William Lethaby Symbolism And The Occult

This book delves into the life and work of architect William Richard Lethaby (1857–1931) and his relationship with the occult and alchemy, in particular. Using detailed analysis of Lethaby’s drawings and architecture, the research uncovers Lethaby’s familiarity with occult concepts and ideology during the spiritual revolution of the nineteenth century. Throughout this time, countless individuals, particularly members of the avant-garde, rejected more traditional religious pathways and sought answers through experimental and mystical alternatives. William Lethaby, Symbolism and the Occult reveals how the architect was profoundly influenced by the Zeitgeist, which was saturated with references to spiritualism, mysticism and the occult, and explores the impact of occultism on his contemporaries and the wider Arts and Crafts Movement. This book is written for upper-level students, researchers and academics interested in architectural history, William Lethaby and nineteenth century culture and society.

Arieh Sharon and Modern Architecture in Israel: Building Social Pragmatism offers the first comprehensive survey of the work of Arieh Sharon and analyzes and discusses his designs and plans in relation to the emergence of the State of Israel. A graduate of the Bauhaus, Sharon worked for a few years at the office of Hannes Mayer before returning to Mandatory Palestine. There, he established his office which was occupied in its first years in planning kibbutzim and residential buildings in Tel Aviv. After the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948, Arieh Sharon became the director and chief architect of the National Planning Department, where he was asked to devise the young country’s first national masterplan. Known as the Sharon Plan, it was instrumental in shaping the development of the new nation. During the 1950s and 1960s, Sharon designed many of Israel’s institutions, including hospitals and buildings on university campuses. This book presents Sharon’s exceptionally wide range of work and examines his perception of architecture in both socialist and pragmatist terms. It also explores Sharon’s modernist approach to architecture and his subsequent shift to Brutalist architecture, when he partnered with Benjamin Idelson in the 1950s and when his son, Eldar Sharon, joined the office in 1964. Thus, the book contributes a missing chapter in the historiography of Israeli architecture in particular and of modern architecture overall. This book will be of interest to researchers in architecture, modern architecture, Israel studies, Middle Eastern studies and migration of knowledge.

Dahomey’s Royal Architecture examines the West African kingdom of Dahomey, located in present-day Republic of Benin. The book explores the Royal Palace of Dahomey’s relationship to the religious, cultural, and national identity of the pre-colonial Kingdom of Dahomey (c. 1625–1892), colonial Dahomey (1892–1960) and post-colonial Benin (1960–present). The Royal Palace of Dahomey covers more than 108 acres and was surrounded by a wall over two miles long. When the French colonial army arrived in Abomey in 1892, the ruling king set fire to the palace to keep it from falling into enemy hands. Though much of the palace structure was subsequently left to ruin, a portion of it was restored from which the French ruled for a short period. In 1945, the colonial administration transformed part of the palace into a museum, and in 1985 the entire palace was added to UNESCO’s World Heritage list. This book documents the palace’s physical transformations in relation to its changing purposes and explores how the space maintained religious significance despite change. The palace’s construction, destruction, and restorations demonstrate how architecture can be manipulated and transformed according to the agendas of governments or according to the religious and cultural needs of a populace. The palace functions as a historic record by discussing aspects of documentation, revision, language, and interpretation. Covering almost four centuries of Dahomey’s history, this book will be of interest to researchers and students of African art and architecture, religious studies, west African history, and post-colonial studies.

No other city in the Indian subcontinent can lay claim to having so many lives as Delhi. This book examines Delhi in the politically and culturally dynamic nineteenth century which was marked midway by the 1857 uprising against British colonial rule as a watershed event. Following British occupation, Delhi became a receptacle for encounters between the centuries-old Mughal traditions and the incoming colonial ideal, producing a traditionalism-modernity binary. Employing the built environment lens, the book traces the architectural trajectory of Delhi as it transitioned from the seventeenth-century Mughal Badshahi Shahar (imperial city) first into a culturally hybrid Dilli-Delhi combine of the pre-uprising era and thereafter into a modern British city following the uprising. This transition is presented via four constructs that draw on the traditionalism-modernity binary of Mughal and British Delhi and include Marhoom Dilli (Dead Delhi); Picturesque Delhi; Baaghi Dilli (Insurgent Delhi) and Tamed Delhi. The book goes beyond the nineteenth century to examine the vestiges of Delhi’s four nineteenth-century lives in the present while making a case for their acknowledgement as a cultural asset that can propel the city’s urban development agenda. By bringing together the city’s past and its present as well as addressing its future, the book can count among its readers not just scholars but also those interested in cities and their evolving landscapes.

Historical studies on the involvement of architecture in twentieth-century politics have overlooked its contribution to building Spain’s democracy. This pioneering book seeks to fill that void. Between the late 1970s and early 1990s, Spain founded representative institutions, launched its welfare state, and devolved autonomy to its regions. The study brings forth the architectural incarnation of that threefold program as it deployed in the Valencian Country, a Catalan-speaking region on Spain’s Mediterranean shores. There, social democratic authorities mobilized architects, planners, and graphic artists to devise a newly open public sphere and to recover a local identity that Franco’s dictatorship had repressed for decades. The research follows the impetus of reform and its contradictions through urban projects, designs for cultural amenities, and the renovation of governmental and professional bodies. Architecture for Spain’s Recovered Democracy contributes to current debates on nationalism and the arts, the environments of democratic socialism, and postmodernism and neoliberalism. As a result, it widens our understanding of how peripheral regions may yield egalitarian architectures of resistance. This book is written for students and researchers in architecture and planning, art history, spatial politics, and Hispanic studies, as well as for a general readership interested in inclusive politics in the built environment.

This book is the first comprehensive monograph on Polish modern architect Jerzy Sołtan’s work including his designs, theory, and teachings in Poland and America based on extensive archival research and oral history interviews with former students. The Life and Work of Jerzy Sołtan takes the reader on a journey to both sides of the iron curtain, the communist Poland and the capitalist United States, contributing to the existing scholarship on modernism in post-socialist counties, on CIAM, and on Team 10. It pictures Sołtan as a central player in the history of modernism, building on his own contribution and on close relationships with Le Corbusier and Team 10. This book illustrates not only Sołtan’s work but also his life and how it influenced twentieth-century architecture. Looking in detail at his designs and texts enables the reader to discover how modern architecture tendencies can fit into a larger geopolitical context and how designs can be true manifestos to an architect’s theory. The reader will be immersed in a series of different contexts – from communist Poland, the vibrant academic atmosphere at Harvard to lively discussions on the future of modern architecture. This publication will be of particular interest for those studying modern architecture in Central Europe and in post-socialist countries, in particular Poland. Architects, designers, architectural and design students, and modern architecture enthusiasts will find this publication on the “last modernist” architect revealing new perspectives thanks to the unpublished and unresearched sources.

This book examines the emergence of modern company towns in Iran by delineating the architectural, political, and industrial histories of three distinct resource-based ‘company town’ projects built in association with the ‘Big Three’ powers of World War II. The book’s narrative builds upon a tripartite research design that chronologically traces the formation and development of the oil, steel, and copper industries, respectively favoured by Great Britain, the Soviet Union, and the United States in this part of the world. By applying three sets of comparative studies, the book provides critical vantage points to three different ideological design paradigms: postcolonial regionalism, socialist universalism, and rationalist modern nation building. From a global political context, the book contributes to the disclosure of new information about the geopolitical confrontation of these three nations in the Global South to increase their sphere of influence after the Second World War. Furthermore, it demonstrates how postwar architectural modernism was adopted by each power and adapted to their ideological mind frame to fulfil distinct social, cultural, political, and economic targets. This book examines multiple interconnections between architecture, politics, and industrial development by adopting a transdisciplinary approach based on comprehensive fieldwork, site surveys, and the analysis of original multilingual documents. As such, it will be of interest to researchers and students of architecture, history, international relations, and Middle Eastern studies.

William Richard Lethaby: His Life and Work 1857-1931 focuses on the masterpieces, achievements, and legacy of Lethaby in architecture. The book first underscores the early life of Lethaby and his humble beginnings in the field of architecture. The text then ponders on the craftsmanship and architectural genius of Lethaby as shown in the design of the Stanmore Hall, Avon Tyrrell, The Hurst, Melsetter House, Rysa Lodge, Eagle Insurance Buildings, and High Coxlease. The publication highlights the creative mind of Lethaby through the artistic presentation of SS Colm and Margaret, All Saints' Church, Liverpool Cathedral Competition, and the Central School of Arts and Crafts. The text also takes a look at the works of Lethaby for the London County Council, his early architectural education and training, and his legacy as a theorist and writer. The book is a fine reference for historians, architects, and researchers interested in the works, contributions, and influence of Lethaby on architecture.