Time for Architecture Time for Architecture: On Modernity, Memory and Time in Architecture and Urban Design By Robert Adam Time for Architecture: On Modernity, Memory and Time in Architecture and Urban Design By Robert Adam This book first published 2020 Cambridge Scholars Publishing Lady Stephenson Library, Newcastle upon Tyne, NE6 2PA, UK British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Copyright © 2020 by Robert Adam All rights for this book reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the copyright owner. ISBN (10): 1-5275-4597-0 ISBN (13): 978-1-5275-4597-7 For Sarah without whose support none of this would have been possible CONTENTS List of Illustrations ................................................................... xi Foreword .................................................................................. 1 Time, Architecture and Urban Design I ................................................................................................ 6 Timeless 1. Timeless Architecture ......................................................... 6 2. Timelessness in Anthropology and Religion.................... 10 3. Timeless Architecture and Religion ................................. 14 4. Proportion and Religion .................................................... 16 5. Proportion and Metaphysics in Architecture ................... 19 6. The Golden Section .......................................................... 24 7. Tradition and the Integration of Time .............................. 32 8. Modernism and the Science of Timelessness ................ 35 9. Presentism and Modernity ............................................... 41 10. From Timeless to Time ..................................................... 44 Endnotes ................................................................................... 45 II .............................................................................................. 50 Recognising Time 1. Time, Space and Architecture .......................................... 50 2. Cosmology, Physics and Time .......................................... 54 3. Time and Experience ........................................................ 58 4. Perceiving Time ................................................................. 61 5. Perceiving Now ................................................................. 64 6. Now and the Future .......................................................... 71 7. Architecture and the Future ............................................. 73 8. Anticipation and Surprise ................................................. 79 9. Architecture, Science Fiction and the Future .................. 84 10. The Future becomes the Past ........................................... 89 Endnotes ................................................................................... 91 viii Contents III ............................................................................................. 97 How Things Change 1. Everything Changes .......................................................... 97 2. How Time Changes ........................................................... 99 3. Change, Economics and Innovation .............................. 102 4. Architecture and Innovation ........................................... 105 5. Post-Modernism, a Case Study in Change .................... 108 The Rise and Fall of the Style ................................... 108 The Post-Modern Rise and Fall in Context ............... 111 6. Variable Rates of Change and their Consequences ..... 115 7. M. R. G. Conzen and Variable Urban Change ............... 122 8. Urban Change and Architecture .................................... 129 9. The Importance of Building Life ..................................... 130 10. Variation in Building Life and Sustainability ................. 134 11. From Change to Modernity ............................................. 143 Endnotes ................................................................................. 143 IV.......................................................................................... 148 Modernity 1. The Significance of Modernity in Contemporary Architecture ........................................................................... 148 2. The Nature of Modernity ................................................ 151 3. The History of Modernity ................................................ 156 Antiquity, the Middle Ages and the Renaissance .... 156 The Enlightenment .................................................... 157 Politics, Science and the Arts in the Nineteenth Century .................................................. 160 The Twentieth Century .............................................. 166 4. Meanings of Modernity ................................................... 167 Simple Modernity ....................................................... 167 Ordinary Modernity .................................................... 170 Modernism ................................................................. 173 Modernism and the Past ........................................... 178 Predictive and Future Modernity .............................. 182 Modernity as the Past ............................................... 188 The Lexicology of Modernity ...................................... 192 5. Positive and Negative Perceptions of Modernity .......... 193 Positive ....................................................................... 195 Time for Architecture ix Negative ..................................................................... 195 Perceptions of Different Modernities ....................... 199 6. The Geography of Modernity .......................................... 200 7. Understanding Modernity ............................................... 206 Endnotes ................................................................................. 209 V........................................................................................... 218 Memory 1. Memory is All We Have ................................................... 218 2. Architecture and Memory ............................................... 219 3. Architecture as the Memory of Others .......................... 226 4. Modernism, Forgetting and Remembering: Post-War Germany, a Case Study .................................................. 230 5. Selective Remembering, History and Building Preservation ......................................................... 234 6. Destroying Buildings as Culture ..................................... 236 7. The Significance of Destruction and Reconstruction ... 241 8. Memory and History ....................................................... 247 9. Reconstruction and Authenticity .................................... 248 10. Memory and Authenticity ............................................... 250 10. The Fallibility of History .................................................. 254 11. Heritage and Community ............................................... 255 12. Community and Collective Memory ............................... 261 13. The Paradox of Tradition and Modernity ....................... 269 14. Tradition and Custom ..................................................... 271 15. Case Studies of Tradition and Culture .......................... 275 Archaeology ................................................................ 275 Primatology ................................................................ 278 The Cultural Memory of the Group ........................... 282 16. Dual Inheritance Theory ................................................. 282 17. Tradition and Group Identity .......................................... 286 18. Reconsidering Enlightenment Attitudes to Tradition .... 294 19. Tradition in a Modern Context ....................................... 296 20. Whose Tradition? Tradition in Architecture and Urban Design ................................................................. 314 Endnotes ................................................................................. 323 x Contents Afterword ............................................................................ 335 Index .................................................................................... 341 ILLUSTRATIONS I Timeless 1. Denver Public Library, Michael Graves, 1990 Creative Commons, photo David Basulto 2. Porta Fira Hotel, Barcelona. Toyo Ito, 2010. Creative Commons, photo Zarateman 3. The Egyptian god Anubis weighing the heart of the deceased. 4. The ideal Gothic city, Augustus Welby Pugin, 1813. 5. The Platonic solids. 6. The Vitruvian Man by Leonardo da Vinci, 1490. 7. Plan of the choir of St Denis, France, 1144 8. The five classical Orders, Sebastiano Serlio, 1537–75. 9. The setting out of Golden Rectangle (a) and spiral (b) from Golden Rectangle. 10. Modulor Man from Le Corbusier, based on the Golden Rectangle. Creative Commons, image Malo Thor 11. Golden Section and 3:5 rectangle compared. 12. Illustration of the Parthenon by Adolf Zeising, 1854. 13. Chiesa del Santo Sepolcro, Pisa twelfth century. Creative Commons, photo Luca Aless 14. Renault Centre, Swindon, England, Norman Foster, 982. Creative Commons, photo Brian Robert Marshall 15. 15. Moorcrag, Windermere, Cumbria , England, C.F.A Voysey, 1899 16. Cherrylands,