Author: Naomi Stead
Publisher: Chronicle Books
ISBN: 1616898909
Category : Architecture
Languages : en
Pages : 319
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Book Description
By and large, architectural historians use texts, drawings, and photographs to craft their narratives. Oral testimony from those who actually occupy or construct buildings is rarely taken as seriously. Speaking of Buildings offers a rebuttal, theorizing the radical potential of a methodology that has historically been cast as unreliable. Essays by an international group of scholars look at varied topics, from the role of gossip in undermining masculine narratives in architecture to workers' accounts of building with cement in midcentury London to a sound art piece created by oral testimonies from Los Angeles public housing residents. In sum, the authors call for a renewed form of listening to enrich our understanding of what buildings are, what they do, and what they mean to people.
Author: Christopher Alexander
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0190050357
Category : Architecture
Languages : en
Pages : 1216
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Book Description
You can use this book to design a house for yourself with your family; you can use it to work with your neighbors to improve your town and neighborhood; you can use it to design an office, or a workshop, or a public building. And you can use it to guide you in the actual process of construction. After a ten-year silence, Christopher Alexander and his colleagues at the Center for Environmental Structure are now publishing a major statement in the form of three books which will, in their words, "lay the basis for an entirely new approach to architecture, building and planning, which will we hope replace existing ideas and practices entirely." The three books are The Timeless Way of Building, The Oregon Experiment, and this book, A Pattern Language. At the core of these books is the idea that people should design for themselves their own houses, streets, and communities. This idea may be radical (it implies a radical transformation of the architectural profession) but it comes simply from the observation that most of the wonderful places of the world were not made by architects but by the people. At the core of the books, too, is the point that in designing their environments people always rely on certain "languages," which, like the languages we speak, allow them to articulate and communicate an infinite variety of designs within a forma system which gives them coherence. This book provides a language of this kind. It will enable a person to make a design for almost any kind of building, or any part of the built environment. "Patterns," the units of this language, are answers to design problems (How high should a window sill be? How many stories should a building have? How much space in a neighborhood should be devoted to grass and trees?). More than 250 of the patterns in this pattern language are given: each consists of a problem statement, a discussion of the problem with an illustration, and a solution. As the authors say in their introduction, many of the patterns are archetypal, so deeply rooted in the nature of things that it seemly likely that they will be a part of human nature, and human action, as much in five hundred years as they are today.
Author: Nancy T. McCoy
Publisher: Texas A&M University Press
ISBN: 1623495539
Category : Architecture
Languages : en
Pages : 246
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Book Description
When the A&M College of Texas opened its doors in 1876, its early buildings followed a Victorian architectural style. Classical architecture came to the campus with the Academic Building, after the 1912 fire that destroyed Old Main. Subsequent buildings generally followed this neoclassical path, but the growth of the campus in the Depression era saw the addition of an extraordinary group of buildings, sited in accordance with a master plan developed by college architect F. E. Giesecke and designed by S. C. P. Vosper, each of whom also held faculty positions in the first architecture program at a state college in Texas. The buildings designed by Vosper are arguably the finest buildings on the campus, uniquely expressive of the agricultural and mechanical origins of the university; they delight the senses with color, sculpture, and wit. Nancy T. McCoy and David G. Woodcock, distinguished preservation architects and scholars, review the history of Texas A&M campus architecture and provide in-depth coverage of Vosper and his legacy. Illustrated by the sumptuous photography of Carolyn Brown, Architecture That Speaks concludes with observations on recent approaches toward the reuse and rehabilitation of campus heritage architecture and a view to the future, as plans evolve for further development of the campus that maintains a respect for both strategic vision and historical heritage.
Author: Nikki Clinton
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780578362410
Category :
Languages : en
Pages :
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Book Description
Buildings protect us, help us and inspire us, but do you ever wonder what they would say if they could talk? Do they have feelings? Are they happy to see us? Does it hurt when we stomp? This imaginative children's book contemplates what would happen if the buildings that surround us suddenly piped up to tell us what's on their minds. Written by Nikki Clinton and illustrated by 14 designers and architects, If Buildings Could Talk invites kids of all ages to ponder the conversations they might have with the architecture in their lives.The architecture industry has a pipeline problem and we feel there's no better way to create opportunities than by inspiring our youth. That's why some of Little's most talented creatives came together to write and illustrate this imaginative children's book. All proceeds from the book will go toward funding architecture and design mentoring programs focused on educating, empowering and supporting underrepresented youth to pursue a career in design.
Author: Anthony Alofsin
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
ISBN: 0226015076
Category : Architecture
Languages : en
Pages : 339
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Book Description
The canonical inventors of International Style have long dominated studies of modern European architecture. But in this text, Anthony Alofsin broadens this scope by exploring the rich yet overlooked architecture of the late Austro-Hungarian Empire and its successor states.
Author: David Wallance
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1000365492
Category : Architecture
Languages : en
Pages : 348
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Book Description
The Future of Modular Architecture presents an unprecedented proposal for mass-customized mid- and high-rise modular housing that can be manufactured and distributed on a global scale. Advocating for the adoption of open-source design based on a new modular standard, the book shows how the construction industry and architectural practice may soon be radically reshaped. By leveraging the existing intermodal freight transport system, global supply chains can be harnessed to realize the long-held promise that housing will be a well-designed and affordable industrial product. We are on the cusp of a transformative change in the way we design and build our cities. Author David Wallance argues that modular architecture is profoundly intertwined with globalization, equitable urbanism, and sustainable development. His book addresses these timely issues through a specific approach grounded in fundamental concepts. Going beyond the individual modular building, Wallance forecasts the emergence of a new type of design, manufacturing, and construction enterprise. Written in an approachable style with illustrated examples, the book is a must read for professionals in architecture and design, city planning, construction, real estate, as well as the general reader with an interest in these topics.
Author: Robert Venturi
Publisher: The Museum of Modern Art
ISBN: 9780870702822
Category : Architecture
Languages : en
Pages : 142
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Book Description
Foreword by Arthur Drexler. Introduction by Vincent Scully.
Author: Alison Lurie
Publisher: Delphinium Books
ISBN: 1497680301
Category : Architecture
Languages : en
Pages : 299
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Book Description
In 1981 Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist Alison Lurie published The Language of Clothes, a meditation on costume and fashion as an expression of history, social status and individual psychology. Amusing, enlightening and full of literary allusion, the book was highly praised and widely anthologized. Now Lurie has returned with a companion book, The Language of Houses, a lucid, provocative and entertaining look at how the architecture of buildings and the spaces within them both reflect and affect the people who inhabit them. Schools, churches, government buildings, museums, prisons, hospitals, restaurants, and of course, houses and apartments, all of them speak to human experience in vital and varied ways. The Language of Houses discusses historical and regional styles and the use of materials such as stone and wood and concrete, as well as contemplating the roles of stairs and mirrors, windows and doors, tiny rooms and cathedral-like expanses, illustrating its conclusions with illuminating literary references as well as the comments of experts in the field. This book, which is accompanied by light-hearted original drawings by Karen Sung, is an essential and highly entertaining new contribution to the literature of modern architecture.
Author: Matthew Rice
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
ISBN: 9781408893784
Category : Architecture
Languages : en
Pages : 0
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Book Description
A beautifully packaged, idiosyncratic introduction to British building styles, by the acclaimed illustrator and architectural enthusiast Matthew Rice. The Language of Buildings covers the grammar and vocabulary of British buildings, explaining the evolution of styles from Norman castles to Norman Foster. Its aim is to enable the reader to recognize, understand and date any British building. As Matthew Rice says, "Once you can speak any language, conversation can begin, but without it communications can only be brief and brutish. The same is the case with Architecture: an inability to describe the component parts of a building leaves one tongue-tied and unable to begin to discuss what is or is not exciting, dull or peculiar about it." The Language of Buildings will explain the language of architecture. With it in your hand, buildings will break down beguilingly into their component parts, ready for inspection and discussion. There will be no more references to that curly bit on top of the thing with the square protrusions. Ungainly and inept descriptions will be a thing of the past and, fluent in the world of volutes, hood moulds, lobed architraves and bucrania, you will be able to leave a cathedral or country house with as much to talk about as a film or play. The Language of Buildings starts with an explanation of the basic "Grammar" of buildings: elevation, plan, roof, gable and eave. This will enable the reader to better make use of what is to follow. It will also cover the Orders of Architecture--Doric, Tuscan, Ionic, Corinthian and Composite--so that the vital basics of Classicism are covered. Following this is the "Vocabulary." This will be a chronological reference section covering, period by period, the windows, doors and doorcases, columns, chimneys, arches, balustrades and pediments that make up the built environment.
Author: JOSEPH G. ALLEN
Publisher: Harvard University Press
ISBN: 0674278364
Category : Architecture
Languages : en
Pages : 337
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Book Description
Buildings can make us sick or keep us well. Diseases and toxins course through indoor spaces, making us ill. Meanwhile, better air quality and light levels improve productivity. At a time when the COVID-19 pandemic has us focused more than ever on indoor air quality, Healthy Buildings shows how much we have to gain from human-centered design.
