Theory of architecture Books

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Book Synopsis

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Book Synopsis

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Book Synopsis

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Book SynopsisIt is a major challenge to write the history of post-WWII architectural theory without boiling it down to a few defining paradigms. An impressive anthologising effort during the 1990s charted architectural theory mostly via the various theoretical frameworks employed, such as critical theory, critical regionalism, deconstructivism, and pragmatism. Yet the intellectual contours of what constitutes architectural theory have been constantly in flux. It is therefore paramount to ask what kind of knowledge has become important in the recent history of architectural theory and how the resulting figure of knowledge sets the conditions for the actual arguments made. The contributions in this volume focus on institutional, geographical, rhetorical, and other conditioning factors. They thus screen the unspoken rules of engagement that postwar architectural theory ascribed to. Contributors: Matthew Allen (University of Toronto), Karen Burns (University of Melbourne), Ole W. Fischer (University of Utah), Philip Goad (University of Melbourne), Hilde Heynen (KU Leuven), Rajesh Heynickx (KU Leuven), Paul Holmquist (Louisiana State University), Sandra Kaji-O'Grady (University of Queensland), Peter Lang (Royal Institute of Art, Stockholm), Andre Loeckx (KU Leuven), Sebastiaan Loosen (KU Leuven), Louis Martin (Universite du Quebec a Montreal), Joan Ockman (University of Pennsylvania), Carmen Popescu (ENSAB, Rennes), Ricardo Ruivo (Architectural Association, London), Andrew Toland (University of Technology Sydney). Free ebook available at OAPEN Library, JSTOR and ProjectMuseTrade Review“le livre offre une vision précise et ample, à la fois érudite et accessible, de l’histoire intellectuelle de l’architecture de ces décennies de bascule, dont les années 1960 constituent le point d’orgue, qui virent les architectes partir à la reconquête de leur statut d’intellectuel. […] ‘The Figure of Knowledge: Conditioning Architectural Theory, 1960s-1990s’ montre, si besoin était, qu’il est possible, pour peu d’agir avec méthode, d’écrire l’histoire d’une matière aussi intangible que la pensée architecturale.“Eléonore Marantz, Critique d’art, URL: http://journals.openedition.org/critiquedart/86655 ; DOI: https://doi.org/10.4000/critiquedart.86655Combined, 'The Figure of Knowledge' and 'Choosing Architecture' make visible the state of architecture theory today. Even though architecture theory is no longer advanced by polemical manifestos, it remains present in other forms. Either in conversations or design reviews, readings or anthologies, architecture theory continues to reveal and reflect on architecture’s entanglement with historical, societal, cultural and economic concerns. Thinking about architecture remains crucial. - Sergio M. Figueiredo, Archined, 17.05.21, https://www.archined.nl/2021/05/architecture-theory-today-of-theorists-and-theoreticians/Table of ContentsINTRODUCTIONThe Shifting Contours of Postwar Architectural TheorySebastiaan Loosen, Rajesh Heynickx, and Hilde HeynenSECTION 1: Modernism and its DiscontentsMeaning and Effect: Revisiting Semiotics in ArchitectureAndré Loeckx and Hilde Heynen A Voice from the Margins: Robin Boyd and 1960s Architecture CulturePhilip GoadContaminations: Art, Architecture, and the Critical Vision of Lara-Vinca MasiniPeter LangArchitecture Becomes Programming: Invisible Technicians, Printouts, and Situated Theories in the 1960sMatthew AllenTroubled Dialogues: Intellectuality at a Crossroads at the Carrefour de l’Europe in BrusselsSebastiaan LoosenSECTION 2: Projects of TheoryInstitutionalized Critique? On the Re(birth) of Architectural Theory after Modernism: ETH and MIT ComparedOle W. FischerThinking Architecture, its Theory and History: A Case Study about Melvin CharneyLouis MartinDirtying the Real: Liane Lefaivre and the Architectural Stalemate with Emerging RealitiesAndrew TolandBetween Making and Acting: The Inherent Ambivalence of Arendtian Architectural TheoryPaul HolmquistCritical Regionalism: A not so Critical TheoryCarmen PopescuSECTION 3: The Misuses of HistoryThe Historiographical Invention of the Soviet Avant-Garde: Cultural Politics and the Return of the Lost ProjectRicardo RuivoEffete, Effeminate, Feminist: Feminizing Architecture TheorySandra Kaji-O’GradyAnthologizing Post-Structuralism: Architecture Ecriture, Gender, and SubjectivityKaren BurnsConsequences of Pragmatism: A Retrospect on “The Pragmatist Imagination”Joan OckmanCODAA Discipline in the MakingHilde Heynen

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Book SynopsisWithin architecture, tacit knowledge plays a substantial role both within the design process and its reception. This book explores the tacit dimension of architecture in its aesthetic, material, cultural, design-based, and reflexive understanding of what we build. Much of architecture's knowledge resides beneath the surface, in nonverbal instruments such as drawings and models that articulate the spatial imagination of the design process. Tacit knowledge, described in 1966 by Michael Polanyi as what we 'can know but cannot tell', often denotes knowledge that escapes quantifiable dimensions of research. Beginning in the studio, where students are guided into becoming architects, the book follows a path through the tacit knowledge present in models, materials, conceptual structures, and the design process, revealing how the tacit dimension leads to craftsmanship and the situated knowledge of architecture-in-the-world. Awareness of the tacit dimension helps to understand the many facets of the spaces we inhabit, from the ideas of the architect to the more hidden assumptions of our cultures. Contributors: Tom Avermaete (ETH Zurich), Margitta Buchert (Leibniz-Universitat Hannover), Christoph Grafe (Bergische Universitat Wuppertal), Mari Lending (The Oslo School of Architecture and Design), Angelika Schnell (Academy of Fine Arts Vienna), Eireen Schreurs (Delft University of Technology), Lara Schrijver (University of Antwerp) Free ebook available at OAPEN Library, JSTOR and Project Muse.Trade Review“In my twenty years of peer-reviewing book manuscripts for potential publication, this one has been the most fascinating for me. In fact, I did not put it down. Thank you for inviting me to peer-review it.” Igea Troiani, University of Plymouth Table of ContentsIntroduction: Tacit Knowledge, Architecture and its UnderpinningsLara SchrijverPerformative Design Research: En-acting Knowledge in TeachingAngelika SchnellTeaching Architecture Full ScaleMari LendingTransformative Dialogues: On Material Knowing in ArchitectureEireen SchreursA Black Box? Architecture and its EpistemesTom AvermaeteDesign Knowledges on the MoveMargitta BuchertA Silent Master: Artistry and Craft in the Work of Peter CelsingChristoph GrafeMaterial Knowledge and Cultural ValuesLara Schrijver

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Book SynopsisTransgressive acts in architecture as responses to today's ecological, political, economic, and social crisesIn architecture, transgressive acts have always been a reality, in spite of rules and canons that have defined the discipline and its extended field. However, in recent decades their frequency and radicality have surged from rather random, marginal and/or idiosyncratic phenomena. While their sudden rise can be explained as a response to the compulsive normativity of modernity, the deeper root is to be sought elsewhere: the recent waves of transgressiveness are intimately linked to the hypercrisis affecting our world today spanning ecological, political, economic, and social dimensions, and catalysing fundamental mutations and disorders. Some of these transgressive acts are motivated by a desire to dismantle a malfunctioning system, but more often than not breaking the rules has become an inherent survival tactic amid urgent social challenges. In our era of after-modernity, transgression emerges not just as an act of defiance but reveals a new paradigm at work a critical framework for reimagining the built environment, challenging established orders, and advocating for the rights of marginalised populations. Through a rich array of empirical case studies and theoretical insights, this volume provides a unique, forward-looking perspective on transgressive acts in architecture as responses to today's ecological, political, economic, and social crises. This book will be made open access within three years of publication thanks to Path to Open, a program developed in partnership between JSTOR, the American Council of Learned Societies (ACLS), University of Michigan Press, and The University of North Carolina Press to bring about equitable access and impact for the entire scholarly community, including authors, researchers, libraries, and university presses around the world. Learn more at https://about.jstor.org/path-to-open/

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Book SynopsisVésma Kontere McQuillan is a Latvian-born architect and writer currently living in Norway. Since 2011, she has been a professor at Kristiania University College, Oslo, where she developed the new retail design bachelor's degree. Her research over the last five years has focused on the collaboration between OMA/AMO and Prada, looking in particular at the fashion shows created by AMO and Prada, and the design process behind these joint productions. This book is a direct outcome of this research.

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Book SynopsisThe Healthy Indoors candidly addresses the increasing need for spaces designed to serve multiple and diverse uses while promoting a culture of wellbeing and innovation. Health, wellbeing and comfort have become critical priorities in carving new spaces. Addressed through the use of carefully selected materials, systems and design strategies, these considerations are now widely implemented to augment the structures we inhabit, from our homes and workplaces to shops and healthcare centres. The Healthy Indoors will provide a cleverly guided survey of projects that have successfully put the occupants’ physical and mental health at the center of their design. Laying claim to significance beyond that of aesthetics, the 50+ case studies selected for this book will be thoroughly presented in a way that will appeal to both professionals and enthusiasts alike. Find out what are the healthiest new ways to live, work and play!

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Book SynopsisWhere We Learn investigates how learning spaces are evolving to be made more engaging, flexible and all-around better suited to today’s challenges and opportunities. When educational spaces are designed not only to suit, but to harness the power of new learning models, they have a catalytic potential to improve the way knowledge is shared and retained. Once static, spaces where learning takes place have expanded far beyond the walls of the classroom to spill into more flexible and interactive settings. Where We Learn will offer some of the most novel insights into the design and performance of new environments that are better adapted to contemporary pedagogical practices. This book will shed light on over 50 projects worldwide, ranging from kindergartens, schools and universities to libraries, study cafés and museums. Geared towards readers interested in understanding the broader impact of design on the human experience, Where We Learn will highlight imaginative projects while remaining grounded in practical contexts and real-world settings.

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Book SynopsisFlanders has had a Government Architect since 1999. The Government Architect advises public commissioning authorities with the aim of promoting the quality of architecture and the built environment. One of the methods used for this purpose is the Open Call. In the essays presented in this book, eight authors discuss, from different perspectives, why this influential ''competition'' is not quite an architecture competition while at the same time being much more. Did architectural criticism in the 1990s help to pave the way for the Government Architect position and the Open Call? Does the key to quality lie in smart procedures? What is a ''strong'' public commissioner in a democratic system? What does the Flemish Government Architect do and what has the Open Call achieved over the past 20 years? What do the distinct projects mean in their broader spatial context? Can architects satisfy a collective desire with singular designs? To what extent is the Open Call in line with the broadening of the practice of architecture and the evolving competition culture? Looking back on two decades of public commissions, this book presents current reflections on these issues.

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Book SynopsisThe first edition of Connections was chosen by the National Association of Publishers (USA) as the best book in “Mathematics, Chemistry, and Astronomy — Professional and Reference” in 1991. It has been a comprehensive reference in design science, bringing together in a single volume material from the areas of proportion in architecture and design, tilings and patterns, polyhedra, and symmetry. The book presents both theory and practice and has more than 750 illustrations. It is suitable for research in a variety of fields and as an aid to teaching a course in the mathematics of design. It has been influential in stimulating the burgeoning interest in the relationship between mathematics and design. In the second edition there are five new sections, supplementary, as well as a new preface describing the advances in design science since the publication of the first edition.Table of ContentsProportion in architecture; similarity; the golden mean; graphs; tilings with polygons; two-dimensional networks and lattices; polyhedra - platonic solids; transformation of the platonic solids I; transformation of the platonic solids II; polyhedra - space filling; isometries and mirrors; symmetry of the plane.

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Book SynopsisThe first edition of Connections was chosen by the National Association of Publishers (USA) as the best book in “Mathematics, Chemistry, and Astronomy — Professional and Reference” in 1991. It has been a comprehensive reference in design science, bringing together in a single volume material from the areas of proportion in architecture and design, tilings and patterns, polyhedra, and symmetry. The book presents both theory and practice and has more than 750 illustrations. It is suitable for research in a variety of fields and as an aid to teaching a course in the mathematics of design. It has been influential in stimulating the burgeoning interest in the relationship between mathematics and design. In the second edition there are five new sections, supplementary, as well as a new preface describing the advances in design science since the publication of the first edition.Table of ContentsProportion in architecture; similarity; the golden mean; graphs; tilings with polygons; two-dimensional networks and lattices; polyhedra - platonic solids; transformation of the platonic solids I; transformation of the platonic solids II; polyhedra - space filling; isometries and mirrors; symmetry of the plane.

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Book SynopsisThis book introduces a ten-year-long design research project in the Yangtze River Delta (YRD), China, based on international cooperation studios, design workshops, a Ph.D. thesis, and concrete practice in China, Germany, and the Netherlands. This research adapts the existing methods of Landscape Character Assessment (UK), Historic Cultural Landscape Elements (Germany), and Dutch Polder Typology to mapping, describing, and classifying landscape character areas and types at the three scales of regional, municipal, and local. Furthermore, to connect research with design, we developed a typological approach of generating specific measures for the networked polder landscape. This research bridges the gap of a missing landscape characterization method for the conservation, transformation, and critical reconstruction of historic cultural landscapes in a metropolitan context. The book is intended for graduate students, researchers, and practitioners interested in the topics of cultural landscape in transition, methods for landscape characterization and typology, and a research-by-design approach in interdisciplinary projects of landscape architecture, urbanism, and regional planning.Table of ContentsAcknowledgments.- Summary.- Forward.- List of Figures.- List of Tables.- Chapter 1 Setting the Scene.- Chapter 2 Building the Research Context.- Chapter 3 Permanence and Resilience: The Framing Role of Landscape Architecture.- Chapter 4 Landscape Characterization and Typology: In Search of Methodology.- Chapter 5 Time, Space and Cultural Landscape: Morphogenesis of a Metropolitan Delta Landscape.- Chapter 6 Landscape Characterization, Typology, and Research-by-design.- Chapter 7 Conclusions and Discussion.- Appendices.- Appendix A Other Relevant Tables.- Appendix B Glossary of Chinese Terms.- Bibliography.

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