No comments about Death and Architecture.

4 comments about Theories and Manifestoes of Contemporary Architecture.

1. A complete and utter waste; the excerpts in this volume are so short - averaging a page and a half each - that they are completely useless. Please do not waste your money like I did. You can learn more about the authors and theories on Comedy Central than you can by reading the thirty second sound-bites in this waste of paper and ink



2. good collection of essays and ideas about the meaning of Architecture through different authors along the 20th century. It's not a dictionary nor gives the whole understanding of the overlaping of styles, but shows condensed points of view about various topics.



3. This little green book is like an encylopedia of contemporary famous architects' writings and is a good source for students or layman with not much architectural theory background.



4. This collection of texts by Mr. Jencks and Mr. Kropf is a post-modern piece of work: joining different ideas as they were equivalent. At the same time it looks like a way to inform about the theories and manifestoes, in fact, it is a reductive and destructive thing because the pieces of writing don't show the real ideas of the architects. The book gives the same importance to entire complex books, short comments about buildings, magazine interviews, etc. They are not equivalent, people should be more respectful with the work of the other ones, mainly when their work is to teach and to help understanding.

No comments about Built to Meet Needs: Cultural Issues in Vernacular Architecture.

2 comments about Traditions in Architecture: Africa, America, Asia, and Oceania.

1. Although the book was written as a textbook for a course in non-western traditions in architectural history, it may be of considerable interest to anyone traveling to parts of Asia, Africa and Oceania. The authors' approach is largely descriptive, and the illustrations both plentiful and very good, so one may be a little impatient that the verbal descriptions rarely provide much information that is not apparent from the photos and drawings; but this is, after all, a textbook, and if you will grant that allowance, it is well-worth your time.
        The architectural traditions covered are contemporary as well as ancient, grand as well as domestic and, throughout, the authors treat the sacred and symbolic traditions of the culture, insofar as they are known or may be inferred, as they bear on the built environment. The book is organized thematically, rather than chronologically or geographically. Among the themes: moveable, stationary and underground dwellings; the impact of colonialism on native structures; the transfer of traditional architectural knowledge; and spatial organization, from courtyards to the axial alignments of cities. The focus is on three categories of structures: professionally designed and built monuments, houses erected by traditional building tradesmen, and structures that ordinary people build for their own use. The overarching theme is that architecture expresses cultural values as well as technology, and it illustrates that theme with an exceptionally wide range of examples.
        In the single area of the book where I have a fairly solid background, the Anasazi/Puebloan architecture of the Southwest, the scholarship is current and sound. Interesting and highly informative.



2. My familiarity with architectural studies stems from 3 years as a graduate student. Most architectural studies are "biased" to western history an organized in chronological order. Traditions in Architecture takes a fresh approach by focusing on a rich source of architectural precedence in the early America, Asia, Africa and the far east. The organization is thematic, rather than chronological covering such diverse topics as fixed versus mobile living spaces, vernacular materials, construction methods, sacred spaces, and so much more.

   The only reason that I did not give the work 5 stars is that many of the pictures (all black and white) lacked clarity. I do not know whether this was due to poor originals or poor reproduction; however, the details often are necessary to untderstand the full impact of the works.

   As UCLA professors, Crouch and Johnson give much credit to their students' work and input. This appears to be a work that has been a culmination of years of study with much independent input. I highly recommend it as a "first" to take this approach and to cover such a wide breadth of topics in one volume.

No comments about Plumbing:: Sounding Modern Architecture.

No comments about Civitas: The Harvard Architecture Review.

No comments about Architecture Is Not Made With the Brain: The Labour of Alison And Peter Smithson.

No comments about Bauhaus-Architecture/Bauhaus-Architektur: 1919-1933.

1 comments about Texas Log Buildings: A Folk Architecture.

1. I was a student of Dr. Jordan's at UT Austin in his Geography of Texas class. His lectures on Texas are as good, as I have found out, as his writings. Recommend to anyone interested in the rural history of Texas

3 comments about Between Silence and Light: Spirit in the Architecture of Louis I. Kahn.

1. If you are inerested in late modern architecture and the thoughts "behind the men", it is a good resource. Lots of bright photos of Kahn's work. The text is a little sparse. but for the price it's a good deal.



2. Kahn's words in this book are very wise.

   For just one example: The reason a city might deserve to exist is not due to packing a lot of warm squirming bodies into a small cubic footage, but rather to be a place where persons can explore things that interest them beyond the requirements of reproduction of individual and species life which determines peasant (and other non-urban) life.

   A city is a place where a young person, as they walk through it, observing various master craftspersons at work, may find something they *want* to do for their whole life (not just something they *have* to do to earn a "living").

   This is remarkable stuff, especially when we compare it with the ethical vapidity of postmodernism. Read this book and then see how the "world" you live in and the architects who designed it shapes up. Do you live in spaces which nurture creative human association? Or do you live and work in "decorated sheds" that put sugar coating on places that make you and your loved ones be banal?




3. If you're someone who's interested in architecture,but don't seem to get the hang of it, the word of Louis I. Kahn might help. I was a sopmore when I read the book , classes were a bit blur to me,it was like seeing an image but not sure of what you were looking at. But this book put things in a way that incouraged me as a student , to see the many concepts from life that concerned an architect, and how an an archetect was more of a artist of living, a thinker than just a constrution manager.