Tag Archives: Nikolaus Pevsner

‘Spirit of the age’ bugaboo

Posted on May 29, 2019 by David Brussat

Among the most inane of modern architecture’s founding conceits is that buildings reflect the spirit of the age. If a building truly reflects the spirit of the age rather than, as most people would expect, its architect’s desire to express … Continue reading →

Posted in Architecture, Architecture History | Tagged , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

Scruton’s first beauty volley

Posted on November 23, 2018 by David Brussat

As I mentioned in “Sir Roger’s hunt for beauty,” Roger Scruton has been appointed chairman of a commission to promote beauty in British housing policy. Naturally, all those who are opposed to beauty in architecture are on the warpath against … Continue reading →

Posted in Architecture | Tagged , , , , , , , | 7 Comments

Bayley on Curl’s “Dystopia”

Posted on August 27, 2018 by David Brussat

Stephen Bayley, critic for The (U.K.) Spectator, has written “Modernist architecture is not barbarous – but the blinkered rejection of it is,” the second review (that I’ve seen so far) of James Stevens Curl’s Making Dystopia: The Strange Rise and … Continue reading →

Posted in Architecture, Book/Film Reviews | Tagged , , , , , , , | 6 Comments

Pevsner’s archiperversity

Posted on April 20, 2018 by David Brussat

What are the sources of modern architecture? I recently completed Nikolaus Pevsner’s The Sources of Modern Architecture and Design, published by the famous German-turned-Brit architectural historian in 1968. Rarely have so many underlinings arisen in protest against so much dubious … Continue reading →

Posted in Architecture | Tagged , , , , , | 3 Comments

Sources of modern silliness

Posted on March 11, 2018 by David Brussat

Nikolaus Pevsner (1902-83) wrote some of the pathbreaking works of architectural history that form the belief system of modern architecture today. The Sources of Modern Architecture and Design is one, which I am reading again for the first time in … Continue reading →

Posted in Architecture, Architecture History | Tagged , , , , , , | 5 Comments

Ross Award winners of 2018

Posted on March 9, 2018 by David Brussat

The Institute of Classical Architecture & Art has just announced this year’s Arthur Ross Award laureates. Unlike the Bulfinch Awards of the New England chapter (also just announced) and other regional ICAA awards programs, which honor specific works, the ICAA’s … Continue reading →

Posted in Architecture | Tagged , , , , , , , | 4 Comments

Mackintosh . . . modernist? Nah.

Posted on May 26, 2014 by David Brussat

No sadist, I open with an image of the glorious facade of the Mackintosh Building, not with the image that has eaten away at the backside of my last several posts on the fire at the Glasgow School of Art … Continue reading →

Posted in Architecture, Architecture Education, Architecture History, Art and design | Tagged , , , , | 1 Comment

Morgan, Pevsner, Vermont

Posted on May 17, 2014 by David Brussat

I have had the pleasure, just now, of running into my old friend William Morgan in my new friend Kristen Richards’s ArchNewsNow, the daily global roundhouse for architectural news and commentary (in English). On Kristen’s list for Friday I find … Continue reading →

Posted in Architecture, Architecture Education, Architecture History | Tagged , , , , | Leave a comment