Bleak Houses: Disappointment and Failure in Architecture

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Timothy J. Brittain-Catlin (Senior Lecturer and Director of Research, University of Kent)

Bleak Houses

Disappointment and Failure in Architecture

Timothy J. Brittain-Catlin (Senior Lecturer and Director of Research, University of Kent)

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English

MIT Press
12 February 2016

Theory of architecture

Series: The MIT Press

Why some architects fail to realize their ideal buildings, and what architecture critics can learn from novelists.

The usual history of architecture is a grand narrative of soaring monuments and heroic makers. But it is also a false narrative in many ways, rarely acknowledging the personal failures and disappointments of architects. In Bleak Houses, Timothy Brittain-Catlin investigates the underside of architecture, the stories of losers and unfulfillment often ignored by an architectural criticism that values novelty, fame, and virility over fallibility and rejection.

As architectural criticism promotes increasingly narrow values, dismissing certain styles wholesale and subjecting buildings to a Victorian litmus test of ""real"" versus ""fake,"" Brittain-Catlin explains the effect this superficial criticality has had not only on architectural discourse but on the quality of buildings. The fact that most buildings receive no critical scrutiny at all has resulted in vast stretches of ugly modern housing and a pervasive public illiteracy about architecture.

By: Timothy J. Brittain-Catlin (Senior Lecturer and Director of Research University of Kent)
Imprint: MIT Press
Country of Publication: United States
Dimensions: Height: 229mm, Width: 152mm, Spine: 11mm
Weight: 295g
ISBN: 9780262528856
ISBN 10: 0262528851
Series: The MIT Press
Pages: 192
Publication Date: 12 February 2016
Recommended Age: From 18 years
Audience: General/trade , ELT Advanced
Format: Paperback
Publisher's Status: Active

Timothy Brittain-Catlin is a Reader at Kent School of Architecture, University of Kent. His writing has appeared in The World of Interiors, Architectural Review, and many other publications.

Reviews for Bleak Houses: Disappointment and Failure in Architecture

...there are few books I can think of that describe the emotional engagement with architecture with such acuity. And despite the subject, Bleak Houses is anything but a bleak read. -- Richard Williams The Times Higher Education ...this is one of the most intriguing, original and gently provocative books on the meaning of architecture for some while. Architecture Review ...It's a book that all who not only write on architecture but who also have a genuine interest in the welfare of the historic built environment ought to read. -- Alex Bremner The Victorian