ABSTRACT
The history of architecture is mainly the history of monumental buildings. The loss of a living vernacular building culture led to heightened awareness among architects and historians of its importance. We’ll explore how this loss of “architecture without architects” has upset the balance in quality between our background urban fabric of everyday buildings and the architecture of our signature public, cultural, and institutional buildings. The chapter begins with a discussion of Adolf Loos, a pivotal figure at the dawn of the Modern Movement who sought to recover authenticity in utilitarian buildings. It then turns to Mies van der Rohe, who made the discipline of modular masonry stacking central to a series of brick house projects and to his architectural pedagogy.
A theory of a global vernacular is proposed, based on the VUC with its standardized dimensions and connections. In accordance with Principle #11: Open Source, it will be a modular language shared among architects, designers, and product manufacturers worldwide that will lead to virtually limitless variety in design expression. By leveraging the power of distributed intelligence, the new global vernacular will raise everyday architecture to a previously unattainable level of excellence in design and quality.
