Postmodern Urbanism

A common critique of modernism was that it failed to serve the city, the community.

Postmodernists believed that the modernist's emphasis of speed and movement failed to let people congeal and congregate

Loyola Law School
In Los Angeles

Built by Frank Gehry

1979-1984

Gehry felted that the buildings had to reflect a cultural of law

Also placed one building on an angle to resist the grid scheme of LA

Landscape unfolds as a new urban space

Columns -> colonnades reflect a postmodern troupe But Gehry used them as a legal symbol

Tried to make spaces that looked like a "stage set for a law school"

Ramp into staircase element -> very reminiscent of Le Corbusier

London National Gallery
Beloved building in downtown London

The building was built in the 1830's in Trafalgar Square but was too small

Competition for addition won by Ahrens, Burton, Koralek 1984

Design was for a postmodern architecture

Prince Charles -> called the project "carbunkle in the face of a beloved friend"

He totally sank the project

Introducing Leon Krier
Thought that the classicism was a capable language for extending the national gallery

submited a design that recovered a classical forum like treatment of the space

Venturi Addition
Mirror the classicism of William Wilkins by copying the facade of the national gallery

then then double and redouble the columns until the facade "fades out"

Facade -> just a skin :: reveals its superficiality because of large gaps cut into the bottom of the facade

Charles Jencks -> "common chameleon" changes at rate that is constant

Opening greated with many critiques and concerns

Symmetrical interior spaces

Lit well from above

Prince Charles
Prince Charles-> architecture "abandoned essential traditional principles" "obsession with novelty and constant change"

Charles became very involved/committed to architecture

Founded a school (8 years of global architecture)

Wrote a book Vision of Britain

Outlined a new approach to rescuing architectural design

Leon Kriner
Neoclassicists who became good friends with Prince Charles

Wrote an amazing theoretical text that contrasted postmodernism with historical styles

Theoretical Projects


 * Utopian, neoclassical spaces

Seaside, Florida
Rich hippie inherited a lot of money and wanted to reconsider the way that the urban space can be made.

Vincent Scully -> Outlined the ways in which the American community has been sprawled by the automobile

1982

Set of codes that controlled set back from the street, color palette, architectural elements

Became a popular Florida city

Used in The Truman Show


 * Very postmodern in that the created an even more heightened sense of artificiality