Buildings Without Architects: A Global Guide to Everyday Architecture

Author: John May (Consultant Editor Anthony Reid)
Year: 2010 (Rizzoli)
Source type: book
Raw file: raw/books/may-reid-2010-buildings-without-architects.md

Summary

A global reference on vernacular building — from adobe pueblos and Hebridean black houses to Mongolian gers, trulli, and squatter settlements — documenting "the diverse methods people have used to create shelter from locally available natural materials." The everyday architecture featured is "a rapidly disappearing genre of handcrafted and beautifully composed structures that are irretrievably 'of their place'" — the work of "unsung and often anonymous builders" combining "artistic beauty, practical form, and necessity." It includes a "Modern Vernacular Architecture" section on squatter settlements, earthships, bottle buildings, and vernacular revivals.

Key Claims

• Vernacular as the architecture of the people: following Paul Oliver, vernacular architecture is "the dwellings and all other buildings of the people," owner- or community-built, "utilizing traditional technologies," accommodating "the values, economies, and ways of life of the cultures that produced them." "Eighty percent or more" of the world's estimated billion-plus buildings are vernacular; "the vast majority of people in the world live in homes ... they and their friends and family have built themselves."
• Built "of their place": the architecture is defined by local materials (wood, stone, earth/clay, poles/thatch, bamboo, reed, recycled materials, snow), the region's geology and ecology, and local climate — "irretrievably 'of their place.'" It is a "window on the lives and traditions" of ordinary people.
• Against modernist "machines for living": Reid criticizes high-density, high-rise housing and the "notion that houses should be 'machines for living'"; vernacular building offers sustainable, human-scale solutions that "engender a profound connection between the builders, their environment, the materials used, and the wider community."
• New vernacular architecture: "The rush to modernization" and urbanization mean squatter settlements (Caracas, Dharavi) constructed "from waste and scrap" are "the new vernacular architecture of our time"; earthships, bottle buildings, and "Natural Building" continue traditions of using local/recycled materials.
• Sustainability message: "vernacular architecture is an important global issue for our time"; since cement production emits CO2, architects and aid organizations "are looking at vernacular architecture to learn how to build using local materials and live lightly on the earth."

Connections

Concepts: Everyday Architecture · Flat Ontology · Authorship · Dwelling
Authors: John May & Anthony Reid
Debates: Genius vs. Bureaucracy
Related source notes: Making New Connections in Vernacular Architecture (Groth) · Between Traditionalism and Modernism (Mann)

Direct Quotes

"[T]he everyday architecture featured here represents a rapidly disappearing genre of handcrafted and beautifully composed structures that are irretrievably 'of their place.'"

"These are the dwellings and all other buildings of the people ... owner- or community-built, utilizing traditional technologies." (Paul Oliver's definition, as quoted)

"The vast majority of people in the world live in homes and use buildings that they and their friends and family have built themselves."

"[S]quatter settlements ... constitute the new vernacular architecture of our time."

Open Questions

• Does celebrating "buildings without architects" risk romanticizing scarcity and displacement, or does it productively challenge the professional/architectural canon (flat ontology) and modernism's failures?