A Weekly Dose of Architecture Books

Sir Banister Fletcher's Global History of Architecture Murray Fraser (General Editor) with Catherine Gregg (Managing Editor) Bloomsbury Visual Arts , December 2019 Two-volume hardcover w/slipcase | 8 x 10 inches | 2,540 pages | 2,200 illustrations | English | ISBN: 978-1472589989 | $472.00 Publisher's Description : Sir Banister Fletcher's Global History of Architecture is the acknowledged classic reference work for architectural history. It has been essential reading for generations of architects and students since the first edition was published in 1896 – and this tradition continues today as the new 21st edition provides the most up-to-date, authoritative and detailed account of the global history of architecture available in any form. Thousands of major buildings from around the world are described and explained, accompanied by over 2,200 photographs, plans, and drawings. Architectural styles and traditions are placed within a clear framework, and the chrono...

Avant-Garde in the Cornfields: Architecture, Landscape, and Preservation in New Harmony Michelangelo Sabatino, Ben Nicholson (Editors) University of Minnesota Press , October 2019 Paperback | 8 x 10 inches | 408 pages | 178 illustrations | English | ISBN: 978-1517903145 | $40.00 Publisher's Description : Avant-Garde in the Cornfields is an in-depth study of New Harmony, Indiana, a unique town in the American Midwest renowned as the site of two successive Utopian settlements during the nineteenth century: the Harmonists and the Owenites. During the Cold War years of the twentieth century, New Harmony became a spiritual “living community” and attracted a wide variety of creative artists and architects who left behind landmarks that are now world famous. This engrossing and well-documented book explores the architecture, topography, and preservation of New Harmony during both periods and addresses troubling questions about the origin, production, and meaning of the town’s...

My blogging activities have just reached drinking age! It was 21 years ago this month that I started A Weekly Dose of Architecture. That website, which I stopped in 2014 , was joined in 2004 by A Daily Dose of Architecture, what is now the one-year-old A Daily Dose of Architecture Books  (or dDAB, which I say in my head as "dee-dabb"). So what will 2020 hold for dDAB? It will continue, but posts in the first third of the year will be less frequent than most of 2019, which averaged about four books per week. I'm in the thick of writing my latest book — a book, coincidentally, about architecture books, currently titled Buildings in Print — so will be posting just two books per week to this blog until May, after I turn in my manuscript to my publisher, Prestel. dDAB might even go on hiatus in April as my deadline nears — that remains to be seen. That said, posts will resume later this week. In the meantime, Happy 2020 to all!

In 2019, the first year for A Daily Dose of Architecture Books (dDAB), I featured nearly 200 books in six day-of-the-week categories: Monograph Monday , Technical Tuesday , World Wednesday , History/Theory Thursday , Free-for-all Friday , and Wayback Weekend . With the year drawing to a close, I've decided to take a look back at all these books and pick my favorite in each category. This is not a "Best of 2019" list, though, since the books I reviewed in 2019 weren't necessarily released in 2019 (obviously this is the case with the Wayback Weekend books). Below are my favorite books reviewed on dDAB in 2019, with just minor commentary provided for each. Reviews on dDAB will resume the second week of 2020. Monograph Monday ( 31 books ): Studio 804: Design Build. Expanding the Pedagogy of Architectural Education by Dan Rockhill with David Sain (Oscar Riera Ojeda Publishers, October 2018)  This long-overdue monograph covers the first 25 years of Studio 804, the ...

The Story of New York's Staircase Prestel, November 2019 Paperback | 10 x 10 inches | 144 pages | 100 illustrations | English | ISBN: 978-3791384733 | $25.00 Publisher's Description : A public space like no other, the staircase was designed by the award-winning Heatherwick Studio to give New Yorkers and visitors a unique vertical experience. In this book, readers can witness every part of its development, from initial designs to the finished structure. They'll learn why and how the staircase came to be and the significance of its placement in the Nelson Byrd Woltz-designed Public Square and Gardens at Hudson Yards. An essay by architecture critic Paul Goldberger explores the importance of public spaces, while additional texts explain the evolution of the neighbourhood and discuss the staircase’s dramatic design. A wealth of photography follows the structure's incredible path to completion and the final result, with a total of 2,500 steps, 154 interconnected sta...

MoMA PS1: A History Klaus Biesenbach, Bettina Funcke (Editors) The Museum of Modern Art , October 2019 Hardcover | 9-1/4 x 10-3/4 inches | 304 pages | English | ISBN: 978-1633450691 | $65.00 Publisher's Description : Since its inception in the early 1970s, MoMA PS1 in Long Island City, Queens, has been a crucible for radical experimentation. Committed to New York City as well as to maintaining an international scope, PS1 has always put the artist at the center, engaging practitioners at work in every discipline from performance, music, dance, poetry and new media to painting, sculpture, photography and architecture. This groundbreaking publication captures the vibrancy of a long and venerable tradition that began with the legendary series of performances and events organized by founder Alanna Heiss under the Brooklyn Bridge in 1971. Organized into four main sections that delve into the former school’s rich history as an art center during the 1970s, 1980s and 1990s up to ...

The Revolution Will Be Stopped Halfway: Oscar Niemeyer in Algeria Jason Oddy Columbia Books on Architecture and the City , September 2019 Paperback | 9 x 11 inches | 208 pages | English | ISBN: 978-1941332504 | $35.00 Publisher's Description : Of all of the Brazilian modernist Oscar Niemeyer’s many built works, his Algerian projects are among the least well known. Beginning in 1968, Algeria’s President Houari Boumediene commissioned Niemeyer to build two universities and an Olympic sports hall, as well as a series of large-scale, never-realized projects across Algeria, in an attempt to forge a modern, independent nation. In 2013, Jason Oddy produced an in-depth photographic survey of these buildings as they exist in Algeria today. The Revolution Will Be Stopped Halfway collects those images alongside archival documents and Oddy’s further research into Niemeyer’s Algerian work in order to explore the revolutionary politics that inspired and formed these buildings. dDAB C...