Status
Available
Publication
New York, N.Y., U.S.A. : Viking, 1993.
Description
This collection of essays has an eclectic range which encompasses all that is to be celebrated, discussed and fondly remembered about the buildings that shape our lives. History's reverberations great and small are explored - from the Chinese Cultural Revolution to quieter changes in the European living room. So too are shifts in taste - from modernism to the views of Prince Charles. Political questions raised by the home are brought to polemical life - the charms of the small home, the poetry of the suburbs, the symbolism of the porch, and the rise of the androgynous home. Rybczynski sounds out buildings as diverse as museums and airports, model homes and postmodernist dreams, listening for Geothe's frozen music.
User reviews
LibraryThing member Pferdina
This collection of essay on architecture deals mainly with housing in the United States and Canada, although some pieces also involve public buildings of various types (such as office buildings, airports, and museums) and the history of architecture. I found it not too technical which was good, but
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the addition of illustrations would have improved the approachability of the book very much. Many of the buildings referred to by the author are unknown to me, so I was bewildered by most of the examples. Photographs, or even simple line drawings, would have helped me understand what the author was trying to explain. All of the essays appeared in newspapers and magazines between 1986 and 1991, which makes them just a little dated now, but the writing is fantastic. Show Less
LibraryThing member mldg
Nearly every essay in this book sent me to the internet with excitement to see pictures of the buildings Rybczynski talks about. Well written, interesting.
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