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History of architecture
1799 pages
A monumental, encyclopedic journey through the built environment that captures the scale of human ambition across millennia.
What it feels like
Reading this monumental work feels less like reading a traditional narrative and more like walking through a vast, meticulously curated museum of human achievement. The pace is steady and deliberate, demanding a reader's full attention as it lays out the structural and cultural foundations of global architecture. Its tone is deeply authoritative and academic, offering a scholarly atmosphere that is both expansive and rigorously structured. The prose is dense with facts, precise terminology, and historical context, accompanied by the iconic, intricate line drawings that make the text come alive. It is an awe-inspiring, encyclopedic experience designed for the dedicated student or historian who wants to understand how human aspirations have been carved into stone, cast in concrete, and raised to the sky.
- Mood
- scholarly
- expansive
- structured
- monumental
- Tone
- authoritative
- academic
- objective
- encyclopedic
- reverent
- Pace
- steady
- Themes
- the evolution of human habitation · cultural expression through built form · technological advancement · global heritage · the intersection of art and engineering
- The writing
- Dense, precise, and highly structured, prioritizing clarity, factual density, and historical context over narrative flourish.
- The arc
- A steady, awe-inspiring accumulation of human achievement, moving from ancient foundations to modern complexities.
- Who it's for
- Architecture students, historians, and dedicated enthusiasts who crave a comprehensive, deeply detailed timeline of global building traditions.
About the book
A History of Architecture is the first major work of history to include an overview of the architectural achievements of the 20th Century. Banister Fletcher has been the standard one volume architectural history for over 100 years and continues to give a concise and factual account of world architecture from the earliest times. In this twentieth and centenary edition, edited by Dan Cruickshank with three consultant editors and fourteen new contributors, chapters have been recast and expanded and a third of the text is new. There are new chapters on the twentieth-century architecture of the Middle East (including Israel), South-east Asia, Hong Kong, Japan and Korea, the Indian subcontinent, Russia and the Soviet Union, Eastern Europe and Latin America. The book's scope has been widened to include more architecture from non European countries and coverage of pre twentieth century architecture now includes 6 chapters on Islam.
For the first time in Banister Fletcher's A History of Architecture the architecture of the20th century is considered as a whole and assessed in a historical perspective. There is more information on vernacular buildings and engineered structures as well as many new plans and sections. This unique reference book places buildings in their social, cultural and historical settings to describe the main patterns of architectural development, from Prehistoric to the International Style. Again in the words of Sir Banister Fletcher, this book shows that 'Architecture... provides a key to the habits, thoughts and aspirations of the people, and without a knowledge of this art the history of any period lacks that human interest with which it should be invested.' THE source book for the historical development of architecture. Publisher's description.
Description from Open Library.
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