Grenfell fire aftermath: how 20th-century buildings can be made safer, not more dangerous
There are three key principles: prevent risk, evacuate users and minimise damage – in that order.
Academic rigour, journalistic flair
Articles on Architecture
Displaying 1 - 20 of 195 articles
Grenfell Tower disaster: how did the fire spread so quickly?
Massive damage and suffering was caused when a London tower block became an inferno.
Frank Lloyd Wright’s Japanese education
When the young Wright moved to Chicago to work for the architect Joseph Silsbee, he was introduced to Japanese prints. It changed his career, and very possibly the course of American architecture.
Looking at buildings can actually give people headaches – here’s how
Repetitive patterns from windows, blinds and stairs are really uncomfortable to look at.
In razing its modernist buildings, Iran is erasing its past Western influence
Without protection, Iran's spectacular American- and Italian-designed mid-century structures will be reduced to dust, beams and concrete blocks.
The mall isn’t dead – it’s just changing
The mall's inventor, Victor Gruen, envisioned thriving hubs of civic activity, rather than bland, asphalt-enclosed shopping centers. Is his original vision now being realized – or further corrupted?
Good riddance to the Garden Bridge: an eye-watering waste of public funds
Ding dong, the bridge is dead.
The real issue with the barmy design ideas for Trump’s border wall
We need to imagine new types of borders in this era of fervent fence building.
A place to live, work and play: why mixed-use developments are making a comeback
Toxic industrial processes put a distance between work, home and leisure. Now, in the post-industrial era, these functions are being reunited.
Rebuilding Homs: how to resurrect a city after six years of conflict
By following these three lessons, Homs can re-emerge from the Syrian conflict an even greater city than before.
The road to recovery: Old Damascus has a long history of rising from the ashes
A Syrian architect reveals what makes her home town so special – and how locals can rebuild it.
Brutalism, a campus love story – or how I learned to love concrete
Academics are often in the vanguard of the fight to preserve heritage buildings but they are losing the battle on home turf as universities shed their 1960s and 1970s concrete skins.
Homage to the forest tree: Architect Francis Kéré pays tribute to his African roots
With his work Francis Kéré, who is one of Africa's top architects, represents an innovative breakthrough in the collective imagery of what architecture in Africa could be in the 21st century.
How the Italian Futurists shaped the aesthetics of modernity in the 20th century
A transcript from a segment of The Anthill podcast about the futuristic visions of Filippo Marinetti.
Architecture, undistracted
Last week it was White Night in Melbourne. I’m embarrassed to say I was tucked up asleep in bed (it had been a long week!). But my Instagram feed attests that the architectural community, along with several…
The ghosts of a literary Indian hill-station that haunt the writers of the present
Are the the hauntings at Landour just practical fictions amidst the solitude of the hills?
Why the Sydney Opera House is a little overcooked
Construction should have stopped once the roofs were erected. Any citizen could then have walked up to the terraced amphitheatre, sat down and gazed back at the country from this shrine to the nation.
How hot-deskers are made to feel like the homeless people of the office world
Hot-desking tends to affect different employees differently – it tends to produce winners and losers.
The lock of love: how leaving padlocks became a modern-day romantic ritual
This universal symbol of love has proven remarkably divisive.
How the 19th-century rebuilding of Britain’s Houses of Parliament made air pollution visible
A century before the modern environmental era, experts realized that London's dirty air was corroding its new Parliament building. This insight led to some of the first air pollution laws.
Top contributors
-
Professor, Monash University
-
Professor of Architecture, Associate Dean International, UNSW
-
Andrew W. Mellon Chair in the Humanities and Professor and Chair of History of Art, Vanderbilt University
-
Transformation Fellow + Senior Lecturer in Architecture, Queensland University of Technology
-
Head and Professor of Architecture, Glasgow School of Art
-
Professor of Architecture, University at Buffalo, The State University of New York
-
Architectural Technologist and Urban Designer, Nottingham Trent University
-
Professor of Practice, University of Technology Sydney
-
Associate professor, University of Sydney
-
Course Director (B Des Arch), Senior Lecturer, School of Architecture, University of Technology Sydney
-
Assistant Professor of Architecture, University of Western Australia
-
Professor of Architecture and Urban Design, University of Melbourne
-
Director, The Wood Studio, Institute for Sustainable Construction, Edinburgh Napier University
-
Lecturer in education, Newcastle University
-
Professor of Urban Design, Lancaster University
Most read on The Conversation
India’s wells are running dry, fast
‘Cow economics’ are killing India’s working class
‘I’m so sorry’: when Indian advertisements turn around sexism
How world cities moving forward on climate change leave the US President behind
Kepler Mission has released its catalogue of exoplanets, but what have we learnt about these worlds?
Wonder Woman: feminist icon or symbol of oppression?
Selling sex: Wonder Woman and the ancient fantasy of hot lady warriors
No, palm oil is not responsible for 40% of global deforestation
When a river is a person: from Ecuador to New Zealand, nature gets its day in court