German architecture prior to the modern period has received less systemic, analytical study than that of Italy, France, and Britain. Scholarly discussion of broad traditions or continuities within Germanic or Central European façade design is even sparser. Baroque era studies of the region mostly devote themselves to isolated architects, monuments, or movements. Modernism's advent decisively changed this: Germanic architecture enjoyed sudden ascendancy. Yet, even so, study specifically of that region's façades still lagged – nothing compares to the dozens of treatments of Le Corbusier's façade systems, for example, and how these juxtapose with French neoclassical or Italian Renaissance methods. Given the paucity of multi-period studies, one can be forgiven for believing Germany's effervescence of radical, modern works seems unprecedented. This book takes up these multiple quandaries. It identifies and documents a previously unrecognized compositional tradition - characterized here as the 'screen façade' – and posits it as a counter-narrative critiquing the essentialist, 'authentic' canon currently dominant in Western architectural history. By crossing evenly over the dividing line between the historical and modern periods, it offers valuable insights on indigenous roots underlying some aspects of Germany's invigorating early twentieth-century architectural developments. The book chronologically examines 400 years of closely related facades, concentrated in Germany but also found in Austria, the Czech Republic, German-speaking Switzerland, and nearby areas of Central Europe. While nearly 75 buildings are mentioned and illustrated, a dozen are given extensive analysis and the book focuses on the works of three architects – Schinkel, Behrens and Mies. Relationships between examples of these three architects' façades far transcend mere homage amongst masters. Glimmers of the system they eventually codify are apparent as early as at Heidelberg Castle in 1559 and Nürnberg's Rathaus in 1622. The book argues that in Germany, northern Gothic affinities for bisection, intense repetition and rote aggregation intersected with southern Classical affinities for symmetry, hierarchy and centrality, thereby spawning a unique hybrid product – the screen. Instead of graphic formality, this study is guided by on-site perceptions, propositional contrasts, means of approach, interpretive conflicts and emotion and it relates the design of these façades to concepts proposed by contemporary philosophers including Novalis, Hegel, Nietzsche, Freud, Adorno, and, most importantly, Gadamer on hermeneutics.

This book attempts to redress this issue by providing an overview of the recent developments in this field thereby providing a basis for the understanding of the structural performance and design of glass in buildings. Each chapter draws on the latest developments in practice and research and contains contributions from various international glass experts. The mix of general and specialist content ranging from rules of thumb to fracture mechanics and novel applications to post-breakage performance make this book useful to practitioners and researchers. Furthermore, the text is supplemented by tables of the major codes of practice and by an extensive list of references.

Hubsch's argument that the technical progress and changed living habits of the nineteenth century rendered neoclassical principles antiquated is presented here along with responses to his essay by architects, historians, and critics over two decades.

This fascinating sourcebook presents the most remarkable, beautiful, and innovative building façades in contemporary architecture. A building's façade sets the aesthetic tone for its entire design while serving a variety of functions, from regulating light and protecting against the elements to providing insulation for temperature and sound. This absorbing book details hundreds of examples of interesting and progressive façades from around the world. Presented in colorful double-page spreads, each façade is photographed from different angles and includes engaging texts that describe their significance. Readers can learn how traditional mashrabiyas in Abu Dhabi are being engineered to respond to light and to regulate heat, how a hospital in Mexico City has been constructed with "smog-eating" tiles, and how a "bio-adaptive" façade in Germany uses algae to generate energy and provide shade. Informative and accessible, this compendium is a highly useful resource for architects, engineers, and designers.

A shift in the architecture industry’s focus in the last 20 years toward ecological concerns, long-term value, and user comfort has coincided with significant new developments in digital controls, actuators, shading typologies, building physics simulation capability, and material performance. This collision has afforded architects an expanded set of opportunities to create architecture that can respond directly to environmental conditions, resulting in innovative façade designs that quickly become landmarks for their cities. Authors Russell Fortmeyer and Charles Linn trace the historical development of active façades in modern architecture, and reveal how contemporary architects and consultants design and test these systems.

Facades - they are the first feature of a building to be noticed, they determine its distinctive appearance and are often the subject of controversial debate. This new first edition of the Facade Construction Manual provides a systematic survey of contemporary expertise in the application of new materials and energy- efficient technologies in facade design, and represents an invaluable addition to our series of Construction Manuals. It surveys the facade design requirements made by various types of buildings, as well as the most important materials, from natural stone through to synthetics, and documents a diversity of construction forms for a wide range of building types. Over 100 international case-studies in large-scale, detailed drawings are presented in the comprehensive project section.

In 1896, Otto Wagner's "Modern Architecture" shocked the European architectural community with its impassioned plea for an end to eclecticism and for a "modern" style suited to contemporary needs and ideals, utilizing the nascent constructional technologies and materials. Through the combined forces of his polemical, pedagogical, and professional efforts, this determined, newly appointed professor at the Vienna Academy of Fine Arts emerged in the late 1890s - along with such contemporaries as Charles Rennie Mackintosh in Glasgow and Louis Sullivan in Chicago - as one of the leaders of the revolution soon to be identified as the "Modern Movement." Wagner's historic manifesto is now presented in a new English translation - the first in almost ninety years - based on the expanded 1902 text and noting emendations made to the 1896, 1898, and 1914 editions. In his introduction, Dr. Harry Mallgrave examines Wagner's tract against the backdrop of nineteenth-century theory, critically exploring the affinities of Wagner's revolutionary élan with the German eclectic debate of the 1840s, the materialistic tendencies of the 1870s and 1880s, and the emerging cultural ideology of modernity. Modern Architecture is one of those rare works in the literature of architecture that not only proclaimed the dawning of a new era, but also perspicaciously and cogently shaped the issues and the course of its development; it defined less the personal aspirations of one individual and more the collective hopes and dreams of a generation facing the sanguine promise of a new century