Architecture and the Public World

Well-argued, well-grounded, well-written, these texts based on architectural practice, critique, and history reach beyond the particular discipline of architecture and the built environment. They touch all design professions that strive to make artifacts compatible with daily life practice in a fragile environment. Design, having become increasingly vaporous in recent years, needs a (re-)linking to the social-political domain confronting the “conflict between power and reason”. -- Gui Bonsiepe, author of The Disobedience of Design To those who have read him, and even to those who have not, the name Kenneth Frampton suggests an intellectual and ethical beacon in architecture. And like a beacon, Frampton has continued to cast light on some of the enduring and critical topics of our times. Perhaps similar to Rilke’s letters to the young poet, Frampton’s writings have alerted generations of architects, young and not so young, across the world, to abide by the cultural ethic of architecture, and compelled them to contemplate on what they do. -- Kazi Khaleed Ashraf, Director of the Bengal Institute for Architecture, Landscapes and Settlements, Bangladesh By employing his deep understanding of the process of designing and crafting buildings, Frampton peels back the layers of a building to reveal its meaning, to understand its relevance, to evaluate its impact. He inhabits the world between thinking and doing, observing what is being done, capturing with incisive clarity the inner workings of projects, charting their equally possible outcomes. Just in case we might forget in this busy, digital world, Frampton reminds us that people's experience of architecture is of highest cultural importance. -- Yvonne Farrell and Shelly McNamara, Grafton Architects, Ireland