I'm interested to known how you assess contemporary architecture viewed against history? What do you see happening in the future (especially in the midst of world economic crisis and concerns about sustainability)? What do you hope for? What are disappointed with? What mentality do you think people have about architecture and architectural education? What do you think is the good, the bad, and the ugly in contemporary architecture?
I am eager to hear from all of you.
Most of the topics in your post that have been discussed at length across multiple threads on this board over the years. It might be better to use the search function to find and read those threads and then come back with more specific questions.
That said, I think we're probably in the midst of a shift that might not have been predicted in threads only a few months old. I will write more about this later.
Diabase: sorry but not clever
Moarlity degree zero: um...what,? Did you misinterpret all of those questions and think that I was asking you to write an article for me and some how that deeply offends you?
PsyArch: also not clever
4arch: Yea I have read through some of the past discussion but it's precisely due to the many changes that have happened in the last month in the world I thought I'd pose this question. All my peers seem to have such negative outlook on the prospects of the future of architecture. I just wanted to see if that permeated through out the architectural community also. But apparently it was like a bad question to ask? I don't know.
People on archinect tend to be way too snobby and trying way too hard to be clever or something. I joined archinect because I thought it was community where people can share thoughts and idea. If you don't want to answer a questions, then don't. Don't think you are all high and mighty by saying a one liner behind your computer screen.
Cerebral, your initial post (esp. the title) sounds like you want to talk about architectural design, but your response to 4arch sounds like you want to talk about practice.
I don't think you've raised a "bad" question, just a vague and enormous one, and the snarky comic commentary is part of the package here; let it be like water of a duck for you.
I think architecture is in transition, as are may other fields. (I don't, however, know enough about other fields to draw exact parallels.) But I think we're in a time when small forces - young offices, small offices, people who aren't traditionally trained in the field - can have enormous impact. I think as architects devoted to the field we have to be open to seeing what positive benefits input from unexpected sources might have.
Oh good god, CA - just calm down. Any forum post with a 'genuine request' for anything must first go through a hazing process of snark and personality carpet-bombing - so settle down and if you don't want to get all agitated about useless commentary *then don't*.
To reply:
You asking a very, VERY! broad question that brings us to view things at the global scale. At which point we realize that some of us are more connected than others, and to degrees which can cannot plumb whilst sitting at the terminal.
Contemporary architecture in rural Tibet? State housing in eastern-europe? Parametric condom dispensing pavillions in Japan? I can't, for the life of me, comment on everything except to say - I don't know enough about everything, but its happening.
I don't think you asked a bad question but I think people want to know someone's willing and able to bring something to the table when they start a discussion like this. Perhaps you could share some of your own thoughts and opinions on the issues?
As for the original topic, I think these questions are a little hard to answer right now. Being in the midst of a period of uncertainty is not exactly an easy place from which to gain perspective on the future. Also, I'm not sure this meltdown has been around long enough for it to have had any major effects on architecture just yet. Sure, firms are laying off and stuff is not getting built, but whatever actually is getting built right now would have been in the pipeline for a year or more.
My big predictions for the next 5 years are:
-Most of what's any good about LEED will be absorbed into building codes and people will finally shut up about green this and green that and just do green buildings.
-New megalomaniacal buildings will be few and far between.
-Blob architecture and some of its other gimmicky cousins will be declared dead.
We're all in the dark, let's shoot some darts and see if we can pop some balloons. I like 4Archs predictions.
in the spirit of broadness, I think consumerism/mass production models are in question - that we're faced with the extremely high cost of over-specialization. i.e.- what do we do if the lights (or job markets) go out? It feels a bit like some of our foundations have been laid on bad soil, and we're trying to figure out if we can put in some piles, or if we oughta just let it lean and try for a spot over on the next hill.
Extended to practice, all these efforts devoted to rambunctious form making seem a bit misplaced and well, decadent. I think it will become increasingly important to devote efforts to tangible steps can be taken to really improve life, from a local point of view. What can be done in your neighborhood? Or the next one over? Here's to the barter system! Or perhaps there are options for some kind of globalized hybrid version of it...
Well, CerebralArms, I couldnt resist typing that answer in.
Now to my opinion.
As evidenced by the past, architecture is allied to a number of constraints and factors.
The most important constraint is money. So in light of the current situation architecture as a whole will remain stagnant whilst funding conditions disallow spending.
There are three lesser scenarios that will accompany this;
architecture will flourish in blooming, developing economies such as Brazil [already evidenced in publications and magazines] despite constraints in the western economies
In western economies where money is scarce, there will be a renovation and efficency boom in existing buildings, and underutlitised space and buildings will be converted or transformed
thirdly, there will be a stream of innovation as circumstances will dictate that architects operate within more severe restrictions that will hopefully create some great architecture albeit of a lesser scale.
The other factor is technological progress. I think that this will stagnate also. This is not such a great concern to architecture because buildings dont need new and better technology to get made. But it will limit another source of funding to create buildings.
About the green building movement. I think this will also suffer because new green buildings can be built only by those who can afford them. It may prompt other technologies and strategies that are less costly, which may stem from the point above - and I think that green methodologies will be employed in making existing buildings more efficient. I think like Liberty Bell mentions above, green strategies will become less gimmick and more commonplace.
Landscape architecture may become more prevalent ans a practice because it costs less money and can significantly transform existing spaces.
As for architecture practice, I think this will evolve into a core of concentrated specialists, and then a range of broader design concerns. I think manufacturers of materials will look to extend their reach from supplying products to supplying documentation of systems and installation.
I think there will be a place for architecture practices to strongly promote their identity either through a distinctive business model [that differs from orthodox practice and blurs design and build], a distincitve aesthetic, and/or a distinctive production model.
I have heard it from a few reputable international sources that independent project management companies are dead. This profession is being brought in house, and while specialist project managers for work that is out of the norm will survive, there will be an opportunity foir architectural professionals to move into client representation - mediating between the client and construction company.
It was 4arch who mentioned green will just be standard practice.
I agree with just about everything you've said, diabase. especially the bit about manufacturers and installers moving into the "design" realm of what we do, and us moving out of design and into management. I think both those things will happen with our profession. Construction activity may be stagnant, but the role of architects is changing.
contemporary architecture is like everything else contemporary these days...a version of a version of a style of a style...nothing really new, just slightly altered.
the architecture that is mainly published and often exhibited is architecture that is highly dependent upon surpluss capital.
bullshit can only be built when people have more money then they know what to do with.
by bullshit, i mean architecture that earns the capital "A". it earns it's "A" by expressing something that architectural critiques can put in a book and call historical cannons. something they start up a thread with...
by bullshit, i mean architecture that earns the capital "A" because it's so iconic, you might just get a tatoo... and the billboard image is so freakin' hot you might just sale your suburban home to own 2 sqft in Manhattan.
by bullshit, just about everything we've been calling cutting architecture these days.
thank goodness for green and people that practice.
all that hot blob shit and signifying blah blah will give way to an industry that has rarely cared about what we think: the construction industry.
wait...maybe we'll finally re-adjust our perspective of what architecture is, especially contemporary architecture, and start talking about something much more real.
the building environment.
It's already out there, less eye candy and more social research, more building technology...
one day I hope to go and by a copy of Architectural Record and find absolutely no eye candy in it and no uber-theory that pretends to be above the market...one day.
I think there are a number of things that mean that manufacturers will move into the design and install area: legal ramifications on improper use of the product by others, additional revenue from installation, a larger labour market that will make it more economical to employ skilled labour, and to support designers and clients through the planning and building approval stage so their product gets used in the first place.
So where an architecture practice merely revolves round coordinating pretty comprehensive information sets [supplied largely by manufacturers] design becomes less important because a downside of this approach is less flexibility in the use of products. This is happen to a large degree anyway, but it will become more entrenched.
So therefore, there will still be a market for niche design/aesthetic led practices that contrast with that approach and offer completely customised architecture.
But architecture's 'product' does not necessarily advance architecture. See this thread. I was meaning more specifically that advancements in technology lead to profits which leads to another source of funding for architecture.
Of course not - if there is one things architects typically don't have, it's funds.
Surely you can see that things like the software/it/web boom of the late 90's and early 2000's [bubble excepted] created wealth and that in turn created architecture - particularly residential architecture.
What is YOUR opinion of Contemporary Architecture?
I'm interested to known how you assess contemporary architecture viewed against history? What do you see happening in the future (especially in the midst of world economic crisis and concerns about sustainability)? What do you hope for? What are disappointed with? What mentality do you think people have about architecture and architectural education? What do you think is the good, the bad, and the ugly in contemporary architecture?
I am eager to hear from all of you.
I think that contemporary architecture is very much of its time.
HEY! Write your own article!
Most of the topics in your post that have been discussed at length across multiple threads on this board over the years. It might be better to use the search function to find and read those threads and then come back with more specific questions.
That said, I think we're probably in the midst of a shift that might not have been predicted in threads only a few months old. I will write more about this later.
B-
Diabase: sorry but not clever
Moarlity degree zero: um...what,? Did you misinterpret all of those questions and think that I was asking you to write an article for me and some how that deeply offends you?
PsyArch: also not clever
4arch: Yea I have read through some of the past discussion but it's precisely due to the many changes that have happened in the last month in the world I thought I'd pose this question. All my peers seem to have such negative outlook on the prospects of the future of architecture. I just wanted to see if that permeated through out the architectural community also. But apparently it was like a bad question to ask? I don't know.
People on archinect tend to be way too snobby and trying way too hard to be clever or something. I joined archinect because I thought it was community where people can share thoughts and idea. If you don't want to answer a questions, then don't. Don't think you are all high and mighty by saying a one liner behind your computer screen.
Cerebral, your initial post (esp. the title) sounds like you want to talk about architectural design, but your response to 4arch sounds like you want to talk about practice.
I don't think you've raised a "bad" question, just a vague and enormous one, and the snarky comic commentary is part of the package here; let it be like water of a duck for you.
I think architecture is in transition, as are may other fields. (I don't, however, know enough about other fields to draw exact parallels.) But I think we're in a time when small forces - young offices, small offices, people who aren't traditionally trained in the field - can have enormous impact. I think as architects devoted to the field we have to be open to seeing what positive benefits input from unexpected sources might have.
Oh good god, CA - just calm down. Any forum post with a 'genuine request' for anything must first go through a hazing process of snark and personality carpet-bombing - so settle down and if you don't want to get all agitated about useless commentary *then don't*.
To reply:
You asking a very, VERY! broad question that brings us to view things at the global scale. At which point we realize that some of us are more connected than others, and to degrees which can cannot plumb whilst sitting at the terminal.
Contemporary architecture in rural Tibet? State housing in eastern-europe? Parametric condom dispensing pavillions in Japan? I can't, for the life of me, comment on everything except to say - I don't know enough about everything, but its happening.
Cerebral,
I don't think you asked a bad question but I think people want to know someone's willing and able to bring something to the table when they start a discussion like this. Perhaps you could share some of your own thoughts and opinions on the issues?
As for the original topic, I think these questions are a little hard to answer right now. Being in the midst of a period of uncertainty is not exactly an easy place from which to gain perspective on the future. Also, I'm not sure this meltdown has been around long enough for it to have had any major effects on architecture just yet. Sure, firms are laying off and stuff is not getting built, but whatever actually is getting built right now would have been in the pipeline for a year or more.
My big predictions for the next 5 years are:
-Most of what's any good about LEED will be absorbed into building codes and people will finally shut up about green this and green that and just do green buildings.
-New megalomaniacal buildings will be few and far between.
-Blob architecture and some of its other gimmicky cousins will be declared dead.
damn Liberty! 1 Second!
I like the broadness of the question.
We're all in the dark, let's shoot some darts and see if we can pop some balloons. I like 4Archs predictions.
in the spirit of broadness, I think consumerism/mass production models are in question - that we're faced with the extremely high cost of over-specialization. i.e.- what do we do if the lights (or job markets) go out? It feels a bit like some of our foundations have been laid on bad soil, and we're trying to figure out if we can put in some piles, or if we oughta just let it lean and try for a spot over on the next hill.
Extended to practice, all these efforts devoted to rambunctious form making seem a bit misplaced and well, decadent. I think it will become increasingly important to devote efforts to tangible steps can be taken to really improve life, from a local point of view. What can be done in your neighborhood? Or the next one over? Here's to the barter system! Or perhaps there are options for some kind of globalized hybrid version of it...
Well, CerebralArms, I couldnt resist typing that answer in.
Now to my opinion.
As evidenced by the past, architecture is allied to a number of constraints and factors.
The most important constraint is money. So in light of the current situation architecture as a whole will remain stagnant whilst funding conditions disallow spending.
There are three lesser scenarios that will accompany this;
architecture will flourish in blooming, developing economies such as Brazil [already evidenced in publications and magazines] despite constraints in the western economies
In western economies where money is scarce, there will be a renovation and efficency boom in existing buildings, and underutlitised space and buildings will be converted or transformed
thirdly, there will be a stream of innovation as circumstances will dictate that architects operate within more severe restrictions that will hopefully create some great architecture albeit of a lesser scale.
The other factor is technological progress. I think that this will stagnate also. This is not such a great concern to architecture because buildings dont need new and better technology to get made. But it will limit another source of funding to create buildings.
About the green building movement. I think this will also suffer because new green buildings can be built only by those who can afford them. It may prompt other technologies and strategies that are less costly, which may stem from the point above - and I think that green methodologies will be employed in making existing buildings more efficient. I think like Liberty Bell mentions above, green strategies will become less gimmick and more commonplace.
Landscape architecture may become more prevalent ans a practice because it costs less money and can significantly transform existing spaces.
As for architecture practice, I think this will evolve into a core of concentrated specialists, and then a range of broader design concerns. I think manufacturers of materials will look to extend their reach from supplying products to supplying documentation of systems and installation.
I think there will be a place for architecture practices to strongly promote their identity either through a distinctive business model [that differs from orthodox practice and blurs design and build], a distincitve aesthetic, and/or a distinctive production model.
I have heard it from a few reputable international sources that independent project management companies are dead. This profession is being brought in house, and while specialist project managers for work that is out of the norm will survive, there will be an opportunity foir architectural professionals to move into client representation - mediating between the client and construction company.
Anyway, thats my thoughts.
It was 4arch who mentioned green will just be standard practice.
I agree with just about everything you've said, diabase. especially the bit about manufacturers and installers moving into the "design" realm of what we do, and us moving out of design and into management. I think both those things will happen with our profession. Construction activity may be stagnant, but the role of architects is changing.
contemporary architecture is like everything else contemporary these days...a version of a version of a style of a style...nothing really new, just slightly altered.
the architecture that is mainly published and often exhibited is architecture that is highly dependent upon surpluss capital.
bullshit can only be built when people have more money then they know what to do with.
by bullshit, i mean architecture that earns the capital "A". it earns it's "A" by expressing something that architectural critiques can put in a book and call historical cannons. something they start up a thread with...
by bullshit, i mean architecture that earns the capital "A" because it's so iconic, you might just get a tatoo... and the billboard image is so freakin' hot you might just sale your suburban home to own 2 sqft in Manhattan.
by bullshit, just about everything we've been calling cutting architecture these days.
thank goodness for green and people that practice.
all that hot blob shit and signifying blah blah will give way to an industry that has rarely cared about what we think: the construction industry.
wait...maybe we'll finally re-adjust our perspective of what architecture is, especially contemporary architecture, and start talking about something much more real.
the building environment.
It's already out there, less eye candy and more social research, more building technology...
one day I hope to go and by a copy of Architectural Record and find absolutely no eye candy in it and no uber-theory that pretends to be above the market...one day.
by the way, i wouldn't mind my bullshit being built.
Thanks for the clarification lb on 4arch.
I think there are a number of things that mean that manufacturers will move into the design and install area: legal ramifications on improper use of the product by others, additional revenue from installation, a larger labour market that will make it more economical to employ skilled labour, and to support designers and clients through the planning and building approval stage so their product gets used in the first place.
So where an architecture practice merely revolves round coordinating pretty comprehensive information sets [supplied largely by manufacturers] design becomes less important because a downside of this approach is less flexibility in the use of products. This is happen to a large degree anyway, but it will become more entrenched.
So therefore, there will still be a market for niche design/aesthetic led practices that contrast with that approach and offer completely customised architecture.
after airplanes, what's the next stage in manufacturing for a developed country like the US?
the niche market will be, what it already is, R&D for the industry funded by clients at their own risk.
exactly.
But architecture's 'product' does not necessarily advance architecture. See this thread. I was meaning more specifically that advancements in technology lead to profits which leads to another source of funding for architecture.
who will get to re-direct these new funds towards architecture? Architects?
Of course not - if there is one things architects typically don't have, it's funds.
Surely you can see that things like the software/it/web boom of the late 90's and early 2000's [bubble excepted] created wealth and that in turn created architecture - particularly residential architecture.
What is contemporary? Blobby Maya/Rhino forms? The 'new' modern box?
2 thumbs up!
I feel contemporary architecture sucks in comparison to "the historical".
contemporary architecture is blago!
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