From Bauhaus to Our House

A lively extended essay in which Wolfe mocks the way that Americans have been taken in by fast-talking, theory-laden European modernist architects in the course of the twentieth century. It’s 130 pages of very clever non-stop ridicule of the cult of the glass-concrete-and-steel box, but that’s really all it is: there is nothing here approaching the subtlety of the criticism of modernist elitism in John Carey’s The intellectuals and the masses. This is a book written to be read and enjoyed by self-justifying philistines, with heavy overtones of Mark Twain and The emperor’s new clothes. But I loved the dust-jacket…

Very funny and insightful look into how the 'compound' theory came to dominate modern architecture. Wolfe combines spiky, laugh-out-loud humour with biting critique. Highly recommended.

This is a very readable account of the history of modern architecture. Its undoubtedly opinionated and contentious, but it wears its prejudices openly and honestly. Perhaps the highest accolade for a book is that it makes you want to read more, to get other viewpoints and know more fully what went on, and this books does that in spades. Highly recommended.

Nearly thirty years ago, Tom Wolfe put the architectural world in a tizzy when he published this essay attacking modern architecture.

Now, I'm not a big fan of glass & steel & concrete office buildings, but Wolfe is absolutely virulent on the subject. And therein lies the rub. He detests Bauhaus-inspired work so much that he has no perspective. He is guilty of the same pretentiousness and arrogance of which he accuses the architects whom he dislikes.

There is a great deal to be said against architects who prefer form over function, theory over practice. But any legitimate criticism is lost in this diatribe. Saying over and over again "it's ugly and I don't like the architects' politics" is not particularly persuasive.

I am reading this book 30 years too late, of course, so probably my opinion is pointless. Or perhaps Wolfe has written an updated version that I've missed. In any case, his basic argument that American architecture had been taken over by a bunch of Europeans and turned into an academic exercise that was designed only for other similarly-deluded (and borderline talentless) architects seems indisputable. One only has to look at New Haven's (thankfully demolished) Oriental Gardens, which looks like a trailer park gone terribly terribly wrong. Looking around, I'm not sure we've made much progress since then, however. One look at Reston, Virginia is enough to make anyone who loves buildings shed a tear. It isn't Bauhaus, but it is damned ugly!

Loved it--an essay about navel gazing and what happens when groups of people navel-gaze and gather together to prove which one of them is more perfect at navel-gazing. Wolfe critiques modern architecture, but it isn't just about the negative effects of the Bauhaus style as much as the dangerousness of a group of people who attempt to rid themselves of pesky intellectual and moreover, ideological, competition. You don't have to hate modern or post modern architecture to like the book, but it probably doesn't hurt if you are a bit of an iconoclast.

Ugliness and impracticality in the name of progress are not really progress and there is no justification for ugliness and impracticality.

I see these homes. There is a riverside home I admire, built into a hill on a riverbend with a lovely view. However, this home has a flat roof, which was a popular architectural feature at the time it was built. We are in a northern location with lots of heavy snow. No matter how lovely the home, or how cheap the price, I would never, ever, buy a flat roofed house in this climate. But it is progressive, it is "modern". Hopefully, the owners see the style as worth having a perpetually leaking roof.

I see what these ideas have led to. Contractors build houses without architectural guidance, while still show more borrowing their ideas. Now I see plenty of houses that; well, one can only presume that a house exists, because of the evidence of a garage. You drive by and see a garage and the hint that the building continues on and that the garage may be part of an overall larger structure and that a home may indeed, exist somewhere behind that garage. I call this particular architectural style "anti-curb appeal".

Regardless of that, other people are free to live in whatever house they can tolerate and I have my own tastes. My home is very old, built while this little rural town was riding the crest of a "spa" boom. It is tall, well built and graciously proportioned. We enjoy plenty of natural light through our tall, plentiful windows. The floor joists are made from trees that were squared off. The snow slides right off the steeply pitched roof. As we live in the north, there are a few hot days in summer, but the old hardwoods in the yard provide shade, the high ceilings ventilate the heat upwards and the cross breezes through the screened windows make air conditioning unnecessary. While there are a few things I would change, like re-converting the previous owner's man cave back into a garage, a more efficient floor plan within the existing structure, and replacing the mid-century stone porch with a reproduction of the original wood porch, I love my house and it is perfect for the way we use it.

I think Wolfe was right about Courbusier being a fascist; I am sure that if he had his way my house would be razed and replaced with a flat roofed, concrete cube with a couple of windows. A home I would hate looking at, and a home I would hate living in; a house I would not want to come home to. After all, I can live with other people's ugly architecture, it only offends my eye. Having no other choice but to live in ugly house; own an ugly house, would offend my very being. show less