The History of Architecture and Urbanism from Brutalism to the Present

This course examines the development of architecture and urbanism from 1980 to 2020, a period marked by the fragmentation of modernist ideals and the emergence of a more global, technologically driven, and environmentally conscious built environment. We'll begin with the rise of postmodern architecture in the 1980s, when history, symbolism, and popular culture as legitimate design tools challenged the formal and ideological clarity of modernism. This was followed by experimental movements such as Deconstructivism, High-Tech architecture, and Minimalism. The second lecture explores the globalization of architectural practice and the rise of iconic “starchitects” such as Frank Gehry, Zaha Hadid, and Rem Koolhaas, whose signature buildings reshaped city identities and contributed to economic and cultural branding. In parallel, came the emergence of New Urbanism, led by Peter Calthorpe, which challenged suburban sprawl through walkable, mixed-use, and transit-oriented planning strategies. As part of this discussion, the course traces the history of the American shopping mall, from its origins as a suburban civic and commercial center in the postwar era to its gradual decline in the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries. The final lecture addresses the impact of digital technologies and sustainability, including computational design, adaptive reuse, and regional planning, and considers the rise of the super-tall skyscraper in Asia and the Middle East as a defining architectural form of the era.