Why Building Styles DON’T MATTER
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What style is it? This is a common initial question people ask to learn more about a building. For architects, this seems like a poor entry point and the initiating question can seem naive and trivial. This varying degree of attentiveness to a building’s style leads to an impasse between the public-that wants to understand the built environment-and architects eager to share the nuances of their discipline. One of the more powerful aspects of the concept of style is its embodiment of two concepts simultaneously, as Eugène Viollet-le-Duc’s famous definition, “there is style, and there are the styles.” The singular is the manner in which something is done and describes the creative act. The plural is a categorization system that groups buildings together according to common characteristics that developed over time. This video explores the complex nature of building style in the hopes to offer a language that can bridge the divide between the public and others more entrenched in the field of architecture.
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Architecture with Stewart is a RUclips journey exploring architecture’s deep and enduring stories in all their bewildering glory. Weekly videos and occasional live events breakdown a wide range of topics related to the built environment in order to increase their general understanding and advocate their importance in shaping the world we inhabit.
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Stewart Hicks is an architectural design educator that leads studios and lecture courses as an Associate Professor in the School of Architecture at the University of Illinois at Chicago. He also serves as an Associate Dean in the College of Architecture, Design, and the Arts and is the co-founder of the practice Design With Company. His work has earned awards such as the Architecture Record Design Vanguard Award or the Young Architect’s Forum Award and has been featured in exhibitions such as the Chicago Architecture Biennial and Design Miami, as well as at the V&A Museum and Tate Modern in London. His writings can be found in the co-authored book Misguided Tactics for Propriety Calibration, published with the Graham Foundation, as well as essays in MONU magazine, the AIA Journal Manifest, Log, bracket, and the guest-edited issue of MAS Context on the topic of character architecture.
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Classical buildings for federal buildings isn’t a bad idea in sense of safekeeping historical craftsmanship and artwork. Big modern cool building styles are done everywhere so having more construction with classical styles could be quite refreshing
you’re not wrong but i think you’re also removing the ideologies that have adopted these styles and their reasons. Classical - from an aesthetical stand point- has no biases and is not inherently problematic but when you consider that supremacist and extreme nationalists movements have rallied around the style and have made it a preferred style due it it’s context and what it represents. A good example is the massive greco-roman influence in the american south, this style flourished and became the southern plantation style due to southern plantations viewing the south and even the abhorrent institution of slavery as mirroring and as impactful as the “glory of roman” and impactful civilizations.
I agree that classical and neoclassical designs can be federally mandated but we have to consider the politics of the styles and what they represent in historical contexts.
I do want to respectfully disagree- I do believe the visual language is part of a nation and reflecting that in architecture is a huge part of identity - I would argue that because these building are federal- and considered to be for the people of the nation as is the idea of a republic reflects - then we architecturally should reflect the talent and ability of the citizens. Our federal buildings should reflects the architectural ability of the citizens through the architects. having buildings that were decided against and lined up with one group in mind rather than the nation as a whole is not reflected in classical.
Lastly I do want to bring up a concept discussed by FLW. Wright is by no means the architectural barometer of absolution in architecture but he does bring up an interesting idea. Wright postured that importing European precedent in architecture makes no sense for north america- that we have more in common geographically and by climate and material to central and south american builders so we should explore that rather than bring over european styles. (take this with a grain of salt though as he was speaking on mayan and incan caricatures and pseudo mysticism of the time)
this is merely to say: classical as a historic style is great and all but why should talented new architects, some of whom can design from a unique lens of american experience, be forced into making a style of centuries ago from civilizations that have fallen or exist entirely unrecognizable from when these styles were birthed; instead of structures that highlight and display a nation’s architectural ability, engineering talent, and modern advancements.
@@janem711what if I simply hate ugliness? European architectural Styles are simply Superior, everything built outside of Europe is simply ugly and disgusting.(except some places in the middle east and north africa, moroccoan style is amazing)
@@janem711our "modern" cities are a piece of shit( I whould literally feel ashamed if my shit look like that)
@@windowfakerq1 well i am
going to to start out by saying your comment is extremely euro centric as well as an outdated ideology of european superiority that a similar mindset had led to large scale global atrocities. you have no way of knowing this but as someone who has native american ancestors and a linage that was directly impacted by europeans your comment about europe being superior has undertones of colonization which i understand may not be your intention i just ask you keep that in mind.
i don’t mean to come off as rude i my response but to respond adequately i do want to start by saying- there is nothing wrong with enjoying or liking european architecture and believing it is a beautiful style. I can agree that many facets of it have a very beautiful and dense conceptual nature that in other cultural styles of architecture we don’t get as much of- a great example being cathedrals and the era of religious political power, to have the church have so much power, influence, and wealth in terms of revenue and resources allowed them to symbolically build architecture that in essence was designed and built to be a space to reflect the glory of G-d is something that lead to massively beautiful structures that we could never build today.
I do want to say though, no one style of architecture is “better” than another as it is subjective to taste as well as the definition of what “good”, “better”, and “ugly” architecture depend on your definition of beauty.
I’m going to take your comment and expand on it- you say European architecture is “better” and the exceptions you list sound like you like architecture that contains Moorish Elements- and I am not attacking that, personally I too love the styles that come from moorish influence.
This leads me to believe to you Architecture is ornate, detail based, a Ruskian “Five Lamps of Architecture” approach to architecture is something more in line with your views. All of these things are okay, there is no issue with you liking that.
I would be curious your metrics on what makes a structure “ugly” or not- You also have not specified what era or style of European Architecture you find to be superior unless you mean all of them are to which I will have to group my responses to address a very LONG lineage of design.
Architecture as I have come to love it has no ugly buildings when’s we think of the people behind it, to me good architecture is architecture that that works for its culture and environment- the idea of “vernacular” architecture and “cultural regionalism” are huge with me
Vernacular architecture is architectural styles built designed and building using what is at a people’s disposal- Im going to address specifically nonEuropean Architecture and try to do so by paralleling similar time periods so apologies in advance for jumping around.
So looking at pre 1500- I want to use the example of the Djinguereber Mosque in Timbuktu, Mali. It was built in the 1300’s entirely free of European Principles of design, it is a series of structures that are made of earth and seem to come up
from the earth almost trapping the space within them inside of the these earthen extrusions, saying practically this space within is something encapsulated by the earth. Conceptually alone- the idea of humans being from the earth and their building and architecture being from the earth and as additions to the earth as well rather than delineations that separate us from the earth is a prevalent idea in not just African architecture but in most pre1500 nonEuropean cultures. The fact space is seen as communal and layouts are not just rigid blocks but shapes that have geometric complexity in society (the layout of several communities due to preColonization African architecture are laid out in a “fractal” layout that reflects the community ideals)
Since you didn’t specify which European style or era I’m going to use African Architecture as a jumping off point for this next point.
If you are speaking on the “best” architecture being European and are grouping in the European Modernist you are falling for the facade they built.
Your European Modernist are simply put Erasers of architecturally denser and richer cultures. - Look at Le Corbusier’s work BEFORE his African trips. He posits that space should intentionally segregated from the natural world around it and this is shown in Villa Savoye- now AFTER his African trips, we see him entirely pull elements from African Architecture without crediting them and contradicts his original statements on architecture. Simply put the massive modernist that helped built european modernism stole from Africa and described African culture and art as “primitive”. There is no beauty in theft and erasure of a culture. Having to pull from the rich history of colonized nations to then help erase their impact is for lack of a better youtube friendly term- despicable and low.
If you are referring to Bauhaus Modernist , sure there’s beauty there but the tenants all go against historical European architectural codes - to say they are European and better doesn’t work since they went against the preconceived codes.
I feel though you can love the process and heritage these European designs have you do have to concede 2 significant points. 1. The styles are rooted in centuries old concepts and executions and the discipline of architecture has come a long way. 2. European mandates on styles and deep refusal of progression (think of Paris not allowing higher rise buildings as a way to preserve their historic design) echo a sentiment that the past is more important that modernization means destruction (a HUGELY European idea btw)
Speaking on Regionalism- put European architecture anywhere else in the globe. It doe not work. Put a European structure in the South American Desert- it won’t last because of the climate. This is what makes good architecture. At its heart Architecture is building and a good building is one that can survive where it’s built. You can have a “pretty” building but if it can’t survive then it doesn’t matter how pretty it is.
Bringing in another non European Architecture group- the Japanese. When we talk historic Japanese architecture we are talking about craftsmanship. Like every process in Japan there is a massive respect to one’s craft and bc of this Japan builders only honed a dedication to craftsmanship in their structures. Moving further from 1500’s we get the rising of conceptual giants especially in the 20th century. You cannot argue that space order and form are done as well by anyone as the japanese titans of the 20th - Kenzo Tange, Arata Isozaki, Kengo Kuma and you what throw in Shoei Yoh because we are talking top tier technical
ability and talent.
I urge you to take a moment and consider what makes architecture good and ugly to you. And i Implore you to see the value and beauty in the people and cultures behind this - it goes past aesthetics and entire speaks on cultures. there is no one best architecture we are merely observing how other cultures
build an environment and to celebrate and pull beauty from them. Europe has many styles taken from other cultures but also does have a rich history itself of blending but the world is so vast and each type of architecture hold beauty of culture in it so definitely look into more than just Europe- I didn’t even get to touch on Venturi Post-Modernism or more contemporary styles.
@@janem711Thomas Jefferson historically based the design of Washington DC on the work of the roman classical architect, Palladio. So, though Frank Lloyd Wright's idea that the united States should nurture a unique and rich tradition of its own is spot on, it is important to understand that the United States came from a collection of European colonies and it is not inappropriate for Europeans to bring over historically European architecture. That said, Wright's populist works, specifically the usonian homes, provide a fantastic addition to and enrichment of the attainable American dream, in a suburban form. I am not particularly familiar with any government or civic building designs which Wright produced to represent the united States. Total tangent, but the triangular grid structure itself, something Wright was famous for using, could be used to create a whole new regional variation on the classical style.
Furthermore and more to my point, the classical style is not as rigid as the video makes it out to be, the existence of the Tuscan and Corinthian orders are evidence enough of that. In the first case the slight extension of the roof line and a few other details give an incredibly unusual and even exotic effect without the need for any flashy capital design while the Corinthian order originally utilized a local flora, the ecanthis leaf, to display the national pride of the city of Corinth. There are numerous examples of Egyptian and composite columns with other unique, local, features which showcase unique styling features that look fantastic within a system of classical proportionality. If the issue is with this allowance for regional specificity and not simply an issue with "Nazis" then that is a much more important and controversial discussion. (Edit: after reading your other comment you don't seem to have an issue with regional specificity, but do you have an issue with the blending of local features with classical proportion or with traditionally non-white people adopting the Polis?
Regarding the Nazi classicism comments. It was appropriate for the fascist movement to utilize Romanesque architecture as the civic style of the Romans was the loose model for the fascist movement, specifically in the celebration of the joining of private and public centers of power. The fascis itself was used most famously by the Romans and is still used as a symbol of a strong nation in many places around the globe. The Nazis specifically do not deserve much credit for a significant degree of architectural innovation though they did produce very large and more square 🤢 examples. My instinct is that an outsized inclination that the classical style is oppressive is likely a reflection of an anti European bias in their education or feelings of anarchism and hatred for the government over them, not simply hatred for the Nazis. I could understand someone saying that the roman Doric order is a bit oppressive maybe, but to hear someone say that would be like hearing someone say that they don't like the smell of vanilla.There are certain modernist styles, such as brutalism which gave rise to buildings that have been characterized by many lay people, including myself, as being highly oppressive. That effect may lay in the eye of the beholder, but there is something common about the eye. It isn't necessary for a famous authoritarian government to use something for it to be oppressive and alienating. That architectural style may be, platonically, more oppressive than another style.
P.s. Greek classicism is superior to Roman styling because of its richer curvilinear complexity and more visually arresting play of shadow
(Edit: book six of Vitruvius' works gives an array of climate based instruction to Augustus)
We People here (in spain at least) use the rule based model very often, for example we describe romanic with round arch and gothic with pointed arch, barroque has more curves while renaissance is more straight. So, if you see a building witch has doric coulombs in the first floor an a solomonic ones on the second it might habe been started on the renaissance and ended on the barroque.
This video definitely embodies the postmodern style of early 20's RUclips videos
I'm not so sure that the general public is obsessed with identifying a style, but HGTV is! Their House Hunters program so often scripts their buyers with wanting conflicting styles, and half the time I don't think they know what those styles represent. Not every house has a named style, but HGTV tries. Many times they'll call a plain little box a "Cape Cod" or a "Craftsman", and if it happened to be built in the 1950s it's automatically a "Mid-Century Modern" even if it has none of the characteristics of those styles. Some houses are just houses.
It's the same with interior design. People are obsessed with the names of styles. I have tried to work on style classification on my blog in order to help people get a sense of how to tell the very general category based on a modern-traditional spectrum model.
Styles are a result of numerous historical factors, mainly people trying to make the best fit for their situation with what they know.
My favorite style is the "Great Camps" of the Adirondacks which resulted from guilded age NYC millionaires building vaction homes in the mountains but due to the limitations of the time the cheapest option was to use local materials instead of importing exotic materials. The result is showing off of local woods and stones including potsdam sandstone which is as strong as marble and chemically inert
Names and labels are helpful to look up styles or cultures, find more of the same things people like, to build, or communicate about to others. It wasn't meant to be stifling and it doesn't mean people can't be creative and invent new styles. Some buildings can be mixed styles.
Great Video. Reminded me when I was in school and ALL the professors in my design studios pushed Modern and contemporary architecture to influence all our design projects. I always appreciated classical styles but never attempted any. It was kinda frowned upon because according to them it did not pushed you creatively. Even after all these years in the field I still had not a chance to work on a project that involves any of the classical styles.
The faculty at my school were split between modernists, traditionalists, and conservationists. But most of my teachers would always ask the freshmen why they’ve chosen a modern design, because they usually do, and the response was usually “coz it’s simpler” lol.
Same. But I also understand we live in a different time. I think it make no sense to build a gothic or barroque building in this time. We apreciate these styles because of their history but a new building in this styles would be a pastiche of the past. We need to find our own language or style so people in the future can look back and see "thats what 2023 look like" not "that a 1800 pastiche".
@@augusto7681 I’d rather attempt to copy these old buildings, the “style” of 2023 is as cheap an as fast as possible. There is no 2023 style unless it’s cheap trash
@@teubks The buildings big companies do just to sell apartaments isnt the best example of 2023 architecture. But if you have time you can look on architecture magazines what is good architecture nowdays. Its different, it wont have columns or floral ornaments but it can beautiful too and represent our time.
Victorian style is my jam. I lived in a Victorian house when I was in my teens. Was so interesting and classy.
Ah victorian. I had a friend that lived in that style. It was a two story with basement, three car garage, green roof white walled surrounded by an apple orchard. It was nice
@@spencervance8484 the house I lived in was in a historical neighborhood that became a dump because the ghetto that surrounded it. Still was awesome. 5 rooms upstairs built in an octagonal shape at the top of the stairs with a chandelier in the middle of the landing. Large living room and large dining room and large kitchen. Also had a Florida room. All the walls were windows. It was an addition. On the alley drive was the garage. Another addition but was huge. My Dad and I were the main renters. Our friends dad owned the place. Various people would rent the upstairs rooms from time to time. The florida room was mine and the dining room was my Dads. We also kept the living room to ourselves. After Hurricane Francis and Gene we had alot of insurance and infrastructure folks renting the.upstairs. then we had many illegal mexicans that would also rent the upstairs. When we moved out the old man sold the place. Despite being in the ghetto, I grew up in that hood and I would buy it now. It's an amazing house. Built in 1909 if I remember correctly. Most of the.houses on that block are so amazing. In my teens a crazed man set fire to his and my brother and I broke in afterwards. Was also an amazing house.
Not an architect, but I always thought, as you, I think, pointed out, that style is a lot like studying history, where it can only be defined when viewed collectively and only after the fact, and when a trend itself is collectively over and is now in contrast with a different way of doing things. Also, I would imagine it would be hard for an artist to call his own work a style, but rather should allow other people to see his work collectively, notice a trend, then decide, whether the artist agrees or not, that there is an attributable style. Again great video!
"my read is that most people's interest in style is probably motivated by the desire to know the story of buildings and understand the motivations of the built environment that structures our activities and daily lives" this reading felt like it glossed over the emotional aspect of buildings. seeing beautiful buildings has me wanting to know what its called so I can find more beautiful buildings like it online.
Good point
In my experience, I've found that it's a real mental exercise for experts to view the topic of their expertise from a layman's perspective. The common person will have questions that the expert likely will not consider, simply because the expert is expecting practical or relevant questions, whereas the common person may not even understand what is practical or relevant for the context of that topic.
i agree blurby. thats what rlly got me into botany (which got me into mycology, entomology, most of the -ology's lol) was the taxonomical system. us apes seem to like systems of organization such as the taxonomy in biology, no reason to think this wouldnt apply to our artistic endeavors like architecture (plus "genres" of music/film, etc)
I feel like people should ask 'who designed this' not 'what is the style' - if I love the appearance I'm more likely to enjoy things designed by the same person over and above a period of design.
@@xisixty or both
I have to say, I really do prefer older style government buildings. Maybe restricting buildings to classical is stifling creativity, but seeing all the post-modern crap that has gone up in the last 50 years, I think it's preferable.
Its funny how every postmodern architect declares " I dont have a style, I am always searching blah, blah, blah" and then they are selling projects branded with their style. "Not having style" became a fetish of contemporary, while its another cultural lie. We have styles, we want styles, we need styles. And yes Eisenman is good example: his building are asily recognisable.
This
My dream house would be a 1930s Craftsman Style, with lots of built in cabinets and big closets. I love the natural woodwork and prefer a vintage home to q new one. I most recently owned a Victorian house, but now have a condo in a high rise. But I do like most styles of architecture. There are good and bad examples in all styles. It gets down to details or lack thereof by the person who designed it.
THANK YOU for putting a single word to what I've long wondered how to research - 'why architecture is' isnt easy to google - and that word was skeuormorphism.
Since childhood my favorite style has been Art Nouveau, purely because Sims 2 was my favorite game, and it had a lot of art nouveau build items that I cherished. I love that art nouveau really can be a gesamtkunstwerk, and easily applied to fashion, interior design, graphic design, as well as architecture. Its extremely distinctive, easily adaptable, as well as stimulating and gorgeous to look at. It was the first movement towards modernism in western history.
And the whole entire movement only lasted 30 years, before nearly everybody that cared about it or was able to craft it died in the First World War.
I think of style for we laypeople is about the aesthetics primarily. As you mentioned in that quote from Eisenman, in response to a question on style he responded by talking about "look." That makes me wonder how much aesthetics or beauty play a role in design. Is that an element when creating a design? Its subjective, so presumably you would have to involve the client, but it would seem like a major consideration even if it relies on "superficial" elements of the design.
You voice is hypnotic and I love the excitement/enthusiasm in your voice
It seems like “style” is used as a shorthand way of “designing” without hiring a designer. Designing isn’t a commodity but people still want “design” in their lives so style is a way to access the commodity without having to go through the design process.
The problem I have with the view expressed in this video is that the dismissal of "styles" as being unhelpful and meaningless is that it ignores the viewer. As an artist, I see a lot of people stressing over their "style" in the exact opposite of how it seems architects view the issue in that artists WANT to have an identifiable style. But what style you work in (regardless of if we're discussing architecture, art, music, fashion, etc) is never actually up to the creator.
We as creators have certain preferences for techniques, materials, and aesthetics that naturally bleed into our work. Over time, as we create more and more work for the public to see and judge, THEY identify those things that we choose, consciously or unconsciously, to utilize in our work again and again. THAT is our style. And as we don't live in a vacuum, climate, culture, current events, sub cultures, etc all affect us as creators and so does our natural tendency to share and form communities of like-minded individuals. So with time, those aspects that were shared amongst a group becomes identifiable and is classified as a "style".
And this classification has it's uses. The public that are viewing, using, and consuming what we have created are drawn to certain aspects emotionally and aesthetically and want to see and experience more of that and that's okay. This in turn helps creators find a market for what they create. It's not degrading or insulting to the original creator, it's just another aspect of history and how it's classified.
I think alot of people ask what style something is because they like something they see and they want to be able to explain to others (real estate agents, friends etc) what they like and be able to search for it.
Its like genre in music. Nirvana didn't set out to be the driving force for grunge music, they were just making their music.
Tarantino said on Bill Maher that he created a sub-genre of crime films with Pulp Fiction. Then for years after, every crime movie tried to have pop culture references in them, but none were ever as good as Pulp Fiction; but its only long after the fact that you can look back and say, "that was this genre at that time". In the moment, its about the individual's creation. Every once in a while, you get a brilliant innovation that inspires/is copied for a long time after.
Is “style” a shortcut kit of known assemblies which allows any reasonably skilled and sensitive person to create a totality that can be categorized, desired, repeated, and recognized as that style.
On a related topic, is the cube the ultimate form? Or just plane laziness? I can appreciate a great cube shape, but it seems like a in lots a cases a crutch and a simple way to solve a problem.
the ultimate form is the one that solves your problem.
The cube, or probably more accurately rectangular prisms (boxes) are generally the most efficient and simplest way to use space to make a building.
It might be lazy to make 4 walls and a roof, but its also the least problematic way to make a simple home. Add a layer for a second floor and some interior walls and you have a structure that everyone can agree is a nice, if simple home.
Having walls at weird angles or worse, rounded can become increasingly difficult to make things fit together well without making dead space.
And lastly, you can simply stack some boxes together to make a really impressive structure, even if its still fundamental just some simple cubes intersecting eachother.
Note: obviously domes and arches are great ways to support heavy things and long spans, but even humble triangles are very effective at this.
And lastly, there is no "best" form, just the optimal or best one for the current situation/context. (And lazy isn't necessarily bad, especially because it can also be economical)
When we see someone on the street its easy to see if they have style. Some don't, some do. Same with a building. That guy in your video says "I don't have a style", and we see his building. No style lmao
Thank you, this was ultra helpful, I should also see style in Industrial Design differently now.
Speaking of styles, I was recently looking at some buildings from pre 1900 and noticed a trend in all the post offices at one point looked a lot like old world castles, and were massive in scale. I might be a bit cynical in my deduction, but weren't many Americans still a bit on the illiterate side, etc. when these behemoth buildings were erected, therefore, the quantity of mail might pale in comparison to the scale of these old buildings.
Regardless of my assumption, could you do an episode on why these buildings took on the facades they did, and why they made these buildings as imposing looking as they were? Sorry if this question is in any way disconnected to the current topic at hand.
Architects may not think in terms of style. However, when I walk through the average American city, I see a convergence of architectural themes.
The way the windows are cut, how the building relates to the surroundings (usually no more thought in that than the direction the door will face)
Not caring about style seems like not caring about history, or how you are affected by history. Only by knowing your context in history can you begin to really think outside it.
Knowing the path of history and how it ended with you where you are possessing the knowledge you do and in the life you live can help guide your actions and see yourself as a part of a greater whole.
I have a burning distaste for the brutalist style of architecture. The philosophy and theory behind it are alienating. And many many people feel the same.
Part of that is the psychological affect of the building techniques (massive, imposing, anti-skueomorphism, etc.), and part of it is the role such buildings play as a part of contemporary society, and their part in the larger modernist movement.
Anyway, this is a largely emotional rant and I hope you can at least empathize with where I'm coming from.
Don't bother. Modern architects pretend styles don't exist so they can express there horrible "artistic vision" on our beautiful world.
@@ildesu789 life is usually more complicated than one group of people deliberately scheming to upend the lives of others. I'm sure there have been some who do believe the old styles were outdated and new styles needed to be made that would usher in a new era of mankind or yada yada yada.
But a lot of times, bad design, bad ideas, etc. Are perpetuated by social pressure, economic pressure, a lack of education on the topic, etc.
Basically, I think most architects are trying to live their lives and aren't thinking about how they are perpetuating a style. To them, I'm sure the decisions they make seem completely practical and normal in the same way that cities feel it's practical and normal to strategize for the next highway expansion.
@@ncpolley don't strawman me. I'm just saying modern architecture is horrible and perpetuated by architects. Just look at me most famous zaha Hadid. Just awful
@@ildesu789 Nothing I said was a straw man, and certainly doesn't deserve your tone.
In your words, architects want to force their vision onto everyone and that is why they choose to pretend style doesn't exist.
At the end of the day, it is the clients that make the decision of what is built. Considering the fact that there isn't much of historical American architecture (or even US history is general) having modernist buildings isn't a big of a deal really.
I think as humans, it helps us to group things together in order to formulate our opinions and possibly ask better questions. For example, knowing someone's age. Although appearance can give clues to a person's age range, knowing exactly how old they are allows us to enquire about specific things. We wouldn't have demographic statistics if it weren't for our curiosity to categorize. Think about dog breeds. What's the first question you ask a stranger whos walking their dog? Same with music. It just feels right when we can fit a song into a particular genre. Likewise with buildings, it makes sense that we would want to know the origin of its style and where it fits in.
I feel like style is mixed up with inspiration. How can a building that is inspired by so many different architects and other buildings be put down to a single style? I think it's more helpful to understand the inspiration behind any art piece than it is to know a style that is usually badly defined and extremely broad. I guess it just depends if people want a quick answer or a deeper understanding.
The Charleston Single House and the Charleston Double House are both styles I think would fit the criteria of a Rule-Based Model. The Charleston Single House is, traditionally two main rooms on each floor with a stair case in the middle. The Double House is similar but there are two sets of rooms on each side of the staircase. Also, the Single House specifically is "turned sideways" with the entrance facing a courtyard on the side of the house. They tend to be relatively long and thin and typically have long porches that stretch the length of the entrance side of the house.
I like buildings that people without training in architecture, or an architect would want to gaze at it, and enjoy the ornament. One of the main reasons I don't like modern architecture/post modern or whatever you want to call it, it is designed not to distract you while driving an automobile. Another reason is that many recent buildings tend to have certain things in common such as every building or bridge must have a wing shape as an example. Or the architect really likes copper, so an entire façade is clad in copper because they either like that material, or they got a good deal from the manufacturer. I overheard a couple of architects hired to design the new city hall say that governments' are willing to pay for an expensive building as long as it does not look expensive to the population. Architects try to build something for the mass of people that looks cheaply built and may house wealthy people until it get run down and easily shows its age because it is difficult to maintain, then the poor people are allowed to live there, or from the beginning it is designed and built cheaply as poor person warehouse with individual living spaces.
This comenta is just to say that I love your videos. They made me study and read a lot about architecture during the pandemic. Would love to see you talk about Oscar Niemeyer.
Hey! I just wanted to say your videoproductions are very well made! Keep it up!
Humans are pack animals with tribal tendencies and we naturally group to the markers of our tribe and tend to wave the same flags to signal our belonging to that group. Even the “I don’t have a style” people try as they may can’t get away from it as their style of throwing random shapes and colour together with complete disregard for tradition, are simply appealing to that crowd. Oh a cow sculpture painted green and it’s the only piece of furniture in the place how avant-garde!
Truth is we love patterns and we love relationships between what we already know as familiar to form a link to any new things we discover. Even if it’s an abstract connection.
Art, architecture, interior design, music, food, colour will all hold primal correlations to things we can’t even access because it’s baked into our DNA so we will always form groups of things connected by some thread even if it’s a thin one.
I have an idea that the dismissal of architectural style by architects is partly a great example of the through-and-through commercialisation of our times: The only goal is functionality.
Architects, the professionals, can to some extent live with that because it is necessary to their way of life, but when we hollow out everything for the sake of function and profit, people start feeling lost and start asking questions of meaning. That is what I interpret the recurrent question of what a buildings architectural style is. What is its character and personality, what does it express about its inhabitants, and what cultural tradition is it a part of?
I once very strongly considered becoming an architect, but I though I would never find a market for the kind of buildings I wanted to create. It seems that I may have been wrong, but oh well. I think that the historical architectural styles have some very distinct feels and characters so to speak, and I find them so natural to use ornamentally to communicate outwards what kind of building we're, and it and its inhabitants' values.
I find Romanesque reclusive, meditative and pondering in its seclusion from the outside with its small windows and thick walls. The Gothic immensily important. The High Renaissance/Classicism reverent of social structure, the law and such. The Baroque powerful and imposing. The Rococo much more soft and gentle. The industrial rugged and utilitarian. Proper French Art Nouveau longing for nature. Art Deco incredibly lavish and monumental. American Modernist reverent of technological progress.
Ornamentation is more expensive than doing nothing, yes, but there are so many values and attitudes that have not disappeared, but simply been covered up in a shell of nothing. There is so much to be expressed.
Now, of course, this is nothing but a transformation into pure aesthetics as no one really is a part of the cultures of the architectural styles mentioned earlier. Should that fact, however, necessarily force us to stop making use of aesthetic motifs with so much potential for expression?
I recently went down this rabbit hole myself, since my wife and I bought a new house. There are a number of houses in our neighborhood with this particular style (I'll call it Cape Code Split Level) but I haven't been able to find anything online about whether this is particular to our town or if it was a common style in the 1970s. I've never seen them anywhere else in the Chicago area. It's more curiosity than anything else. :)
Modern and neoclassical architecture are my favourites! I think they blend pretty well!
Hey Stuart, absolutely love your work. It's been a revelation for me and opened my eyes to so many aspects that (inexplicably) aren't taught on my course. I'm a mature student who's gone back to Uni to finish to my studies and am in the final year of my Masters. If these concepts were explained with the same level of clarity and simplicity (a complement) and without any level of "archispeak" as you have, so many students would not be as utterly confused and stumped as they are.
My Thesis subject is the repurposing of a vacant English Edwardian civic building (red brick/slate hipped roof) into a Youth Theatre workshop and teaching facility along with a sizeable side extension to form a new 450 seat Theatre for the town. The area which has stumped me most has been the styling of the new Theatre extension and whether this is should contrast, echo elements/ratios/proportions or merely pastiche the style of the existing civic building. Everyone has their own view but maybe a video on larger building extensions and how the architect has styled them could be one for the future?
You seem to have won at RUclips. Amazing growth, been subscribed for some time now. Congrats!
Thank you for the support!
Subcategorisation theory: sufficient and necessary conditions about categories.
Sorry, I’m one of those people where style does make an impact to how I view certain buildings. Over time as someone who has studied the arts, and always had an interest in architecture since I was a kid, I once looked at older styles as stuffy or dated to over time appreciating the value they offer by being the essence of classical. At the same time, modern buildings to me have revealed something that needs to be addressed not just in the architecture community, but the building community too, they do have a play in this.
What I have noticed over time is that most modern buildings are a trend, they are basically a box with no personality to have residence to have the role of accessorizing how the box functions to their needs. The issue is that is has created a society that over time have been conformed to keep their space muted, losing the bond they should have with the building they live in. Over time, these buildings tend to not have anything to update it when the concept is that it is a space to be updated. Then these buildings fall into the wrong hands and the buildings become “outdated.” The lose the value of being a place to be cherished. And because of how there is little regard to having being built to last, most of these buildings have a function problem real quickly. The only thing that they tend to be “superior” over older buildings is that they come ventilated. But at this point, most older buildings have learned to adapt to new accommodation, in some cases better than the modern buildings.
The older buildings have something that modern buildings can never have, it’s character. Character makes a difference in buildings because it shows that a lot of planning went into the structure more than the average cookie cutter building. Characters shows that personal detail that the average person doesn’t think about is placed to ease the residence without a second thought. It’s fascinating studying quirks older building were meticulously well thought of, normally but a single family making their own customs.
The main reason I go for older buildings than modern is not just the lack of character or warmth (though that is one big criteria) but I trust the structures of older buildings that were built with the mindset to last, something that modern buildings seem to have list by playing cutting corners. Even though there are plenty of older homes in disarray, it’s been proven by many hone owners that these buildings can be restored while miraculously adapting to new functions. Sadly this can’t be said for some modern buildings. Example, how many people go to a mall when it’s rain? How many people notice how many buckets there are to catch the leaks in the roof? Can it be said of an older building? How many older buildings just fall out of nowhere like the Champlain Towers last year in Florida? Besides the Tower of Pisa, how many older buildings are sinking like the Millennium Tower in SF?
To me style is an art, but lately it’s also key to appreciating structure. Each to their own, but honestly wish buildings were treated more like a friend that an entity.
In a lot of ways I agreed with you, style give a structure characters. Though the reasons why newer buildings are boring and built not-to-last are not the results of architects and engineers but because the public or customers don't care about its constructions. If we talked only about North American housing, ever since the post war economic boom, more materials are available. Prior, they are built more carefully, because it is costlier in relations to their incomes. Without easily-accessible central heating or hvac system, people had to give greater care in regulating heat and air flows. That is how styles tend to develop.
In the modern era, styles are just what happened to be popular. Something to brag to families and neighbors. Most people lived outside their houses in their offices or plants rather than in it. Unless you are into art, trying to compete in unique styles is no longer in vogue, today. All the "cape cod", "tudor", are just ways to brag. Everything is "unique". For coporations that build malls and houses, they could not a give a shite as long as you buy it. They are not craftmen who want to be satified with their craft. Also, I agreed with an article from the Atlantic titled "Stop Fetishized Old Houses". Old houses may tend to be built with better materials (except lead, etc) and careful craftmen but also under outdated safety regulation if any. Working with old houses and newer ones, the new ones are often far easier to maintain, at least in term of electricity and plumbing.
I think i threw up in my mouth a little when you said "old buildings have characters"
@@Account.for.Comment I volunteered in a brand-new museum once and the week before the new building even opened, a 20-foot section of ceiling collapsed in the Great Gallery. And modern buildings still have no accounting for doorknobs at all.
My place leaks like a sieve, but only in the part that was added well over half a century after construction. So long ago I don't even know when.
@@thoughtengine Where is this i ? It sound like a liberterian local government handed the project to the cheapest contracter they could find and reap the benefits of the market. I hope the art works are safe.
I think Wittgensteins ideas on groups being defined by a feeling of association rather than any definable norms comes close to what is being argued, while also being very clear about there not being any set in stone boundaries that would hinder creativity
An emphasis on style by the public is not misplaced. When architects wake up in the morning do they not style their hair, nor think about the style of clothes they will wear? Do they not ponder the style of car they'll drive or which style of cuisine they'll eat? The superficial matters, and to pretend like it doesn't is really just an excuse by architects for poor quality work.
This was his top ten worst
Just as important as the facade, the entrances, the emergency exits, and how the building communicates with the surrounding sidewalk and neighborhood is the internal layout. What would an ideal museum be like to walk through? How do we make subway stations easy to navigate? What would an innovative shopping center with a human scale, sense of place, and a facilitator of intrigue look like - especially important as cities densify and move away from street level shops to multi-level "shopping walkways"?
"It's an aspect of buildings that Architects don't care that much about."
That explains a lot, really.
People don't understand architectural style because so many homes are ugly hodgepodges today. Since you can just buy architectural details readymade, you can have Grecian colums, a wraparound porch, skylights, and a cupola on an otherwise Colonial style house if you want. It's sort of like how Disney designs costumes for their characters. They're rarely of a specific era, they just read as "olden days." People design houses in a similar way. They just throw a bunch of "traditional" details together and call it a day.
Combining styles can obviously be very successful, but it needs to be done in a thoughtful, informed way. A mix of Cape and Craftsman details? That's probably lovely. Brutalism mixed with Art Deco? Why not? Things go in an ugly direction when the choices just seem arbitrary. Victorian elements, with Craftsman elements, with Georgian elements, with farmhouse elements? Ugh.
I feel like the hodgepodge of traditional elements style deserves it's own classification. It's so prevalent, and it's very recognizable as its own thing. (Even beyond McMansions, since there are buildings that aren't McMansions in that style.) Something like "Traditional Collage."
Stewart, You must go watch the You Toob video by Ask a Mortician titled: is this $250 million selfie spot dangerous?
As an interior designer, we focus primarily on the buildings' program and space plan too. Certain architectural elements can be altered, edited, and deleted depending on a client's objective. However, the buildings' overall architectural style is inescapable. An interior designer would never dream to take an Eichler and try to make it into a center hall colonial. Not because we couldn't do it, but because it wouldn't make sense to do that. In this respect, I think style does matter. I think it's also important to maintain a regional style and aesthetic. I think regional styles are important because even though we have the technology to build any style anywhere, I don't necessarily think we should. I think your initial observation, that a buildings' style tells its story, has wider implications. That by adulterating regional styles, we're also adulterating that regions' story. That is why I think style matters.
As an aspiring concept artist I find myself delving into the research of architectural styles. And just like in concept art, most of the time it really is form follows function. In that vain you are right about people wanting to know about the story behind such styles. Architecture often mirrors that of its setting. You are not likely to find a marble mansion in the forests of Alaska.. A log cabin however! People used the resources they had around them at the time. Took inspiration from other people and other architecture around them. Most people weren't worried about form so if the form of the architecture around them worked, that's what they'd copy.
Though there is something to be said about rare instances where an architect in history would care about the form and specifically work backwards to make sure it functioned properly. If you look at the Cathedral of Santa Maria del Fiore in Florence, Italy, It was ahead of its time when you look at the dome. There were probably many practical ways for them to complete the build and cap it off with a standard roof of some kind. But the architect/engineer and the financers were determined to cap it off with a dome that didn't require any support pillars. They may be rare, but cases where the architect cares more about the form tend to be the most memorable. And those probably go on to inspire or influence the surrounding architecture.
I never made the connection between Greek columns and timber post skeuomorphism. Thanks!
My school that was built right before I went through. it went for a post modern or modern design, and it made me super bias against it. They made a huge vaulted front entrance that served as the lunch room, massive, but most of it was stairs, walk ways or display areas, leaving no room to eat lunch, they also got rid of tons of class rooms, even though the school was already over crowded. And the final kicker, because they used so much glass they couldn't afford to heat or cool the school in a place that could see -25 F to 100 F... So needless to say I will always be bias against post modern, I would have preferred a giant concrete box buried in the ground than have had to sweat and freeze my way through school, design should always come second to practicality and yes they are separate things in my eye. Practicality is meeting the bare minimum requirements while design is adding cool features like art and acoustics or convince or really ugly post modern glass and juts.
It was funny because they ended up in a lot of trouble, they tried to fix the overcrowding by punish students with a C or lower with no lunch but that didn't last long, eventually they just had to start spacing out the different grades lunches, which took tons of time away from other class and added way to much time to some.... Just goes to show that practicality is actually king or should be king over everything.
Apparently a "stifling" design environment produces true beauty and aesthetically pleasing structures, while a free environment apparently produces hideous, offensive, atrocities.
I live in a early 1960s 3 bed 2 bath, two car garage, the most basic of designs, a box for the house and triangle roof.
In regards to a rule based model, I'm not aware of a retroactive model of comparing an existing design to style, but I do know of a generative model by which a ruleset can create designs of a given style. You can take a look a the research of Stiny and Gips who began this avenue of research back in the 70s. For your specific topic, there was a paper published in 1981 by Koning and Eizenberg called "The Language of the Prairie: Frank Lloyd Write's Prairie Houses", which developed a set of rules which could describe FLW's prairie houses, as well as be used to design derivative iterations within the style. I found this research interesting enough to use it as a base for my thesis, creating a series of rule based design systems based of of atonal music.
Categorization is necessary but it should never inhibit creativity
I've asked that question online--posted a pic and asked, "What style is my house?" For me, the question was driven in part by wanting to make harmonious choices in interior design and renovations. I also had spotted multiple houses in my city that were obviously built from the same plans, as well as an even larger group of near twins (similar facade but less ornamentation and presumably a different layout as their "back" staircase is consistently on the side of the house rather than the back), and was simply curious. No one had a simple answer to my question, as my house seems to be a bit of an outlier in a style that most laypeople haven't heard of. It has Italian Renaissance Revival aspirations and ornamentation on a basic form that has rather a lot in common with a Foursquare. I got some value out of finding an answer but more in the research involved in finding it.
Interesting
I understand people wanting to design or build in a given style.
What I do like to see is when a building is a good example of that style.
I do not generally like when a building or house randomly mix styles or incorrectly interpret the style they are trying to represent.
The town I used to live in built a new town hall. It was meant to a building in the Classic style but everyone on the building comity must have been allowed to add their two cents. In my opinion, the building was a disastrous hodgepodge of individual parts non of which was correctly represented. Almost no care was given to getting simple details correct.
I was starting to doubt your credentials until 7:52. Only a true architect could make a spelling error like that. It's like how doctors all have bad handwriting and engineers are all tactless.
I like variety! Having a variety of styles is nice!
I think style does matter for multiple reasons:
Limitations during construction
Factors such as water level, precipitation, wind, sun...
Functionality linked to a culture (e.g. tea room)
Display of culture and status (sense of belonging, etc)
Other aspects of human psyche (just build deliberately against the rules of Feng Shui, or harmony, and you'll see people feel uncomfortable even if they think little of Feng Shui). Humans simply prefer certain parameters over others such as a certain ceiling height for a bedroom, where they face their back to while sitting, etc.).
I am very FORM FOLLOWS FUNCTION guy . I do appreciate all architectural styles but the historical buildings need to be respected . If I move into a neighborhood with mostly Victorian houses I will respected that and design a Victorian house not a MINIMALIST glass house that is all one floor and all glass from floor to ceiling . There's a builder who built a house all black steel exterior designed to survive any disaster and it was built looking like black steel box in an old neighborhood with Craftmans and Victorian houses
I think the speciation comparison is apt - they both essentially are defined after the fact.
your content is top shelf. glad i found you!
Thank you! Glad you found the channel as well...
Stewart... What did that site mean by a "French house"? LOL. Do they think all homes in France are identical? A few French live in underground homes carved out of the rock, 8m underground. Others live in semi-detached homes, row houses, mansions, old detached homes, so much variety. It does bug me a bit that many homes have features that are never used, completely useless but are there because they are expected to be there or due to real estate agents' influence. Features like front porches with galleries and an overhang roof which blocks sunlight from reaching the room inside. Those porches sometimes have chairs on them but are never used (who sits outside to watch cars go by? No one). Or the fake columns on either side of front entrances.
I think the public cares about the superficial aspect of buildings because they want buildings that look nice. The root of the disconnect is that the field of architecture forgot that “striking” and “actually good architecture” are not necessarily the same thing.
Great video! I'd sum up the concept of style is a category of convergence between materials, techniques, trends and ideas in a vernacular time-space segment.
There appears to be a parallel to genres in music. The epithet genre exercise is not a compliment! Still, most music falls mainly in one genre or the other, whilst also borrowing from others with varying similarity.
While it may seem absurd for Trump to mandate a group of historically unrelated style into an official American Civic Style, according to a Semiotic of Convention, this is actually how some of the greatest architecture was inspired. It’s not baffling to all Architects, because it has historical precedence as stated at the beginning of this video. I hope you notice I used the same tone as your video to do a deconstruction.
Function and context, that's my styles.
3 videos in and I think I want to become an Architect.
I got French style too. Love your videos so informative :D
What kind of style is this? Should be replaced by Is this beautiful? Then we'll all be happy ☺️
That’s why in Greek, we use the word:”rhythms”, for what you call: styles, and style for what you call : style.
I think that in regards to people asking for the style, I would say they more mean the characteristics of the building that tend to constitute the style in popular belief.
One reason why style matter is when you really like what you see in a certain area of a building, without knowing what that style is called you will have a really hard time finding it again.
For example I absolutely adore the style of brownstone and limestone townhouses in NYC, but looking for those styles elsewhere was impossible without knowing what they were called.
12:50 Stugly. I'd call that stugly.
dude its 4 am i have never even been interested or new anything about architecture but I'm on like my 8th video.
Some styles really are more than just an external appearance; sometimes they actually decide the entire structure. A few pointy arches on a box does not make a Gothic structure. Where are the groin and fan vaults, and the hammerbeam roof trusses? That's not architecture, that's gaming terrain.
When it comes to building style I think more about aesthetics. Im not concerned about the rules of one style or another so much as does the building look cool.
I wonder if more people like the modern architecture like in Dubai or older style Paris. Personally I wouldnt like walking on the street of Dubai.
I was shock that there is a time when some architect s were advocating tearing down Paris and put up modern buildings back in the 50s which now look like low income housing.
Well done.
Your french is not that bad. Your Violet-Le-Duc is quite correct. The t is silent and the last part of violet sounds like hey.
Hey Stewart! There is a 2nd "are" in the title that seems to have sneaked its way in.
Oops. Thanks!
3:54 this is exactly the only reason I look out the window on car rides(though its nauseating)
you left the American 4 square the jc penny house the 1900 version. my grandparents house was a American 4 square built in 1910
I can't pinpoint exactly what it is, but there's something about the way you talk and your voice that both made me much more interested in architecture than I thought I was and give me ASMR for the first time in years. Got yourself a new subscriber. Now it's time to binge all your videos.
I see this being no different to music. The stooges never sat in a room one day and decided to make punk, however Iggy is know as the godfather of punk. It is organic then categorised.
a french house? what style of french house??? un mas provençal? une ferme normande? un manoir breton? une masure alsacienne?
0:48 Mines came out as a Colonial house
personally, i like the classical style, at least for public buildings, don't think i'd wanna live in one (and individual offices can have more comfortable accommodations)
most courthouses i have been in really stand out as works of art, least where i live, they have the classical style, one of em has some kind of relief (the kind where it kinda looks like statues but half the statue is part of the wall, i don't know what you call that) in the triangular section of the founding fathers and an inscription below it reading "of the people, for the people, and answerable to the people" i find that inspiring. the building for parks and recreations however is a big box with the parking lot on the opposite end of the entrance.
i really hate the brutalist style, especially for government buildings. the brutalist style is devoid of humanity and on a government building portrays a government similarly devoid. they are an eye sore, just big concrete blocks that shout "i don't give a f***"
i don't know what it is about the classical style that makes it so appealing, could just be the association with the ancient greeks and romans, i think the parthanon is laid out according to the golden ratio, so that might have something to do with it, maybe it's all of those things.
What Gothic and Georgian share is that they are historic. Trump's campaign promise was based on nostalgia so in that sense it's promises made and promises kept. I don't know whether nostalgia is a sensible way to run a country but it's perfectly fine as a design guideline for building a house.
Style is not a "thin veneer" that you can slap on the top of any building after the fact. I think people probably under estimate the difficulty of creating an authentic period style fake and they over estimate their abilities. My neighbor spent millions of dollars on their classic Greek Temple style house. The frieze is extra skeuomorphic but it has no architrave. Just the beams hovering unsupported. And the cornice is not right and the pillars are especially wrong and ugly.
One problem with architecture is that all the money is in commercial property and all the recognition is in experiments and innovation. Meanwhile what people don't have the money to pay for it, but what they want are houses which remind them of their childhood vacations.
Took the quiz and got Contemporary. It's right!
How did I not get contemporary?
Oh god... that bus sign from 2:38 is really unfortunately distracting... any chance it could be blocked over...? Thanks,
simple questions and complicated answers.
In the thumbnail, the house on your right could be labeled 'Domestic Brutalism'.
En español (por lo menos en las facultades de arquitectura de Argentina) se diferencia el Lenguaje arquitectonico (seria lo descripto en el video como Styles) y estilo (style). El lenguaje posee "reglas" que leer en un gran numero de obras diferentes generalmente de un mismo periodo historico, los estilos son personales o correpondientes a algun grupo en particular.
Viollet-Le Duc era francés. Cuando dijo Estilo versus los estilos, eso fue un juego sobre palabras. En las facultades inglés (o yanquis), también se habla del lenguaje visual con su gramática compartida versus estilo personal con su idiosincrasia, al igual que en las argentinas. "Estilo contra los estilos" es solo una expresión poética; conferir el "menos es más" de Van Der Rohe: mismo concepto, juego de palabras, poesía, etcetera.
you should make a collab with 30x40 !
I want nothing more than a log cabin in a forest. Nothing out of place. Cheers 🍻
One may wanna know so if they see something they like they can google the style and find more of it
Why stuart hicks is telling me what to think
I need to send this to my friends and family. HAHAHAHA Every time they talk about Architecture, styles are often what they always talk about and its difficult to try to broaden the idea of designing outside these preconceptions.
Isnt in the USA the most prominent style the plywood-style?
12:45 the jetsons