Archithese

Archithese

Mediated Messages

Mediated Messages presents a collection of original writing exploring the role played by the media in the development of postmodern architecture in the 1970s and 80s. The book's twelve chapters and case-studies examine a range of contemporary periodicals and exhibitions to explore their role in the postmodern. This focus on mediation as a key feature of architectural post-modernism, and the recognition that post-modernism grew out of developments in the media, opens up the possibility of an important new account of post-modernism distinct from existing narratives. Accompanied by a contextualizing introduction, the essays are arranged across four thematic sections (covering: images; international postmodernisms; high and low culture; and postmodern architects as theorists) and present a range of case-studies with a genuinely international scope. Altogether, this work makes a substantial contribution to the historical account of architectural postmodernism, and will be of great interest to researchers in postmodernism as well as those examining the role of the media in architectural history.

Discovering Early Modernism in Switzerland

An insightful and engagingly narrated exploratory work on a pioneer of modern architecture from Switzerland The Queen Alexandra Sanatorium in Davos is a masterpiece of early modernist architecture by the Swiss architects Pfleghard & Haefeli (Schatzalp, Davos) and the renowned civil engineer and bridge builder Robert Maillart. A new form of architecture was forged here, full of contradictions and compromises and the result of intense collaboration between engineer, architect, and client. It stands at the threshold of modernism, which is largely characterized by the use of reinforced concrete. Apart from certain early mentions in architectural history, very little has been written about this Swiss precursor of modernist architecture. Drawing on numerous archival records, Daniel Korwan now provides the first detailed chronology of this 1909 building, thus expanding the record on the historical reception of modernism. First publication on a Swiss building that prefigured modern architecture Unpublished illustrations and plans of the Queen Alexandra Sanatorium in Davos Insightful and engagingly narrated new contribution to the study of 20th century modernism