Reglazing Modernism


Book Description

The worldwide use of building envelopes in steel and glass is one of the characteristic features of modern architecture. Many of these pre- and post-war buildings are now suffering severe defects in the building fabric, which necessitate measures to preserve the buildings. In this endeavor, aspects of architectural design, building physics, and the preservation of historic buildings play a key role. Using a selection of 20 iconic buildings in Europe and the USA, the book documents the current technological status of the three most common strategies used today: restoration, rehabilitation, and replacement. The buildings include Fallingwater House by Frank Lloyd Wright, Farnsworth House by Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, Fagus Factory and Bauhaus Building by Walter Gropius.




Resurfacing Modernism


Book Description

This issue explores the prospects of mid-century modernism in a postmodern age. It invokes three meanings of "resurface": reappearance of aspects of the past as well as the layering of meanings and interpretations onto accepted conventions, and the peeling away of patinas associated with modernism.




Great Windows in Modern Architecture


Book Description

Windows are moments in modern architecture where we look to ascertain elegance, technical expression and material language or to capture a certain atmosphere. A window opening is as much an interval and an opportunity as it is a device for admitting light, air or views; it is simultaneously a physical aperture but also a philosophical opening of collaboration and reflection. In order to understand the language of a building we might look to the detail of the window. But what does this mean and why does modern architecture invest so much expression in the window? This book explores how the act of detailing and situating windows in buildings is a key proponent in the language of architecture, which both informs and works with the contingencies of design and construction. It investigates 18 case studies in-depth using painstakingly drawn details and vivid photographs in full colour to define what makes these windows “great” and how each window is situated within both its technical and philosophical context and as an overall development of modern architecture. Case studies include the work of Walter Gropius, Mies van der Rohe, Pierre Chareau, Frank Lloyd Wright, Alvar Aalto, Carlo Scarpa, Le Corbusier, Stirling and Gowan, Raili and Reima Pietilä, Louis Kahn, Peter Womersley, Miralles/Pinós, Steven Holl, Glen Murcutt and O’Donnell + Tuomey.




Managing Energy Use in Modern Buildings


Book Description

This timely volume brings together case studies that address the urgent need to manage energy use and improve thermal comfort in modern buildings while preserving their historic significance and character. This collection of ten case studies addresses the issues surrounding the improvement of energy consumption and thermal comfort in modern buildings built between 1928 and 1969 and offers valuable lessons for other structures facing similar issues. These buildings, international in scope and diverse in type, style, and size, range from the Shulman House, a small residence in Los Angeles, to the TD Bank Tower, a skyscraper complex in Toronto, and from the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation, a cultural venue in Lisbon, to the Van Nelle Factory in Rotterdam, now an office building. Showing ingenuity and sensitivity, the case studies consider improvements to such systems as heating, cooling, lighting, ventilation, and controls. They provide examples that demonstrate best practices in conservation and show ways to reduce carbon footprints, minimize impacts to historic materials and features, and introduce renewable energy sources, in compliance with energy codes and green-building rating systems. The Conserving Modern Heritage series, launched in 2019, is written by architects, engineers, conservators, scholars, and allied professionals. The books in this series provide well-vetted case studies that address the challenges of conserving twentieth-century heritage.




History of Construction Cultures Volume 2


Book Description

Volume 2 of History of Construction Cultures contains papers presented at the 7ICCH – Seventh International Congress on Construction History, held at the Lisbon School of Architecture, Portugal, from 12 to 16 July, 2021. The conference has been organized by the Lisbon School of Architecture (FAUL), NOVA School of Social Sciences and Humanities, the Portuguese Society for Construction History Studies and the University of the Azores. The contributions cover the wide interdisciplinary spectrum of Construction History and consist on the most recent advances in theory and practical case studies analysis, following themes such as: - epistemological issues; - building actors; - building materials; - building machines, tools and equipment; - construction processes; - building services and techniques ; -structural theory and analysis ; - political, social and economic aspects; - knowledge transfer and cultural translation of construction cultures. Furthermore, papers presented at thematic sessions aim at covering important problematics, historical periods and different regions of the globe, opening new directions for Construction History research. We are what we build and how we build; thus, the study of Construction History is now more than ever at the centre of current debates as to the shape of a sustainable future for humankind. Therefore, History of Construction Cultures is a critical and indispensable work to expand our understanding of the ways in which everyday building activities have been perceived and experienced in different cultures, from ancient times to our century and all over the world.




Glass in Architecture from the Pre- to the Post-Industrial Era


Book Description

Glass is one of the most fascinating and versatile building materials in architectural history. The new insights into glass in architecture are the result of research at the intersection of glass production, construction technology and building culture. Coming from a variety of disciplines, the contributions bridge the divide between natural sciences, humanities and the preservation and restoration of cultural heritage. They explore the crucial role of flat glass in shaping architecture, particularly since the 18th century, and discuss the in-situ restoration of historic windows and glass façades and the importance of preserving this fragile heritage. The topics range from the manufacture of sheet glass in pre-industrial times to the possibilities of repair and reusability of insulating glazing. With contributions by Océane Bailleul, Peter Bellendorf, Stefan Bichlmair, Catherine Blaine, Anne-Laure Carré, Niels De Temmerman, Matthias Fischer, Susanne Fischer, Waldo Galle, Josef Ganka, Esther Geboes, Emma Groult, Melchior Fischli, Ueli Fritz, Florin Gstöhl, Isabel Haupt, Laura Hindelang, Hauke Horn, Peter Heinrich Jahn, Olivia Jorgji, Dunja Kielmann, Ralf Kilian, Katrin Lenz, Giulia Marino, Christine Milch, Angelika Reiff, Alexandra Schmölder, Logan Sisley, Helen Spencer, Ruth Tenschert, Vitaly Volkov and Sophie Wolf A multi-disciplinary survey of the history of the production and use of flat glass From the Roman times to the present day New insights on sheet glass as building material and cultural heritage




Re-Covering Modernism


Book Description

In the first half of the twentieth century, modernist works appeared not only in obscure little magazines and books published by tiny exclusive presses but also in literary reprint magazines of the 1920s, tawdry pulp magazines of the 1930s, and lurid paperbacks of the 1940s. In his nuanced exploration of the publishing and marketing of modernist works, David M. Earle questions how and why modernist literature came to be viewed as the exclusive purview of a cultural elite given its availability in such popular forums. As he examines sensational and popular manifestations of modernism, as well as their reception by critics and readers, Earle provides a methodology for reconciling formerly separate or contradictory materialist, cultural, visual, and modernist approaches to avant-garde literature. Central to Earle's innovative approach is his consideration of the physical aspects of the books and magazines—covers, dust wrappers, illustrations, cost—which become texts in their own right. Richly illustrated and accessibly written, Earle's study shows that modernism emerged in a publishing ecosystem that was both richer and more complex than has been previously documented.




Preface to Modernism


Book Description

Berman traces the conceptual lineage of modernism, examining its evolution in Western art and literature through empiricism, idealism, and romanticism. Using modernist literary and visual movements as examples, Berman demonstrates how modern social, political, and scientific developments--including capitalism, socialism, humanism, psychoanalysis, fascism, and modernism itself--have altered attitudes toward time, space, self, creativity, the natural world, and community.




The Highroad Around Modernism


Book Description

Discussions of modernism and postmodernism in philosophy and the arts are usually based on a narrow reading of the Western tradition and are not conscious of the narrowness. The modern period, beginning with the European Renaissance, spawned many developments, not just the modernist one in terms of which the tradition has been read. From the standpoint of the highroad around modernism, both modernism and post-modernism look like nothing more than two late modern movements, perhaps too preoccupied with themselves and their historical place to engage a swiftly changing world containing more than the Western tradition. The Highroad Around Modernism develops and defends an explicitly non-modernist and non-postmodernist extension of modernity applicable to the problems of world-wide cultural interactions.




Vernacular Modernism


Book Description

Vernacular Modernism advocates a rethinking of the importance of the vernacular as part of the modernist discourse of place, from art to literature, from architectural to social practice.