Living Modernity: Experiments in the Exceptional and Everyday, 1920s-1970s
Shinkenchiku-shan 2026
€42,50
From the 1920s, architects such as Le Corbusier and Mies van der Rohe sought to create both functional and comfortable living spaces, utilising new and constantly developing technologies. Their experimental visions and innovative ideas became widely disseminated, transforming people’s daily lives. This book showcases houses designed by architects who embraced modernity by re-examining the fundamentals of living. Each shares an ethos of creating a new architecture connected to their specific time, region, climate, and social context. Included are works by Frank Gehry, Lina Bo Bardi, Alvar Aalto, Jean Prouvé, Kenji Hirose, Antonin Raymond, and several others.
They also vividly express the family dynamics and characters of their individual residents. Innovations in living by the architects pursuing ideallifestyles are deeply intertwined with the distinct context of each house.
These houses were a means to solve universal issues that have emerged in modern times. Sanitary spaces that promote personal hygiene, expansive glass windows to bring in light and breezes, kitchens to reduce household chores, furnishings such as chairs and lighting to enhance bodily comfort, and verdant landscapes brought into living spaces became key elements in defining residential architecture in the 20th century. Iconic images of these new living spaces proliferated widely through model home exhibitions, magazines and other new media.
The publication reexamines these innovative aspirations in residential architecture that emerged in the 20th century from seven perspectives that define modern houses: hygiene,materiality, windows, kitchen, furnishings, media, and landscape. Highlighting 14residential masterpieces, it provides a multi-faceted examination of 20th century experimental homes through photographs, drawings and sketches, models,furnishings, textiles, tableware, magazines and graphics.
ISBN: 9784786903366
