This highly acclaimed book, now available for the first time in the United States in simultaneous paperback and hardcover editions, is particularly valuable for its unique approach to architectural history: The author explores structures not as separate, neatly labeled museum pieces but as part of a vital, living continuity through the ages. Beginning with the classical origins of Western architecture and coming right up to the new millennium, the book discusses every major milestone in the development of Western architecture in probing detail. Features of the revised edition include expanded chapters on Mesopotamian and Egyptian architecture, made possible by important recent archeological findings; and urban planning sections added throughout the book. The latter will be of special value to the growing numbers of readers who take an active interest in the relationship between a city’s buildings and the community residents who live and work in them.

Preface p. 6 1 Mesopotamia and Egypt p. 9 Mesopotamia p. 9 Egypt p. 13 2 The Classical Foundation: Greek, Hellenistic, Roman p. 19 The Bronze Age Heritage p. 19 The Hellenistic Background p. 41 The Rise of Rome p. 57 3 Early Christian and Byzantine p. 89 4 Carolingian and Romanesque p. 107 5 The Gothic Experiment p. 149 France p. 150 England p. 168 Germany and Central Europe, Belgium, Italy, Spain, Portugal p. 185 Town Planning p. 207 6 Renaissance Harmony p. 211 The Birth of the Renaissance p. 211 High Renaissance p. 223 The Renaissance Outside Italy p. 251 Town Planning p. 279 7 Baroque Expansion p. 283 Italy p. 283 Baroque Outside Italy p. 314 Town Planning p. 362 8 Eighteenth-Century Classicism p. 369 The Impact of Rome p. 369 The Rise of Neo-Classicism in France p. 391 The Classical Tradition Elsewhere in Europe p. 410 The Rise of Classicism in the USA p. 424 Town Planning p. 434 9 The Nineteenth Century p. 439 France p. 439 Britain p. 459 Germany, Austria and Italy p. 477 Scandinavia, Russia and Greece p. 497 Belgium and Holland p. 509 USA p. 512 Town Planning p. 530 10 Art Nouveau p. 537 Belgium and France p. 537 Scotland and England p. 543 Germany, Austria and Italy p. 546 Spain p. 556 11 The Twentieth Century p. 565 USA Up to 1939 p. 565 Europe Up to 1939 p. 582 Modernism After 1945 p. 648 Post-Modernism p. 660 Town Planning p. 668 Architecture for the Millennium p. 670 Glossary p. 685 Further Reading p. 688 Acknowledgements p. 693 Index p. 694.

Sir Christopher Wren - Classical Greek - Roman Empire - Byzantine - Renaissance - Mannerist - Baroque - 19th century - Modern Architecture - Filippo Brunelleschi - Baldassare Peruzzi - Paris - London.

"What makes a city endure and prosper? In this masterful survey of a thousand years of urban architecture, Wolfgang Braunfels identifies certain themes common to cities as different as Siena and London, Munich and Venice ... Braunfels describes scores of cities, classifying them as cathedral cities, city-states, imperial cities, maritime cities, "ideal cities" (those towns which, planned by often absent rulers for a specefic purpose, failed to develop independent lives) ... Lavishly illustrated with city plans, bird's-eye views, early renderings, and modern photographs, Urban Design in Western Europe will both delight and instruct architects, urban planners, historians, and travelers."--Page 4 of cover

This book offers a comprehensive and up-to-date overview of Islamic palace architecture in Spain, Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, and southern Italy, presenting all known palace buildings in ground plans, sections and individual descriptions. The author traces their evolution from the 8th to the 19th century and places them within the context of the history of Islamic culture.

An authoritative survey situating some of the Western world’s most renowned buildings within a millennium of Islamic history Some of the most outstanding examples of world architecture, such as the Mosque of Córdoba, the ceiling of the Cappella Palatina in Palermo, the Giralda tower in Seville, and the Alhambra Palace in Granada, belong to the Western Islamic tradition. This architectural style flourished for over a thousand years along the southern and western shores of the Mediterranean—between Tunisia and Spain—from the 8th century through the 19th, blending new ideas with local building practices from across the region. Jonathan M. Bloom’s Architecture of the Islamic West introduces readers to the full scope of this vibrant tradition, presenting both famous and little-known buildings in six countries in North Africa and southern Europe. It is richly illustrated with photographs, specially commissioned architectural plans, and historical documents. The result is a personally guided tour of Islamic architecture led by one of the finest scholars in the field and a powerful testament to Muslim cultural achievement.

In thirteen well-illustrated essays, this book tells the story of the building of the American West and of the edifices that are as much a part of the history of the region as the people who built them. Organised in sequence according to central themes in the history of the West, the collection begins with two essays that describe the cultural connections between East and West during the late nineteenth century. The next two essays place American building forms in their western context, emphasising the distinctive regional qualities of the buildings and the lifeways they represent. The third pair of essays highlights the fact that in settling the West, Americans had to brush aside existing populations, often with serious ramifications for the displaced. Other essays focus on various ethnic groups and women and the exploitation of resources as a significant facet of western architectural development -- and the effect of such exploitation on the western landscape.

Western Architecture is an original and far-reaching survey of the history of architecture in Europe and North America, from ancient Greece to the present. From the earliest classical temples to today's achievements, over two thousand years of Western architectural history are summarized. Every architectural style is the product of an ideology, and the author shows how the buildings of Greece and Rome, of the Early Christian and Byzantine centuries, of the Gothic Middle Ages, the Renaissance, and the Enlightenment grew out of their respective cultures. In the nineteenth century the story in Europe and North America became more complicated, with the competing forces of Romanticism and industrial functionalism leading to apparently contradictory results--a situation that continues today in the clash between postmodernism and high-tech. But perspectives change, and every decade has its own views of the past. Eastern Europe has inevitably been underrepresented in Western criticism since 1945; Czech Baroque, Polish Neoclassicism, and Hungarian Art Nouveau provide some unexpected revelations. Illustrated throughout with photographs closely linked to the text, this is a guide for the student and general reader to follow into the twenty-first century. 456 black-and-white illustrations