Thinkers for Architects
About the Book Series
Architects have often looked to thinkers in philosophy and theory to find design ideas or in search of a critical framework for practice. Yet architects, and students of architecture, can struggle to navigate thinkers’ writings. It can be daunting to approach original texts with little appreciation of their contexts. And existing introductions seldom explore architectural material in any detail.
This original series offers clear, quick and accurate introductions to key thinkers who have written about architecture. Each book summarises what a thinker has to offer for architects. It locates their architectural thinking in the body of their work, introduces significant books and essays, helps decode terms and provides quick reference for further reading. If you find philosophical and theoretical writing about architecture difficult, or just don’t know where to begin, this series will be indispensable.
Books in the Thinkers for Architects series come out of architecture. They pursue architectural modes of understanding, aiming to introduce a thinker to an architectural audience. Each author in the series – an architect or an architectural critic – has focussed on a selection of a thinker’s writings which they judge most relevant to designers and interpreters of architecture. Thinkers for Architects has proved highly successful, now with over ten volumes dealing with familiar cultural figures whose writings have influenced architectural designers, critics and commentators in distinctive and important ways. The series continues to expand, addressing an increasingly rich diversity of contemporary thinkers who have something to say to architects.
Gadamer for Architects
1st Edition
By Paul Kidder
December 14, 2012
Providing a concise and accessible introduction to the work of the celebrated twentieth century German philosopher, Hans-Georg Gadamer, this book focuses on the aspects of Gadamer’s philosophy that have been the most influential among architects, educators in architecture, and architectural ...
Derrida for Architects
1st Edition
By Richard Coyne
April 28, 2011
Looking afresh at the implications of Jacques Derrida’s thinking for architecture, this book simplifies his ideas in a clear, concise way. Derrida‘s treatment of key philosophical texts has been labelled as "deconstruction," a term that resonates with architecture. Although his main focus is ...
Benjamin for Architects
1st Edition
By Brian Elliott
January 12, 2011
Walter Benjamin has become a decisive reference point for a whole range of critical disciplines, as he constructed a unique and provocative synthesis of aesthetics, politics and philosophy. Examining Benjamin’s contributions to cultural criticism in relation to the works of Max Ernst, Adolf Loos, ...
Bourdieu for Architects
1st Edition
By Helena Webster
August 18, 2010
Pierre Bourdieu is arguably one of the twentieth century’s greatest socio-philosophical thinkers and his writings have much to offer anyone interested in the ways that people value, consume and produce architecture. Bourdieu spent much of his life attempting to understand cultural consumption and ...
Bhabha for Architects
1st Edition
By Felipe Hernandez
March 02, 2010
The work of Homi K. Bhabha has permeated into numerous publications which use postcolonial discourse as a means to analyze architectural practices in previously colonized contexts, particularly in Africa, Asia, the Middle-East, South-East Asia and, Latin America. Bhabha's use of the concept of...
Irigaray for Architects
1st Edition
By Peg Rawes
December 07, 2007
Specifically for architects, the third title in the Thinkers for Architects series examines the relevance of Luce Irigaray’s work for architecture. Eight thematic chapters explore the bodily, spatio-temporal, political and cultural value of her ideas for making, discussing and experiencing ...
Heidegger for Architects
1st Edition
By Adam Sharr
November 19, 2007
Informing the designs of architects as diverse as Peter Zumthor, Steven Holl, Hans Scharoun and Colin St. John Wilson, the work of Martin Heidegger has proved of great interest to architects and architectural theorists. The first introduction to Heidegger’s philosophy written specifically for ...
Deleuze & Guattari for Architects
1st Edition
By Andrew Ballantyne
November 16, 2007
The work of Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari has been inspirational for architects and architectural theorists in recent years. It has influenced the design work of architects as diverse as Greg Lynn and David Chipperfield, and is regularly cited by avant-gardist architects and by students, but ...