Concrete vs. Character: The Battle for Architectural Beauty
Have you ever walked through many different suburbs and thought, “Wow, these all look very similar”?
But if beautiful architecture reflects a community’s shared identity, then this is some pretty ugly stuff because there’s no way all these neighborhoods have the exact same identity.
That’s right, we are talking about architectural beauty and how America’s housing plans have killed it. But let’s not get confused. When I say beauty, I don’t mean what most of us instinctively think of. I’m not rating the visual appeal of American houses nor am I saying one style is objectively more pleasant to look at than another. Architectural beauty has to do with reflecting community identity.
Modernist architecture
The emergence and rise of modernist architecture has dramatically impacted the way American structures are designed and constructed. Above all, it emphasizes function; the form is to serve its functional purposes. As such, modernist architecture is known for a minimalist aesthetic including simple linear elements, neutral color palettes, and little to no ornamentation. Heavily inspired by the emergence of scientific management, modernism also advocates for standardization and efficiency, championing the capacity of rational planning to produce the “one best way” of building.
Metal, concrete, glass, and steel became the primary construction materials since man-made materials could be prefabricated and were more durable than natural materials such as limestone and brick.
As Professor Wendy Steiner puts it, “… modernism advocated purity and mono-functionality, attempting to manage disjunction and diversity either by suppressing or vilifying them.”
History
In a paper by Mauro Guillén, he discusses the correlation between a country’s speed of industrialization and their adoption of modernist architecture. According to the paper, after World War I, Britain, the United States, and Spain experienced quick industrialization, which included the adoption of assembly line practices, mass production, and a large growth of manufacturing companies. At the same time, they saw a Gothic revival in their architecture.
In contrast, countries like Germany, Russia, and Italy experienced slower industrialization and a huge rise in modernism. It seems that in societies drastically impacted by industrialization, modernism became clumped into the overall industrial movement, whereas slower industrialization allowed modernist architecture to evolve independently.
Thus, European modernist architects wanted to make scientific management beautiful by reinterpreting it in aesthetic terms. By contrast, in America, modernism did not get this unconstrained development as art. It was more of a tool to serve mass production. Therefore, while there has been a general loss of architectural beauty in the West, America has experienced it more intensely.
When we talk about modernism, we are referring to the rationalized version of it that developed in America. After the Second World War, housing became one of the main social problems of the decade. In industrialized nations, urban cities were utterly unprepared for the mass influxes of citizens that migrated to cities, as well as the post-war baby boom, creating overcrowded and poor hygienic conditions.
It was then that modernist architectural planning exploded in popularity as a proposed solution to the housing crisis. The modernists believed that they could design the best functioning, most efficient neighborhood and reproduce this blueprint by the masses, aided by the era’s improving technology and standardized labor practices — they had faith in a “one size fits all” solution.
Initially, most modernist projects were successful. However, over time, many household types other than “standard nuclear families” emerged. This increase in the diversity of living styles was something the uniformity and repetition of modernist architecture could not address. It could not foster solidarity in communities because residents saw none of their connected identity reflected back by their neighborhood structures. Herein lies the loss of beautiful architecture.
What is architectural beauty?
Beauty is a subjective term, dependent on various factors such as culture, geographical location, and time period. However, according to Glenn Parsons’ work “Beauty and Public Policy,” beauty produces a feeling of perfection in its particular context. This feeling of perfection is not necessarily the traditional sense of perfection; great artists often break the rules of their genre or art form, producing works that are imperfect instances of their kind. Despite this, they can still be very beautiful.
When it comes to architectural beauty specifically, this means that the architecture accurately reflects the identity of the community it represents, such that it feels perfect. The community’s identity is a unified expression of a set of material, biological, psychological, and/or cultural signs that differentiate groups, individuals, or cultures from one another. Since architecture is linked to these things, it is a conveyor of a community’s identity.
Different cultures have different design systems, which is why the spatial organization of schools, houses, markets, and bathrooms greatly differ between Persian and American architecture. Building materials also play a crucial role in reflecting certain values; for example, gold and marble represent wealth and polish, whereas wood exudes natural and warm characteristics. Moreover, architecture relies on context. A building’s meaning is understood in relation to its surrounding space, and if it is relocated to a different city, it will lose its definition.
Architectural beauty is not just about the visual appeal of a building; it is about reflecting the community’s identity. A Gothic cathedral’s combination of space and light is beautiful because it evokes religious awe, but the same Gothic style in a courtroom comes off as awkward because courtrooms are meant to be serious and procedural rather than spiritually inspiring.
Of course, individuals can still disagree on what design is best suited for a given purpose, but collectively, neighborhoods retain a shared imaginative “community.” How perfectly architecture captures the identity of this shared community is the architectural beauty we are talking about.
What I mean by identity here is a unified expression of a set of material, biological, psychological, and/or cultural signs that differentiate groups, individuals, or cultures from one another. Since architecture is linked to these things, it conveys the community’s identity.
For instance, architect Amos Rapoport writes about how different cultures have very different design systems. This is why the spatial organization of schools, houses, markets, and bathrooms greatly differ between Persian and American architecture.
Building materials also play a crucial role in reflecting certain values. For example, gold and marble represent wealth and polish, whereas wood exudes natural and warm characteristics.
Moreover, architecture relies on context. The meaning of Persepolis is understood in relation to its surrounding space, and if it is relocated to a different city, such as Tokyo, it will lose its definition.
What I mean by identity here is a unified expression of a set of material, biological, psychological, and/or cultural signs that differentiate groups, individuals, or cultures from one another. Since architecture is linked to these things, it conveys the community’s identity.
For instance, architect Amos Rapoport writes about how different cultures have very different design systems. This is why the spatial organization of schools, houses, markets, and bathrooms greatly differ between Persian and American architecture.
Building materials also play a crucial role in reflecting certain values. For example, gold and marble represent wealth and polish, whereas wood exudes natural and warm characteristics.
Moreover, architecture relies on context. The meaning of Persepolis is understood in relation to its surrounding space, and if it is relocated to a different city, such as Tokyo, it will lose its definition.
So, in this article, “architectural beauty” or “beautiful architecture” is defined as architecture that accurately reflects the identity of the community it represents, making it feel perfect.
The rationalization of society
In his essay “The McDonaldization of Society,” G. Ritzer describes the rationalization of society — i.e., a society that emphasizes efficiency, predictability, calculability, the substitution of non-human for human technology, and control over uncertainty.
Under this framework, architectural beauty is negatively affected by the increasing and continuous emphasis on rationalization, which largely explains America’s homogenous planned housing developments.
Given that efficiency prioritizes function and speed, modern architecture follows suit with its motto “form follows function”. “The American architect Louis Sullivan expressed the credo of the modernists when he said that form follows function. In other words, stop thinking about the way a building looks, and think instead about what it does.”
Modernism aims to create standardized housing developments that can be pre-planned, applied universally, and demolished when deemed useless. Although this creates easier, functional designs that can be built quickly, rational modernism’s globalizing tendencies portray indigenous and non-modern architecture as ‘bad’ and modern rational architecture as the only good.
Remember, modernist rational architecture believed there is one best way of building. However, obviously, communities vary in their history, culture, and values, and so it is impossible to rationally develop a housing blueprint that perfectly captures the essence of all communities; its capacity to be architecturally beautiful is limited.
When individuals are surrounded by architecture that poorly reflects their community identity, individuals actually internalize the negative emotions evoked by the external ugliness, resulting in higher rates of dissatisfaction, depression, and boredom. This shouldn’t come off as too surprising, considering we know that our external environment and its appearance have a considerable impact on the way we feel inside.
“This building is boarded up because nobody has a use for it. Nobody has a use for it because nobody wants to be in it. Nobody wants to be in it because it’s so damn ugly.”
Calculability exacerbates the disregard for architectural beauty by focusing on how many buildings can be built rather than how beautiful the buildings are, evident in many rational projects such as Gropius, May, and Le Corbusier’s. They wrote papers on the “minimum existence housing unit”. The minimum existence housing unit was the smallest possible apartment that an average family could comfortably inhabit. The three architects measured success by the number of houses they could fit into a neighborhood rather than the architecture’s connection with community identity.
Moreover, as architectural designs become increasingly simple and repeatable, non-human technology holds a greater presence, where computers are able to copy past designs and create new similar ones. Model-based software development has grown in popularity because it has a library full of source models, reusable components, and transformation rules that allow it to engage in automatic processes of design. Consequently, the creative touch of individual architects is fading.
Despite these harms of a rationalized society, Ritzer says it is still preferable to the pre-rationalized way of life, and I probably agree. After WWII, the mass rationalization of America’s planned housing developments no doubt lifted millions of citizens out of poverty, improved hygienic conditions, and largely solved overcrowding. It was very important to construct as many functional houses as possible — who cares if they all looked the same and had no connection to the local residents?
Thus, rather than force all architects to revert to the pre-modern era, perhaps we should have ways to control rationalization, such as having the state subsidize urban planning corporations and architectural firms that produce architecturally beautiful planned housing developments. This creates a rational incentive — namely, lower costs — for beauty.
Or post-secondary architecture programs could mandate students to take a neuroaesthetics course so that architecture students recognize the importance of considering beauty along with function. We could also support architectural conservation organizations that aim to preserve beautiful buildings and protect them from being demolished.
In the British governments’ National Planning Policy Framework last year, they proposed putting a greater concentration on designing neighborhoods based on local residents’ wishes. Local councils should be asked to formulate their own, unique “local design code” as an outline for design standards that architects and planners must adapt to meet or else their designs will not be approved. I think this can be seen as a preventive measure towards extreme calculability where urban planners just try to build as many buildings as possible.
Moreover, to protect against rationalization’s frequent demolition practices, the government is urging communities to nominate historically or culturally significant architectural structures to their council’s local heritage list for preservation. Now, whether this proposal has been actually working, I am not sure. If there are any Brits reading who have knowledge about this, let me know.
Government’s Role
Now that’s great and all, we care about architectural beauty, yay! But why is it the government’s responsibility to help spread architectural beauty if it’s not an essential good?
The basic needs theory asserts that state provision is justified when distributing basic necessities such as food, shelter, and healthcare. However, it doesn’t go deeper than necessities. Which leaves us wondering: the government should supply basic goods to live, but what should they supply to live well?
The theory has a neutral stance on our understanding of the good life, making it useless for discussing the supply of discretionary goods. These are goods that may not be necessities, but are still extremely valuable, such as music or art.
The democracy theory tries to fill in this gap by saying that if the state is remaining neutral about what is good, then their supply of discretionary goods should be determined by the majority.
In Kohn’s Public Goods and Social Justice, she explores the state provision of discretionary public goods; these are public goods that are not absolutely essential. These are collective consumption goods that the state provides even though they are not preferred or enjoyed by everyone. Think of it as if the government funded high-brow culture like opera or classical music but not other genres. We can all still collectively consume opera and classical music, but Mozart’s Requiem may not be everyone’s cup of tea. Or worse, it disrupts the aesthetic of your obscurely titled soft indie playlist!
Kohn presents three existing accounts for when the state should step in to help distribute public goods: market failure, basic needs, and democracy. Market failure is when the market distribution of public goods creates free riding which is when people want to get benefits without contributing, like that annoying person in group projects who receives an A for doing nothing. This causes highly beneficial goods to be under-produced.
While the classic type of market failure is absent in private recreational spaces such as health clubs and private parks, they still experience market failure, but at a different time. Kohn focuses on parks to discuss how gated private parks lose public parks’ ability to force people to run up against a broad variety of people in society. In private parks, you can only bump into other people that live super close by, whereas in public parks, anyone from anywhere can come.
In this situation, market failure is also the “inability to provide a collective, inclusive, and diverse place of encounter”. The issue with this, though, is that it excludes minority preferences. It also fails to consider that perhaps there are some discretionary goods that are just, by principle, intrinsically valuable but under-produced in the free market. Ahem, quality education.
So maybe we think it is the responsibility of the government to subsidize those goods, no matter what the majority votes.
Margaret Kohn’s Solidarism Theory
This is why I think Kohn’s solidarism theory is strong. It takes these non-essential but still highly valuable goods and says the government ought to provide them for the public. It is not a choice but an obligation.
You see, modern society is very interdependent due to the division of labor, resulting in social products rather than individual ones. Just think about the chair that I have. It was not made by one or two craftsmen; it was made by shipping materials from China to Britain, building the base in Britain, and then shipping that off to like Italy where the paint is applied, then that is sent to Japan for the leather — I hope you know I’m spitting out random countries right now, I have no clue what the actual process of this chair was. Even the value of land is not just based on this independent plot of land. It includes its proximity to markets, infrastructure, transit, schools… the land may be owned privately but its value is produced socially.
Public spaces are crucial to creating awareness of our interdependence. Although some people care more about, say, using a public park than others, they still indirectly relate to one another in the sharing of public space, forming an “imagined community.” We feel a sense of solidarity with people connected by access to this public space. But when all planned housing developments look like rows of closed-off drab boxes, it is much harder for residents to feel any special ties to the people around them.
Can rationalization be compatible with architectural beauty?
Some may argue that rationalization and architectural beauty are not completely incompatible. The shared imaginative community that public space creates comes from its publicness but not its beauty — whether a public park has swings, a basketball court, or a garden does not interfere with the fact that the park functions as an open public space for people to walk through and spend time in. Teenagers will still go to their community’s park to meet with their friends even if it looks the same as all other parks. It is the people themselves that enable parks to reflect community identity and make architecture beautiful.
However, I think the beauty of a public space can have important implications on how good the solidarity is. In neighborhoods, residents are forced to observe its architecture anytime they step out the door. Ones that beautifully capture community identity act as a constant reminder of solidarity. It visually exemplifies the local community’s indirect connectivity with each other whereas architecturally ugly design alienates.
Plus, if public spaces are supposed to create awareness of interdependence, then why do only rich neighborhoods get beautiful architecture? Rich people are also very dependent on the labor of those who live in planned housing developments and less wealthy suburbs. In this sense, the higher socioeconomic classes have a “quasi-contractual debt to society” which they can repay by making discretionary goods like architectural beauty public.
The trade-off between beauty and efficiency
Now don’t get me wrong, beauty is not the most important thing. Having a place to live is the top priority. However, I do believe there’s a trade-off when it comes to housing development. When planners focus on making neighborhoods beautiful, it will undoubtedly slow down the process of building those neighborhoods.
Since shelter is a basic necessity, it should be prioritized over architectural beauty, which is a non-essential good. While rationalization may reduce the qualitative effectiveness of solidarity, the efficient spread of housing developments does create more opportunities for solidarity to occur.
However, it’s been over half a century since the post-war housing crisis, and present-day America no longer has an extreme shortage of housing. While there’s still a shortage of affordable housing, it’s not to the same extent as the 1940s and 50s. This provides an opportunity to mend the damage that rational architecture has done to architectural beauty.
Firstly, in capitalist America, beautiful architecture is underproduced by the free market. It takes more time and effort and may not use the most cost-effective methods. As a result, the wealthy tend to reside in expensive and beautiful housing developments, creating a disproportionate ability to access them.
But architectural beauty is a valuable discretionary good that shouldn’t require a huge financial investment to access. Due to society’s interdependence, the wealthy have an obligation to help make architectural beauty a public good.
What about interior design?
Now, the rational modernist may say, “No need! Those people that complain about ugly neighborhoods can work on beautiful interior design instead!” However, this simply transforms architectural beauty into a private good, defeating the purpose of increasing the accessibility of goods for less affluent communities. Interior design is exclusive only to whoever is able to enter that building. Hence, at large, interior design’s purpose is to reflect the identity of individual residents, not the community.
Comparatively, the exterior of architecture is observed by all and it must coordinate with the appearance of other neighborhood structures, making each building a contributor to community identity. Our conversation ends, then, with this: the state is justified in subsidizing planned housing projects that consider architectural beauty with a particular emphasis on projects for less-affluent communities.
I acknowledge that the government may be questionable as a primary funder. Nazi and Soviet communist leadership have both utilized architecture for political means by selectively conserving monuments that send certain political messages or arranging public spaces in a way that allows for easy surveillance. So, it is important to think about accountability measures that can prevent current governments from subsidizing developments they deem beautiful.
It’s clear that the exterior of architecture is just as important as the interior. It’s not enough for buildings to be functional and efficient; they must also reflect the community’s identity. And this can only be achieved by prioritizing architectural beauty in all planned housing projects.
The state has a responsibility to ensure that all communities have access to beautiful, well-designed housing. By subsidizing projects for less-affluent communities, the government can make sure that even those who may not have the means to hire an interior designer can still live in a home that reflects their community’s identity.
Of course, there are concerns about government overreach and the potential for abuse. But with proper accountability measures in place, we can ensure that government-funded projects are focused on the greater good, rather than political agendas. The future of our neighborhoods depends on it.
Closing Remark
Now that you have made it to the end of this convoluted article, I want to leave you off with a quote from architect Gropius:
“The assumption that the industrialization of housing construction entails a decline in aesthetic values is erroneous. On the contrary, the standardization of structural elements will have the wholesome result of lending a common character to new residential buildings and neighborhoods…Well-manufactured materials and clear, simple design of these mass-produced elements will guarantee the unified ‘beauty’ of the resulting buildings”.
If architectural beauty is to reflect a community’s identity as perfectly as possible, then perhaps rationalized architecture can indeed be beautiful when the purpose is to be machine-like, such as a community of factory workers. But whether modernists are able to guarantee beauty in planned housing developments is quite a different story.
Thank you for reading.
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