dis[PLACE]ment architecture

First blog.

Since the concept of the Garden City is what I am currently researching for my Architecture of the City course, it's going to become the topic of my first post here.

While his 1898 text "To-Morrow: A Peaceful Path to Real Reform" is anything but contemporary, pieces of Ebenezer Howard's Garden City concept is clearly visible in Safde's "Every Man a Garden" ideal, Israeli kibbutzes and even in the kitschy "Neo-Trad" communities popping up everwhere today.

It's interesting to see how closely Howard's Garden City movement is intertwined with the political, societal, and economic ideologies of the time, including socialism and temperence. While Howard himself was not an architect, he had a number of architects as his followers. It raises the question of whether contemporary architects should find themselves and their design logics allied with a greater ideology, or remain in a more detatched and objective position.

posted by clintor @ 4:09 PM