Is this the end?

‘This is the end, my only friend the end.’

I’ll be honest I do have other friends, but sadly this is the end of this series of outpourings (I’m self aware enough to know I’ve lost the battle with restraint on several occasions over the last 8 weeks), and hopefully you’ve picked up on why I use a lot of music and film references? I’ll explain anyway even though I know you got it really, it’s our old friend context again, nothing happens in a vacuum even architecture. We can’t really tackle a subject without acknowledging what is effecting, directly or indirectly, the people and happenings we’re talking about.

There’s some irony in our subject matter this week, we’ve already talked about capitalism and nuclear war and the general end of the world it seems fitting that the end of this blog should focus on the country that many believe will or could have been responsible for the end of us all. The text of choice is USA by John Dos Passos, in particular 3 biographies of Frank Lloyd Wright, Henry Ford and Torstein Veblen.

So three very different people, an architect (well this is an architecture blog), a car maker and a thinker/author. Now I know what you’re thinking ‘what have these guys got in common apart from all having carked it?’ well its tragedy, they all had ideas which they hoped would change the world, but in some cases ended up recoiling away from it, in case you hadn’t already guessed we’re not dealing with a great deal of happiness today, so if your disposition leans towards the negative now may be the time to pop a happy pill.

Henry Ford changed production forever let’s not mess around on that one, his ideas on mass production, ‘the production line’, have effected manufacturing and are still evident today. How he achieved this was probably in no small way effected by his megalomaniacal side, we’ve all got one some of us are better at keeping it in check than others! Ford believed that progression would be achieved through values; his values to be specific, Ford decided that his workers shouldn’t drink, smoke, gamble or get into debt. Sounds like a real bucket of fun this guy, haven’t got one of those happy pills spare have you? For all his success Ford recoiled away from society, recreating his childhood in a rural small town with no roads!

Torstein next, well you didn’t think i was going to let you skip through anything by cutting straight to the architect did you? Famously dubbed the man, who couldn’t say yes, he refused to compromise on his principles, would agree to anything that might impinge on his modus operandi. He’s a little like the character Paul in Decline and Fall, can’t get in the game, prefers to sit watching the people struggling on the wheel of life. Veblen ended up living in a shack in Palo Alto.

So finally we’re at Frank Lloyd Wright and we’ve only got ourselves another megalomaniac, what are the odds? Frank was known for bullying his clients; he famously insisted one client must forgo having a bed in their shiny new house and sleep on a futon! I think i said it last week, what kind of architect are you if you don’t actually deliver something that works for your client, if it doesn’t work from them then what’s the point!!

Frank had his share of tragedy; his own home burnt to the ground twice, and was the site of  

So this is all great but what does it mean? Henry saw his dreams come true and recoiled from the world he changed, Veblen sought to understand the world and succeeded, perhaps understanding the US population better than almost anyone, and he recoiled away from it. Now Frank he, like Corbusier never saw his dreams come true, they never saw their new utopian cities created. Would he have recoiled away from that city? Would it be another Milton Keynes?

‘you either die a hero or live long enough to see yourself become a villain’ – that’s Batman, now I’m not suggesting that these guys are villains although I’m not sure that there’s ever been a heroic megalomaniac – answers on a post card. I’m suggesting there megalomaniacal tendencies blocked their path to the changes to humanity they were desperate to make, we rarely get anywhere entirely on our own after all.

So who’s the odd one out, drum roll please............. its Torstein! While Ford and Frank Busied themselves building monuments to their ideals that would stand long after they were gone, Torstein only sought to understand, requesting at the end that there be no ceremony, no memorial built. Just goes to show if you stop the me me me for 5 minutes you might come up with some ideas you can live with long term and there’s where the virtue is my friend.  

Decline down by the old Fountainhead

Words by Mike Judd & Thom Yorke


‘A person is smart. People are dumb, panicky dangerous animals.’


I’m quoting films again, Men in Black this time, it’s a very universal medium film some good lessons if you know where to look. Now I’m assuming you’re not reading this aloud to a bloodthirsty mob, all of whom are calling for my head, so I’m going to assume you’re the smart person I hope you to be and we can rattle along as normal.


That baying mob is part of what we’re dealing with today folks, the mob and the representation of them forms a major character in the Fountainhead. Now when I say the fountainhead we’re talking about the film rather than the book, I’ll confess I’m not sure I could have coped with the book it’s layered on pretty thick in the film and any more than 2 hours of it probably would have sent me back to that dark room we talked about last week.... ‘For a minute there I lost myself, I lost myself.’


Decline and fall is the counterpoint today, written between the world wars, it’s a comic tragedy set against the backdrop of the decline (hence the title, I like the obvious sometimes, it’s reassuring don’t you think?) of the British class system.


So we’ve got two stories both with architects as central characters (I can’t think of two many storeys like that, I think Three men and a baby had an architect in but I don’t think it’s got quite the same weight as these) one set in the good old USA and one routed right here in blighty.


Our two architects couldn’t be more different, in Decline and Fall professor Sillineus cuts a pretty forlorn figure, he’s not built much (a chewing gum factory in eastern Europe) he doesn’t sleep, he hates everything he’s done and he thinks the only buildings that work are factories because they house machines not people. I’ll admit I started cacking myself when I read that, as a young(ish) man at the start of my architectural career the idea of ending up like that had those Radiohead songs swirling round my head again.......’ For a minute there I lost myself, I lost myself’.


Must keep a clear head, we’re close to the end I can’t let this slide into negativity. Although id be remiss if we didn’t talk about Sillineus’s giant stone cold bummer to end them all, his big theory is that life is like a spinning wheel – people get on they fall they get back up again the fall again and again, very few get to the middle and when you’re there it’s not moving, you’ve reached equilibrium. He then tells Paul the main character that he is a watcher, not made to get on the wheel at all, but instead to stand on the side lines watch others living. Wow not sure I’d take being told I’m like that, I’m mean come on you might slip over once or twice on the wheel but deep down you know it’s a giggle. Although watching people fall over is a giggle too, pop ‘face plants’ into youtube you’ll see what I mean.


Now a man of definite intelligence posed the question, is it impossible not to feel sorry for rourke? – the architect in the fountainhead. Err in a word yes; I can’t get onside with anyone who says they don’t care what the people who inhabit one of their buildings think about it. Now it’s worth pointing out at this point that the character of Rourke is based on Frank Lloyd Wright, and he like Wright will offer no explanation of method or end product. Now it’s at this exact moment, right here right now that you should be saying to yourself oh yeah just like Zaha Hadid in the first of these blogs!!!! It’s implied that you’re supposed to worship these guys and any explanation would shatter the god like mystic they’ve created. Can you imagine the average architect essentially telling their client to go fuck themselves if they want to make any changes to a design? I’ve got to say I’ve always found reasoning with a client to be a more productive discourse.


Again we’re in need of background to all this, like last week we’re in interesting times when the fountainhead was written, we’ve got communism (you know my feelings on ism’s I’m trying to remain calm), the reality of nuclear obliteration (heavy, really heavy). It’s this fear that brings the mob into play here, when people don’t understand something they have a tendency to fear it, the same goes for buildings, Rourke finds himself in a battle with the banner a news paper which represents the baying mob. They deplore his new buildings that have no reference to past styles, indeed when a client suggests adding some period features to a design he declares that he’d rather it wasn’t built at all.


I’m going to float this idea, hopefully its sits well, I don’t think it’s something new they’re against it’s the lack of explanation. If the mob were ambivalent to the self indulgent god complex brigade (I’m talking to you here Hadid!!) if there wasn’t such frenzy would these people get on as well as they do? would they actually explain themselves if they weren’t so entrenched? If there were no wall of opinion to push back against would they just fall over?.......’phew for a minute there I lost myself, I lost myself’

What did the 'Beats' ever do for us?

We’re under pressure this week folks, the deadline’s been set the clock is ticking, oppressively loud volume, fractured thoughts and blind panic. It’s time to draw inspiration from dear Hunter S. Thompson and throw some gonzo at the situation, no time to mull this one over, it’s a one shot deal. Luckily that’s exactly what the subject matter calls for! We’re talking the other S. of the beat generation William S. Burroughs (the Job), throw in some Allen Ginsberg (Howl) and a touch of Archigram and all we’re missing is the mescaline!

The instant commonality with all these guys is their generation. We’re talking 60’s, we’re talking flower power hippies, LSD, on the road, don’t drop the bomb, purple haze, the magic bus, and the grateful dead.

The beat generation openly challenged the establishment and the inherent ideals of the ‘norm’ whether it was through liberal attitudes towards sex, drugs, music or through political ideas (hence counter culture). All this is set against a background of oppression; it’s all a direct response the Vietnam War and the draft of brave young men to fight. The civil rights movement is exploding all over the USA, the threat of nuclear war with those pesky commies looms large. I think what the beat generation were trying to say was ‘you guys had you you’re chance and you fucked us so let’s look at things in a completely different way.

In Howl Ginsberg celebrates ‘the best minds of his generation’ but these people aren’t doctors, or lawyers no no, they’re the hippies, drug users, musicians, drinkers, smokers and shaggers. These are the people who had the balls to say there might be a different way.

Burroughs agrees on the importance of the ‘hippy’ going as far as saying these are the people who will be able to solve world conflicts as they are able to talk to people from a non western background on a more human level free from political leanings.

Archigram’s stance is routed in the same rejection of the norm, hell in a letter written by one members daughter she says that he wanted to be the Burroughs, the Hunter Thompson the James Dean of the architectural world.

They even float the idea that maybe the correct response to an architectural problem is not a building! Now I know what you’re thinking because my bullshit meter is registering some pretty high readings too but Archigram do temper this somewhat. They talk about only holding onto influences as long as they are useful, now that sounds to me like it’s not a complete rejection of the norm, correct me if I’m wrong but that sounds like an admission that there may be use in things that have gone before.

I’m not alone in this assumption when Burroughs is asked about experimental writing he says it fails when it is purely experimental. Instead he talks about using his experimental techniques and returning and applying them to the conventional problem of writing a narrative rather than tossing the baby out with the bathwater and writing in a completely new way.

 Problem with the extreme rejection of the norm in the beat sense is its been done, getting high at a music festival isn’t counter culture, now you can do it at any number of sites all over the world filmed in glorious HD by all the major media outlets and bookended by large corporate sponsors.

You could say the man fucked us again, he learnt from the new thinking quicker than we did brought into the counter culture packaged it, took those nasty edges off and then sold it back to us. There’s still more than enough for the current generation of students, thinkers and smokers to rebel against but mr badiou says there’s too much spectacle these days.

Architecturally speaking we’ve got: form making, unsullied by program. Mike Webb (Archigram)

So pull up a seat, light up a joint, turn on the TV and welcome to the spectacular Zaha Hadid capitalist void sponsored by pepsi brought to you by Murdoch in glistening HD.

Shame we could probably do with you smoking that joint meaning something.

The production of space (a thesauruses 'Work' is never done)

Right its official I need a thesaurus, and I don’t think a pocket one is going to cut the mustard. I mentioned a common theme running through the texts we’ve been looking at last week, but this blog is definitely developing a common theme of its own. Cutting to the heart of the text for me has not only been about teasing the issues out but also cutting through the language these guys are throwing around; I swear some of these authors have been involved in some kind of decade’s long linguistic pissing contest.

We’re talking (hopefully in words of less than 5 syllables) social Space this week, but it’s not all cocktail bars boys and girls, no no no we’re dealing with Henri Lefebvre here. He kicks off by explaining the difference between work and product. To understand the difference between the two we’re going to look at a couple of TV shows: Gardener’s World & Grand Designs. I can feel the anger bubbling up again, Kevin McLeod (grand designs presenter) illicits that same feeling of rage that Zaha Hadid does, the idea that this hack pretty much represents architecture, (my Profession!!) as far as the average man in the street is concerned, is so overwhelmingly depressing it’s all I can do to not disappear into a dark room with the Radiohead back catalogue and a bottle of scotch.

We’re rapidly getting off track again that’s two rants in three paragraphs, anger’ll do that to a man, let’s start breaking this down. If we start with ‘work’ as Lefebvre describes it we’re into the realms of Gardeners World - A flower is work, it is an object that has no political leanings, it is. It doesn’t know that it is beautiful and its growth can’t be scrutinised to find efficiency savings. Gardeners World cannot delve deeper into the growth of a flower there’s nowhere to go with it, flowers grow, they’re pretty, they die end of.

For ‘product’ we look to Grand Designs, a kitchen is a product, it is designed and its design can and is influenced by many factors (need, want, fashion, technology), sadly for Kev he has no idea this is the case. Humans are creatures of production, we analyse our own ideas yet nothing on Grand Designs is looked at past the level of work, the kitchen is stunning and the heart of the family home but not once does Kev ask why it’s a mass produced IKEA kitchen with soft close drawers and a Smeg Fridge. Or for that matter not once does he ask the couple with 2 kids and another on the way why they’re only building two bedrooms but have a fantastic triple height living space. Sorry I’m struggling with my rage again, sometimes counting to ten just doesn’t work.

Lefebvre moves on to talk about Venice, a city which he believes represents both work and product, the whole is a work born of the sea, anticipating its own death like a flower, but its constituent parts are works – houses like those on grand designs. I’m fascinated by this idea that Venice can be both but as the main man says, other cities are simply product I think you could argue in the same way that Venice defiantly rises from the sea that Vegas defiantly rises from the desert. I’m not sure where I stand on this one and to delve any deeper now would unravel this whole situation and we’re too close to the end for me to allow that to happen.

Tuscany next and we’re into more products, Tuscan farms representing the human domination of the landscape, we’re into product again. Once you start dominating a landscape from scratch you’re going to do it with thought with leanings, it might be a collection of people (planning authority, government, tribe) or it might be the local big dick showing the plebs just how powerful he is – that he can literally mould the landscape to suit his whims.

I’m going to end where I started, on another commonality between this and earlier texts, it’s that idea of whipping the slate clean and starting again, Ms Hadid had a real Jones on for this idea if you remember, Lefebvre is backing me up here though, he says that no space can be removed entirely there will always remnants of it left behind. Now is it just me or if it’s there should you not have the decency to acknowledge it, even if you decide not to incorporate anything of it into a new design, but maybe that’s just sentimental (slightly angry) old me.

All that's Faust melts my brain!

I’m going to start this with a confession: until I read ‘All that’s solid melts to air’ I had no idea what the story of Faust was, I’d heard the name but had no idea what the concept of a Fuastian story was all about. Luckily this commentary on Gothes Faust start with no real introduction, no overview of the story arch & you’re told next to nothing about the author and his history.

Whether or not starting from scratch is a good thing i don’t know, you could argue that you go in carrying no preconceptions and are therefore more open to the ideas. Luckily for me i spent the first few pages in a state that I can only compare to trying to read street signs in a foreign language, you know what’s written are words, you know the ones you want are in there somewhere, but there’s not a hope in hell of figuring out where you’re going.

Right rant over text read twice we’re back on an even keel. Gothe’s Faust is shaped by the industrial revolution, written over a period of 60’s Gothe saw the industrial world exploding around him. Living on the cusp of such rapid development will no doubt form certain ideas about that development and the new idea of capitalism. As we’ve riffed on in previous blogs I’m pretty sure the ‘minds’ of our time are finding the apparent death of the capitalist dream just as interesting.

We’re dealing with simile again here folks! Ms Hadid must be feeling uncomfortable right about now there’s a real simile vibe running right through this whole blog. The key to this is not what the characters do but what they represent. In the first act Faust becomes infatuated with Gretchen and simple girl from a puritanical world. Gretchen and her world represent the world of god. Mephisto on first glance seems to represent the devil but it’s much more than that he represents the world of science, of discovery. This concept of duality is key not only to this text but to looking at cultural theory in general, for every action there is a reaction, after all how do you know good if there is no evil?

As the story develops Faust takes on the role of the developer, but he’s not in it for the bucks ladies and gentlemen, Mephisto points out that he could be raking it in but instead it’s a more ‘noble’ purpose Faust sees for himself, a vision of how he can make humanity better. Much like Corbusier he conceives a way he thinks he can improve the lives of everyone . We’re back to talking about context again, at the time Gothe’s penning his tome some thinkers in France are coining phrases like ‘Socialisme’. There’s a good plot twist here, i never saw it coming, here i was thinking we were knee deep in a traditional industrial revolution capitalist tale, but no our protagonist is living the socialist dream.

That Faust ends up blind (ironic that his tale ends with exactly how i felt when i started reading this) represents his loss of humanity, holding on to his vision ignoring the damage it may be doing, even when he begins to destroy himself. Sounds a lot like some headline architects who shall remain nameless.

‘You were so busy thinking about whether you could, you never stopped to ask if you should.’ For those wondering where that quote comes from its Jurassic Park! I’ll be honest I’m feeling a little smug at being able to make the same point with a quote from a Spielberg movie that it took Berman 60pages and most of the contents of a thesaurus to say. What we’re getting to here people is that we should interrogate our choices as architects we have a duty to, but more than that we should because others will. We should be interrogating our work to deliver the best building we can, I’d look pretty silly demanding answers of Ms Hadid if i was unwilling to provide a few of my own.

I'm After Some Theory

Much like Eagleton let’s get straight into the meat of this one. I however am not going to name drop to the extent that he does (sadly it’s because I don’t know as many as he does). Quite a clever little ploy that one, it’s not only establishing who the players are but for me is reassuring the reader that he knows his stuff, that you’re going to get the full picture of the situation not just the biased ravings of a lunatic.


Eagleton talks about the incorrect inferences that can be made about the title, that we are in a time past theory, that there is no going back. However the situations a little more après skithan post theory – the fun’s not done for the day it’s just time to remove one ridiculous get-up slide into another one and get our kicks in a different way.


He suggests that the meaning of theory is a ‘reflection on our guiding assumptions’. To me this suggests that the theory we’re dealing with here is more reactive, more commentary than theory not proposing what will come, but looking at why something has happened. Does the event have to happen before one of the names droppees can form a theory on it? It’s quite like architectures inherent link to cultural movements, much more reactive than trend setting (although the time taken to get a building built has a large influence on the architectural situation.)


The opening chapter talks a great deal about sex, and how sex has replaced most of the ism’s (socialism, capitalism etc etc) as the in vogue subject of study, and how the acceptance of sexuality as an accepted field of academic study is an achievement of cultural theory.  Personal y I think it’s a great victory for capitalist society’s mantra – sex sells.  The theorists are reacting again, of course it has to be an accepted area of study, cultural theory wouldn’t count for much if they weren’t talking about the major cultural aspects of the time, and right here right now the capitalist world wants sex and lots of.


The great shame of this book is it was probably published about 10 years too early. There’s a clear yearning for the past and the world events that shaped the cultural theory of the mid-20th century.  Eagleton calls this a time of high theory and laments on how the younger generation of academics have little of ‘world shaking political importance’ in their living memory. Well that sure isn’t the case now what these guys have is a front row seat to the end of the world as we know it. I think it’s a pretty safe assumption that we’ve been grabbed by the short and curlies in the vice like grip of a period of high theory. I suspect that Mr Eagleton and his contemporaries are,even as I write this, glued to a giant bank of TV’s trying to understand the cluster fuck that is the eco-political situation the world finds itself in, frantically trying to formulate a coherent ism to sum up the general mood of despair engulfing the world.


Overall I like Eagleton, he can cut to the meat of some pretty hefty subjects using far simpler language than other authors in this field would, using simile and poking fun at the more obscure areas of the theory. In one section he dissects severalism’s by pointing out that they are impossible to follow, that merely by using language they are subverted. I like I think I can get on board with a theory that understands that we need to ask the right questions, but keep ourselves in the real world of the plausible.

Excess and escapism in the desert

Ding Ding, round two, we’re talking Vegas baby. Home of the big fight, the high roller & the big spender and squaring up against the old seasoned pro that is sin city we’ve got Dubai, the challenger, the young upstart.

Representing these pillars of capitalism we’ve got Dave Hickey’s ‘At home in the neon’, a piece about Vegas but that strives for a different outlook on somewhere whose very name evokes a myriad of imagery. Examining Vegas through the idea of the home rather than that of the visitor is not a common one and throws up some good insights.

Jumping into the ring with Hickey we’ve got ‘Fear and money in Dubai’ by Mike Davis. I can’t decide if it’s a great right left combo or a blow below the belt invoking Hunter S. Thompson and his classic vision of Vegas (Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas) for me the writing’s just not in the same league it’s like a little boy claiming he’s a heavyweight, for all that its insightful it lacks any real guts to justify the title.

So we’ve got two cities, both in the desert, both built on capitalism, excess, glitz, glamour and most importantly escapism. Both can also be considered lenses, Hickey says you can use Vegas as a lens to examine the rest of America but you can use America as lenses to examine Vegas. The same is true of Dubai, the capitalist world’s reliance on oil (and the life after it), spending  and that word again – escapism, is encapsulated in Dubai.

But there are some major differences, In Hickey’s Vegas you’re cheat but fairly, the odds are there on the slot machine, there ‘s no subjectivity in 7:1 odds just win or lose. Davis talks about the projected daily spends at Dubai World ($100/day each) I bet that’s not written on the entrance sign!

Money gets you everywhere in Dubai, but in Vegas its only your willingness to put chips on the table that gets you noticed, as Hickey says there are no hidden doors or VIP rooms for those not willing to play the odds and put their money on the line.

Davis talks about Dubai hiding its sins, slave labourers hidden on the edge of town, drinking only in the hotels bars populated by prostitutes that the government refuse to recognise. In the areas of Nevada that surrounds Vegas it’s perfectly legal to visit a brothel. But even in sin city there are signs of attempts to normalise the excess, it is good form to drop into the little white wedding chapel with your stripper before you bed her!

Both articles fail to land the killer blow when it comes to the current hot topic – sustainability. Just how sustainable is massive developments of glass buildings in the desert!?!? For all the moral veneer is building the world’s largest airport in a time when fewer people can afford to fly really a great idea? Building a city on the hum of an air conditioner is an idea that now seems rooted in the excess of pre 2008.

The big difference for me is Vegas seems comfortable in its own skin, entertainment Mecca. Dubai on the other can only identify its self by massive projects, tallest buildings, and largest malls. Its entire identity is surrounding in whatever the next piece of earth moving is to take place as Mike Davis says it’s all about tons of sand moved.

The bells rung who’s still standing, well I’ll give you great odds but you’ll have to pay to see them.