The chief appeal of The Architecture of Happiness, the thoughtful if rather conservative new book by Alain de Botton, is its offering of a plausible theory about why we inexplicably find certain buildings beautiful, others ugly, and why these emotions can be so passionate. A review by Kevin Nance, for the Chicago Sun-Times | previously 1 | 2
7 Comments
de Bottom sure makes the rounds...he's been on every single show, newspaper, and magazine except the very critical publications.
i disagree with nance. i didn't think de botton's message was one of seeking more of the same at all. while he certainly describes some environments which are comforting, he also describes architecture as 'aspirational' in several different ways and makes arguments for an architecture appropriate for its time and place (without going so far as to be prescriptive).
i will admit that this book is fairly enigmatic. each review i read and each person i talk to who has read it has taken away a different impression of what de botton 'is saying'. probably because it's somewhat agenda-less. it's a meditation on architecture in relation to personal experience, not a manifesto.
agree re: being enigmatic in this book without coming off like a polemicist.
*i've only read portions of someone else's copy, having just purchased my own last month.
now that I'm reading from the beginning (and enjoying it), I expect it will make my CNY list of 8.
?
typo or subtle commentary?
Freudian slip...
To listen to the arguments towards the "Ikea Alvar Aalto" modernism ( http://archinect.com/news/article.php?id=38958_0_24_0_C ) before having to buy the book check out the London Biennale breakfast talks published by BD last summer where Botton was an invited speaker > http://www.bdonline.co.uk/story.asp?storyType=177§ioncode=643&storyCode=3070381
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