Barnabas Calder

A groundbreaking history of architecture told through the relationship between buildings and energy The story of architecture is the story of humanity. The buildings we live in, from the humblest pre-historic huts to today's skyscrapers, reveal our priorities and ambitions, our family structures and power structures. And to an extent never explored until now, architecture has been shaped in every era by our access to energy, from fire to farming to fossil fuels. In this ground-breaking history of world architecture, Barnabas Calder takes us on a dazzling tour of some of the most astonishing buildings of the past fifteen thousand years, from Uruk, via Ancient Rome and Victorian Liverpool, to China's booming megacities. He reveals how every building - from the Parthenon to the Great Mosque of Damascus to a typical Georgian house - was influenced by the energy available to its architects, and why this matters. Today architecture consumes so much energy that 40% of the world's greenhouse gas emissions come from the construction and running of buildings. If we are to avoid catastrophic climate change then now, more than ever, we need beautiful but also intelligent architecture, and to retrofit - not demolish - the buildings we already have.

From Prehistory to Climate Emergency

Architecture

Reducing energy use is the single biggest challenge facing architecture today. From the humblest prehistoric hut to the imposing monuments of Rome or Egypt to super-connected modern airports, buildings in every era and place have been shaped by the energy available for their construction and running. This utterly original and compelling survey tells the story of our buildings, from our hunter-gatherer origins to the age of fossil-fuel dependence, and shows how architecture has been influenced by designers, builders and societies adapting to changing energy contexts. Architecture and Energy is a fascinating celebration of human ingenuity and creativity, and a timely reminder of the scale of the task ahead in our search for truly sustainable architecture.

From Pre-History to Climate Crisis

Architecture and Energy

The Beauty of Brutalism

Raw Concrete

Story of Architecture

'Brilliant' Elain Harwood 'Part history, part aesthetic autobiography, wholly engaging and liable to convince those procrastinators sitting (uncomfortably) on the concrete fence' Jonathan Meades 'A learned and passionate book' Simon Bradley, author of The Railways 'A compelling and evocative read, meticulously researched, and filled with insight and passion' Kate Goodwin, Head of Architecture, Royal Academy of Arts The raw concrete buildings of the 1960s constitute the greatest flowering of architecture the world has ever seen. The biggest construction boom in history promoted unprecedented technological innovation and an explosion of competitive creativity amongst architects, engineers and concrete-workers. The Brutalist style was the result. Today, after several decades in the shadows, attitudes towards Brutalism are slowly changing, but it is a movement that is still overlooked, and grossly underrated. Raw Concrete overturns the perception of Brutalist buildings as the penny-pinching, utilitarian products of dutiful social concern. Instead it looks a little closer, uncovering the luxuriously skilled craft and daring engineering with which the best buildings of the 1960s came into being: magnificent architectural visions serving clients rich and poor, radical and conservative. Beginning in a tiny hermitage on the remote north Scottish coast, and ending up backstage at the National Theatre, Raw Concrete embarks on a wide-ranging journey through Britain over the past sixty years, stopping to examine how eight extraordinary buildings were made - from commission to construction - why they have been so vilified, and why they are beginning to be loved. In it, Barnabas Calder puts forward a powerful case: Brutalism is the best architecture there has ever been, and perhaps the best there ever will be.

Barnabas Calder

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