A Weekly Dose of Architecture Books

Postmodern Architecture: Less Is a Bore Owen Hopkins Phaidon , February 2020 Hardcover | 10 x 11-1/2 inches | 224 pages | 200 illustrations | English | ISBN: 978-0714878126 | $49.95 Publisher's Description : This unprecedented book takes its subtitle from Postmodernist icon Robert Venturi's spirited response to Mies van der Rohe's dictum that ‘less is more'. One of the 20th century's most controversial styles, Postmodernism began in the 1970s, reached a fever pitch of eclectic non-conformity in the 1980s and 90s, and after nearly 40 years is now enjoying a newfound popularity. Postmodern Architecture showcases examples of the movement in a rainbow of hues and forms from around the globe. dDAB Commentary : What is Postmodern architecture (PoMo for short)? If we go the Wikipedia route — and why not? — it is "a style or movement which emerged in the 1960s as a reaction against the austerity, formality, and lack of variety of modern architecture....

Digital Monuments: The Dreams and Abuses of Iconic Architecture Simone Brott Routledge , October 2019 Paperback | 5 x 7-1/4 inches | 196 pages | 49 illustrations | English | ISBN: 978-0367201128 | $44.95 Publisher's Description : Digital Monuments radically explodes "iconic architecture" of the new millennium and its hijacking of the public imagination via the digital image. Hallucinatory constructions such as Rem Koolhaas’s CCTV headquarters in Beijing, Frank Gehry’s Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao and Zaha Hadid’s Performing Arts Centre in Abu Dhabi are all introduced to the world by immortal digital imagery that floods the internet—yet comes to haunt the actualised buildings. Like holograms, these "digital monuments," which violently push physics and engineering to their limits, flicker eerily between the real and the unreal—invoking fantasies of omnipotence, immortality and utopian cities. But this experience of iconic architecture as a digital drea...

Frei Otto, Carlfried Mutschler, Multihalle Georg Vrachliotis Spector Books , November 2018 Paperback | 8-1/2 x 13 inches | 255 pages | 192 illustrations | German/English | ISBN: 978-3959051927 | $45.00 Publisher's Description : The temporary multipurpose hall built by Frei Otto and Carlfried Mutschler for the 1975 Federal Horticultural Show in Mannheim ranks as the world’s largest wooden grid shell construction. Although it was actually put under a preservation order in 1998, an international debate is now underway to discuss whether to demolish or maintain this structure. Working by and large without any digital computation technology, Frei Otto used a delicate suspended model to design the complex roof: modelling, drawing, and measurement techniques formed the basis for a creative culture of experimentation that involved an ongoing calibration of hand and eye, of scientific observation and technical skill—a form of manual and intellectual self-alignment, in which the pr...

Balkrishna Doshi: Writings on Architecture & Identity Vera Simone Bader (Editor) ArchiTangle , October 2019 Hardcover | 6-1/4 x 8-1/4 inches | 224 pages | 64 illustrations | English | ISBN: 978-3966800013 | 24,00 € Publisher's Description : The book is edited by Vera Simone Bader and has been published on October 16, 2019­, accompanying the Balkrishna Doshi Exhibition at the Architekturmuseum der TUM, Pinakothek der Moderne, Munich. Balkrishna Doshi (born 1927 in Pune, India) played a pivotal role in shaping of postcolonial architecture in India. He is a pioneer in addressing crucial issues of social housing and urbanization in India. Doshi influenced the development of Indian architecture significantly through his teaching and lecturing activities and played a major role in the development of Ahmedabad into a center of Indian architectural education. This anthology assembles a selection of his writings, such as lectures, articles and essays. dDAB Commentary : O...

Architecture in Dialogue: Aga Khan Award for Architecture 2019 Andres Lepik (Editor) ArchiTangle , September 2019 Hardcover | 6-1/2 x 9-1/2 inches | 352 pages | 210 illustrations | English | ISBN: 978-3966800020 | 38,00 € Publisher's Description : The Aga Khan Award for Architecture is one of the most prestigious and renowned awards for architecture worldwide. Since 1980 the Award has been given every three years to projects that combine social and ecological aspects and translate them into innovative and exemplary design. The Award seeks to identify and encourage building concepts that successfully address the needs and aspirations of societies across the world, in which Muslims have a significant presence. This publication presents the shortlist of the 2017–2019 award cycle. From a group of almost 400, 20 projects have been shortlisted by the Master Jury and evaluated by an expert group of technical reviewers. Some of these projects have been honoured with the Aga Kha...

Gordon Bunshaft and SOM: Building Corporate Modernism Nicholas Adams Yale University Press , November 2019 Hardcover | 9 x 11-1/2 inches | 296 pages | 204 illustrations | English | ISBN: 978-0300227475 | $65.00 Publisher's Description : Gordon Bunshaft’s (1909–1990) landmark 1952 design for Lever House reshaped the Manhattan skyline and elevated the reputation of Skidmore, Owings & Merrill (SOM), the firm where he would spend more than 40 years as a partner. Although this enigmatic architect left behind few records, his legacy endures in the corporate headquarters, museums, and libraries that were built in his distinctive modernist style. Bunshaft’s career was marked by shifts in material. Glass and steel structures of the 1950s, such as New York’s Chase Manhattan Bank, gave way to revolutionary designs in concrete, such as the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library at Yale University and the doughnut-shaped Hirshhorn Museum in Washington, DC. Bunshaft’s collaborat...

The World by Design: The Story of a Global Architecture Firm A. Eugene Kohn with Clifford Pearson Rosetta Books, October 2019 Hardcover | 7 x 10 inches | 328 pages | English | ISBN: 978-1948122498 | $34.99 Publisher's Description : Founded on July 4, 1976, Kohn Pedersen Fox quickly became a darling of the architectural press with groundbreaking buildings such as the headquarters for the American Broadcasting Company (ABC) on Manhattan’s Upper West Side, 333 Wacker Drive in Chicago, the Procter & Gamble headquarters in Cincinnati, and the World Bank Headquarters in Washington, DC. By the early 1990s, when most architecture firms in the U.S. were struggling to survive a major recession, KPF was busy with significant buildings in London, Germany, Canada, Japan, Korea, and Indonesia—pioneering a model of global practice that has influenced architecture, design, and creative-services firms ever since. Like any other business, though, KPF has stumbled along the way and wr...