses.
Fig. 10.43. 'High-Tech' is claimed to embody the true principles of the Modern Movement. One manifestation is the slick rectangular box, serviced within the thickness of the envelope and designed for adaptability and extension.
Sainsbury Centre for the Visual Arts, University of East Anglia, Norwich, 1977. (Archts: Foster Associates. Engrs: Anthony Hunt Associates.) [Photo: Foster & Partners. Select 'Projects', then e.g. 'Alphabetical' and 'Sainsbury Centre'.]
Fig. 10.44. The 'stick-and-string' version of High-Tech. Adaptable column-free space is achieved by masts and cables using newly-developed components.
Parts Distribution Centre for Renault UK at Swindon, 1983. (Archts: Foster Associates. Engrs: Ove Arup and Partners.) Photo.
Fig. 10.45. At the Sainsbury Centre, services are located within the width of the wall and roof structures. [Drawings: Foster & Partners. After finding 'Sainsbury Centre' select the thumbnail drawings.]
Fig. 10.46. High-Tech adaptability achieved with interchangeable wall panels providing wall/window/toilet options. Advanced Industrial Unit, Warrington, England, c. 1979. (Archts: Farrell/Grimshaw.) [Source.]
Although it is now strongly associated with industrial buildings the High-Tech concept was put on the world map by a cultural centre: the Centre Pompidou in Paris, and will once more become highly visible with the completion of two prestige buildings: Lloyd's new headquarters in London, and the HSBC building in Hong Kong.
Fig. 10.47. The Pompidou Centre (formerly Beaubourg Centre), Paris, 1977. The building which brought High-Tech concepts forcibly to the notice of the general public. (Archts: Rogers and Piano. Engrs: Ove Arup and Partners.) Galinsky.
Fig. 10.48. High-Tech concepts and a galleria feature in the Lloyd's HQ, London, 1986. (Archts: Richard Rogers and Partners. Engrs: Ove Arup and Partners. Photo. [See also Galinsky.]
Fig. 10.49. High-Tech in Hong Kong. Headquarters of the Hong Kong and Shanghai Banking Corporation, 1986. (Archts: Foster Associates. Engrs: Ove Arup and Partners.) Foster & Partners.
Already there are signs that as happened to the International Style, the external appearance (as Banham defines it, the "High-Finish") will be taken over by architects of lesser ability and used without the underlying commitment, in this case a respect for user needs and technological imperatives.
This, then must complete our very brief introduction to historic and present-day styles. Although certain trends are discernible in current architectural thought, the immediate impression is one of confusion. Modern Architecture is not completely dead. Many architects around the world still take it seriously and, to add to the confusion, some of the Post-Moderns make historicist allusions to it. As Jencks put it:
"the paradox facing our generation of architects is that it has to go backwards to previous theories, and reweave several strands which have been cut away, in order to go forward". (Jencks (1977), p.101.)
While many architects and critics see Post-Modernism and High-Tech as passing fads, reports in the architectural journals indicate that more and more clients are opting for them [1980s]. In the way of things they will probably become familiar and acceptable, be adopted by government and 'big-business' and be rejected on these accounts in much the same way as the International Style.
Engineers will no doubt find the problem-solving approach through social psychology and even semiotics, and the real technical content of High-Tech buildings, no more difficult to understand than the nominal 'Functionalism' of the Modern Movement. However the elitist, esoteric and artistic side of Post-Modern may cause greater difficulties in architect-engineer relationships than ever before unless the engineer is willing to switch off his moral judgement and sympathize with Jencks' statement that:
"no other profession [than the architect's] is specifically responsible for articulating meaning and seeing that the environment is sensual, humorous, surprising and codes as a readable text". (Jencks 1977, p.101.)
It is of course impossible to do anything like justice to a topic as broad as the history of architectural ideas in such a limited space. The reader is strongly advised to read at least one introductory book on the subject and preferably more. The architectural journals provide up-to-date information on projects and views and perhaps most importantly a channel through which practising architects are able to express their attitudes alongside those of the critics.
Suggestions for suitable reading matter are provided in the Notes. [Note 14.]
[Contents.] [References.]
[Previous Chapter.] [Next Chapter.]
Note 1. Pevsner (1950); Jordan (1970); See also Raeburn, M. (ed). Architecture of the Western World. Orbis, London, 1980. Norwich, J.J. (ed). Great Architecture of the World. Mitchell Beazley, London, 1975. Copplestone, T. (ed). World Architecture. Hamlyn, London 1963. [Return.]
Note 2. The winning design in the competition for a new Foreign Office in London in 1857 was in the Renaissance style. However, as a result of lobbying, the Minister of Works was persuaded to overrule the jury in favour of a Gothic design which had obtained third place. This aroused the 'Classical' lobby to approach the Prime Minister who was known to favour the Renaissance style. The final result was that the 'Gothic' architect, who had by now been given the commission, appointed an assistant who was accomplished in the Renaissance style to design the exterior. This sort of 'facade-ism' and inconsistency is thought by Collins (1965, p.121) to have contributed to the growth of Eclecticism. [Return.]
Note 3. The architectural critic Peter Blake attributed this saying to Sullivan's assistant Adler (Blake 1960, p.77). However in Blake (1977), p.16, he wrote "nobody is quite certain who first proclaimed" this dictum, but "most historians think it was Horatio Greenough". [Return.]
Note 4. For Le Corbusier this statement was based on Blake (1976), p.4 "... both his father and his mother were professional engravers of watch cases", p.6 "When he was only fourteen years old he qualified for the Ecole d'Art at La Chaux-de-Fonds, a kind of technical high-school set up for the express purpose of training engravers for the watch-making industries in the town", and p.29 "The publication of Vers une architecture [1923] marked a milestone both in the development of modern architecture and in Corbu's own life. As of that date, Le Corbusier stopped exhibiting his paintings (he was tired of being known as a painter and a sort of 'dilettante architect') and stopped using the name Jeanneret. He continued to paint, of course; but he wanted to be known primarily - even exclusively - as an architect, and he refused to show any of his other work until many years later in 1937."
Mies van der Rohe was the son of a stone mason (Blake 1976, p.168) and worked for two years for a furniture designer (Blake mentions only architects, p.170, but see Schulze 1985, p.21). Drexler (1960) writes: "Craft and the limitations of materials he learned as an apprentice in his father's stone-cutting yard ... From his fifteenth to his nineteenth year Mies was a draughtsman-designer of stucco ornament ... In 1905 he went to Berlin; seeking to improve his knowledge of wood he spent two years in the office of Bruno Paul, a skilful decorator and furniture designer." p.11. Pawley (1970) gives a very similar account on his p.9. Schulze's is the most detailed account.
For Gropius see Hatje (1963) p.139 "Walter Gropius received his training in architecture first at Munich from 1903 to 1905 and then in Berlin to 1907, when he entered the office of Peter Behrens ... In 1910 ... Gropius started on his own as an industrial designer and architect. His designing covered a wide range and included interior decoration schemes, wall fabrics, models for mass-produced furniture, motor-car bodies, and a diesel locomotive." Relevant photographs may be found in Nerdinger (1985) 296-310. [Return.]
Note 5. Wright on Phillip Johnson: Boyd (1965), p.59. [Return.]
Note 6. It was wrong to describe the ban as totally irrational. (See Note 8, Chapter 7, TAISD. Gropius did give six rationalisations for the use of flat roofs (Jencks 1977, p.63). The quotation from Boyd (1965, p.55) became distorted during successive redrafting of TAISD. Boyd's actual words are: "Everything was done in the name of rationalism, realism and Functionalism, and while the results were usually intensely genuine and often rawly sensitive, they were still no more than artistic expressions of these principles ..." [Return.]
Note 7. The owner lost the case. Cowan (1978, p.225) records that the house, after being severely modified by its owner in order to make it livable, was eventually demolished to make room for a highway. [Return.]
Note 8. This is exemplified in the Team X [Team Ten] philosophy, described in Smithson (1974). Team X was a group of young architects who tried to revivify CIAM, the 'Congrès Internationaux d'Architecture Moderne'. CIAM was an organisation formed under the tutelage of a rich patroness to bring together the major figures of the Modern Movement, resolve differences, and evolve a coherent body of theory. Ten meetings were organised from 1928 to 1956. (Hatje 1963, p.70.) [Return.]
Note 9. Venturi (1977), p.104. The reference to his views was based on Drew (1972) and Cook and Klotz (1973), 247ff, especially p.248. [Return.]
Note 10. Jencks (1977), p.9. In Jencks (1980a) he finds it necessary to state (p.7) that this was not meant to be taken too literally. [Return.]
Note 11. These included MacEwen's Crisis in architecture (1974), Allsopp's Towards a humane architecture (1974), Brolin's The failure of modern architecture (1974), and Blake's Form follows fiasco (1977). Jencks (1977, p.15-19) makes a scathing attack on the work of Mies. MacEwen was the only one of these authors who was not an architect by training, but he was director of public affairs for the RIBA and previously a journalist (New Civil Engineer, 16 May 1974, p.17). Lasdun's National Theatre in London came under attack for the 'monumentalism' of its powerful concrete form. Curtis, loyal to the principles of the Modern Movement, commented: "The National Theatre is big, forceful and made of concrete when the prevalent ethos requires the petite, the anonymous and the vernacular, no matter what the building task. The theatre confidently concerns itself with questions of form but the last thing a crisis- and conscience-stricken architectural profession wishes to discuss is the problem of form in architecture. Aesthetics goes to the bottom of the list while morality, sociology and politics go to the top." (Architectural Review Jan. 1977, p.8.) [Return.]
Note 12. The series of articles had the general title 'Towards another architecture' and readers' discussions and contributions were published under the title 'RSVP'. They were contained in the following issues:
1976: July, p.44; Aug., p.80; Sept. p.144; Oct. p.206; Nov. p.268; Dec. p.334;
1977: Feb. p.72; Mar., p.134; April, p.197; May, p.258; July, p.3; Aug., p.66; Sept., p.128; Dec., p.324. [Return.]
Note 13. A spirited defence of Modern Architecture appeared in Architectural Review, May 1978, 257-60. [Return.]
Note 14. Original Note: Introduction to Twentieth Century Architecture (Surveys and Histories).
Category A: Sharp (1972); Davern (1980); Drexler (1979); Jencks (1981); Jencks (1980a); Kulterman (1980); Architectural Record, mid-Aug. 1982?, Jencks and Chaitkin (1982).
Category B: Boyd (1965), Scully (1974), Frampton (1980); Curtis (1982); Benevolo (1971); Banham (1975); Blake (1976); Jencks (1977), Jencks (1980b); Jencks (1982); Risebero (1982).
Blake's books on Corbusier (Blake 1963) and Mies (Blake 1960) give a very human portrait. Carter's book on Mies (1972) will appeal more than others to the engineer. Drew (1972) provides an introduction to the 'third generation' architects. Sharp (1967) provides a handy bibliography relating to well-known architects and to Modern Architecture in general. [Return.]
Grateful thanks to the following organisations which have made it possible to provide links to full colour photographs and descriptions of buildings for this chapter.
archINFORM. Link.
Archiseek. Link.
Z. Ashe's 19C-City website. Link.
Atelier Kroll. Link.
Digital Archive of American Architecture. Prof. Jeffery Howe, Boston College. Link.
Digital Imaging Project. Prof. Mary Ann Sullivan, Bluffton College. Link.
English Heritage. Link.
Essential World Architecture. Link.
Florence. [Firenze.] Link.
Foster & Partners. Link.
Friends of the Segovia Mint. Link.
Galinsky. Link.
Goddess Athena. Link.
Hellenic Ministry of Culture. Link.
Looking at Buildings. Link.
Monolithic. Link.
National Monuments Record, Images of England. Link.
Open University, UK. Link.
Palazzo Strozzi. Link.
Philadelphia Buildings. Link.
El Poder de la Palabra. Link.
Sandy Brown Associates. Link.
Smithsonian Archives of American Art. Link.
Vitruvio. Link.
[Top.]
The art in structural design navigation:
[Chapter 9.]
[Chapter 11.]
[Contents]
[References]
Site navigation:
[Aesthetics of built form.]
[Papers.]
[Work of Jörg Schlaich.]
[John Monash's early engineering.]