Architecture Today

This work is a comprehensive overview of architecture worldwide since the 1960s. A guide to the many and varied contemporary architectural trends, it leads the reader through the styles and movements of architecture in the latter half of the 20th century. The Modern Movement in architecture early in the 20th century gave rise to the "International Style" - architecture was intended to transcend its time and place and provide a new world order in building and city planning. In the 1960s, modernism was seriously challenged by architects who began to question the validity of its principles. In place of modernism, a diverse array of building types and styles, driven by new architectural beliefs and theories, began to emerge. This text is an attempt to make sense of the pluralistic nature of contemporary architecture, by offering an accessible critique of the world's most prominent architectural movements and trends.

“"As a beginner's guide to the trends of the last 25 years, Architecture Today is invaluable. Accessible text and a preponderance of colour pictures go a long way toward doing for architecture what Gombrich did for art."-- Creative Review "Exceptionally handsome. A lavish look at some of the best building trends since 1960."-- Met House "An ambitious guide to the trends in architecture over the last 25 years. In other words, a romp through all those tricky isms, from Vernacular to Deconstruction."-- The Sunday Times”

"As a beginner's guide to the trends of the last 25 years, Architecture Today is invaluable. Accessible text and a preponderance of colour pictures go a long way toward doing for architecture what Gombrich did for art."-Creative Review

"Exceptionally handsome. A lavish look at some of the best building trends since 1960."-Met House

"An ambitious guide to the trends in architecture over the last 25 years. In other words, a romp through all those tricky isms, from Vernacular to Deconstruction."-The Sunday Times

James Steele is Associate Professor at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles. He has previously taught at Texas Tech University, the University of London and the Prince of Wales Institute of Architecture. His many publications include Los Angeles Architecture: the Contemporary Condition, and the Architecture in Detail monographs Eames House, Barnsdall House and Lawson-Westen House (all Phaidon).

With the collapse of Modernism in the 1960s, architecture has fragmented and evolved in many different directions, each driven by its own ideologies and theories. This book sets out a clear and comprehensive guide to the prominent styles and movements, tracing the work of the main protagonists of contemporary architecture. Architecture Today is divided thematically into 16 chapters, offering an incisive critique of the predominant trends, stylistic and regional, of the last 25 years. It traces the recent roots of today's architecture with sensitivity and sophistication: from the Los Angeles avant-garde and experimentation in Japan, through the stylistic upheavals of Postmodernism and Deconstructivism, to the global development of ecological architecture and the contemporary vernacular. Biographies are also included to reveal the individual history behind each of the protagonist architects featured. Free from the jargon that often characterizes architectural criticism, Architecture Today is accessible and essential reading for all those interested in architecture, the visual arts and modern culture.

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