A Weekly Dose of Architecture Books

original bauhaus Nina Wiedemeyer (Editor) Prestel , November 2019 Hardcover | 9-3/4 x 12 inches | 224 pages | 231 illustrations | English | ISBN: 978-3791359045 | $60.00 PUBLISHER'S DESCRIPTION : The Bauhaus existed for only 14 years in Germany, but for the past 100 years its ideas have been passed on and its products relaunched, imitated and further developed. Using 14 famous, familiar, or forgotten objects, this book offers 14 case studies. It examines questions such as how did the woman sitting on the tubular-steel chair become the most famous anonymous figure from the Bauhaus; whether the Haus am Horn in Weimar has a secret twin; and why the tea infusers by Marianne Brandt which were created as prototypes for industrial production always remained one-of-a-kind pieces. This book presents art and design from the Bauhaus-Archiv’s collection, along with exceptional loans from international collections. It sheds light on how unique work and series, remake and original are insepa...

Inside North Korea Oliver Wainwright Taschen , August 2018 Hardcover | 8-1/4 x 10-3/4 inches | 240 pages | 200 illustrations | English/German/French | ISBN: 978-3836572217 | $60.00 PUBLISHER'S DESCRIPTION : Erased by bombing during the Korean War, North Korea’s trophy capital of Pyongyang was entirely rebuilt from scratch from 1953, in line with the vision of the nation’s founder, Kim Il Sung. Designed as an imposing stage set, it is a place of grand axial boulevards linking gargantuan monuments, lined with stately piles of distinctly Korean flavor, to be “national in form and socialist in content.” Under the present leader, Kim Jong Un, construction has ramped up apace—“Let us turn the whole country into a socialist fairyland,” declares one of his official patriotic slogans. He is rapidly transforming Pyongyang into a playground, conjuring a flimsy fantasy of prosperity and using architecture as a powerful anesthetic, numbing the population from the stark reality of his autho...

Sean Godsell: Houses Sean Godsell Thames & Hudson , December 2019 Hardcover | 12-1/4 x 10-1/2 inches | 252 pages | 284 illustrations | English | ISBN: 978-0500343524 | $85.00 PUBLISHER'S DESCRIPTION : As many architects turn to Australia for inspiration, Sean Godsell—a pioneer of Australian minimalism—has established himself as an important influencer on the global architecture scene. This survey of his residential architecture features twelve house projects across Australia, each illustrated with full-color photography, as well as a selection of the architect’s hand-drawn plans and exploratory sketches, which illuminate how each project relates to its surrounding landscape. Featuring an essay by Godsell about the influences of Australia’s landscape and culture in his work, this survey also includes an introduction by leading critic and commentator Philip Goad about the achievements of Godsell’s career to date and the importance of his visionary designs. With a complete i...

Stone Shelters Edward Allen The MIT Press , June 1969 Hardcover | 7 x 10 inches | 213 pages | English | ISBN: 978-0262010276 PUBLISHER'S DESCRIPTION : Numerous photographs, scaled maps, and drawings trace the development of this vernacular architecture from the Stone Age to the present. Professor Edward Allen was a faculty member in the MIT Department of Architecture from 1968 to 1983. REFERRAL LINKS :     dDAB COMMENTARY : Although it wasn't picked up in architectural journals until this week , longtime MIT professor Edward Allen died on July 7 at the age of 81 . Allen was best known for authoring or co-authoring ten architecture books, most of them on the technical aspects of building materials and construction and geared to architecture students. I don't own any of these seminal books, such as Fundamentals of Building Construction , which is now in its seventh edition, but I do have a copy of his first book, Stone Shelters , which came out of a Fulbright researc...

Designing a Garden: Monk's Garden at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum Michael Van Valkenburgh The Monacelli Press , October 2019 Hardcover | 7-1/2 x 9-1/2 inches | 208 pages | English | ISBN: 978-1580935524 | $40.00 PUBLISHER'S DESCRIPTION : In Designing a Garden , Van Valkenburgh presents the design of the Monk’s Garden at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, an intimate, walled garden that Laurie Olin has described as “a masterpiece, and not a minor one.” The book documents the evolution of the garden’s design, which is based on the concept of meandering paths through a dreamlike woodland to create a contemplative space. Sketches and models show how the idea was worked out, and lush photographs reveal the completed garden through the seasons. Van Valkenburgh’s text explores the origins of his love of landscape and plants in his family farm in Upstate New York and how this has influenced his intuitions as a designer. He shares the full background story of the Monk’s G...

Assembling the Architect: The History and Theory of Professional Practice George Barnett Johnston Bloomsbury Visual Arts , January 2020 Paperback | 6-1/4 x 9 inches | 296 pages | 74 illustrations | English | ISBN: 978-1350126862 | $34.95 PUBLISHER'S DESCRIPTION : Assembling the Architect explores the origins and history of architectural practice. It unravels the competing interests that historically have structured the field and cultivates a deeper understanding of the contemporary profession. Focusing on the period 1870 to 1920 when the foundations were being laid for the U.S. architectural profession that we recognize today, this study traces the formation and standardization of the fundamental relationships among architects, owners, and builders, as codified in the American Institute of Architects’ very first Handbook of Architectural Practice. It reveals how these archetypal roles have always been fluid, each successfully redefining their own agency with respect to the o...