How architecture in Belgium, from its very beginnings, has epitomized modernity and singularity.Since the foundation of the country in 1830, architecture in Belgium has been an expression of the key issues of modern Western societies. In Something Completely Different, Christophe Van Gerrewey uses this small European country as a case study to describe, interpret, and criticize more universal spatial problems and behaviors. In seven wide-ranging essays, he looks at the activities of architects from the past two centuries to better understand political evolutions, social gaps, aesthetic considerations, housing and planning, transport and infrastructure, order and chaos, and culture and ecology. The result is a literary text full of surprises and discoveries, showing both the shortcomings and the merits of what architects do.Written as a kind of anti-guidebook, Something Completely Different appropriates certain clichés about Belgium (Baudelaire famously called Belgian monuments “counterfeits of France”), eschews the pragmatism of most guidebooks in favor of meditative, essayistic prose, and finally, cunningly, reveals that all along the subject has not been Belgium at all, but rather the nature of architecture.

Choosing Architecture traces the history of arguments about architecture in the West via analyses of key documents to show how vital a subject it is for anyone interested in our contemporary world.For as long as there have been buildings, architecture has been a major subject of public discussion, considered and argued about not just by architects or residents, but also by critics, theoreticians, historians, and writers. This book offers an overview of these discussions in the Western world by means of four thematic trajectories, focused on housing, society, history, and art. Each of these four chronological paths starts in the nineteenth century, traverses the twentieth century, and ends as closely as possible to the contemporary moment. The stepping stones that Christophe Van Gerreway uses are historical documents—texts, books, essays, and articles—that are analyzed, interpreted, criticized, and compared. The aim of the book is to show that architecture remains a vital subject matter for anyone interested in our contemporary world and its recent history. Reading, inquiring, and thinking are essential for making substantiated choices, and, Van Gerreway shows, architecture can be a useful starting point.

A unique book about one of the most famous buildings in Switzerland.  The Rolex Learning Center at EPFL Lausanne opened in 2010. Designed by Pritzker Prize laureates SANAA (Kazuyo Sejima and Ryue Nishizawa) from Japan, it soon became one of the more well-known buildings of recent times. In this book, akin to an architectural novella,  Christophe Van Gerrewey tells the variegated story of this piece of architecture—from many points of view, with some unexpected twists, and accompanied by unusual images. Through Higher Knowledge, the Rolex Learning Center emerges not only as a remarkable architectural achievement, but also as a building that contains knowledge, and that can speak to us in different ways.

Choosing Architecture traces the history of arguments about architecture in the West via analyses of key documents to show how vital a subject it is for anyone interested in our contemporary world.For as long as there have been buildings, architecture has been a major subject of public discussion, considered and argued about not just by architects or residents, but also by critics, theoreticians, historians, and writers. This book offers an overview of these discussions in the Western world by means of four thematic trajectories, focused on housing, society, history, and art. Each of these four chronological paths starts in the nineteenth century, traverses the twentieth century, and ends as closely as possible to the contemporary moment. The stepping stones that Christophe Van Gerreway uses are historical documents—texts, books, essays, and articles—that are analyzed, interpreted, criticized, and compared. The aim of the book is to show that architecture remains a vital subject matter for anyone interested in our contemporary world and its recent history. Reading, inquiring, and thinking are essential for making substantiated choices, and, Van Gerreway shows, architecture can be a useful starting point.

How architecture in Belgium, from its very beginnings, has epitomized modernity and singularity.Since the foundation of the country in 1830, architecture in Belgium has been an expression of the key issues of modern Western societies. In Something Completely Different, Christophe Van Gerrewey uses this small European country as a case study to describe, interpret, and criticize more universal spatial problems and behaviors. In seven wide-ranging essays, he looks at the activities of architects from the past two centuries to better understand political evolutions, social gaps, aesthetic considerations, housing and planning, transport and infrastructure, order and chaos, and culture and ecology. The result is a literary text full of surprises and discoveries, showing both the shortcomings and the merits of what architects do.Written as a kind of anti-guidebook, Something Completely Different appropriates certain clichés about Belgium (Baudelaire famously called Belgian monuments “counterfeits of France”), eschews the pragmatism of most guidebooks in favor of meditative, essayistic prose, and finally, cunningly, reveals that all along the subject has not been Belgium at all, but rather the nature of architecture.

Choosing Architecture traces the history of arguments about architecture in the West via analyses of key documents to show how vital a subject it is for anyone interested in our contemporary world.For as long as there have been buildings, architecture has been a major subject of public discussion, considered and argued about not just by architects or residents, but also by critics, theoreticians, historians, and writers. This book offers an overview of these discussions in the Western world by means of four thematic trajectories, focused on housing, society, history, and art. Each of these four chronological paths starts in the nineteenth century, traverses the twentieth century, and ends as closely as possible to the contemporary moment. The stepping stones that Christophe Van Gerreway uses are historical documents—texts, books, essays, and articles—that are analyzed, interpreted, criticized, and compared. The aim of the book is to show that architecture remains a vital subject matter for anyone interested in our contemporary world and its recent history. Reading, inquiring, and thinking are essential for making substantiated choices, and, Van Gerreway shows, architecture can be a useful starting point.

A unique book about one of the most famous buildings in Switzerland.  The Rolex Learning Center at EPFL Lausanne opened in 2010. Designed by Pritzker Prize laureates SANAA (Kazuyo Sejima and Ryue Nishizawa) from Japan, it soon became one of the more well-known buildings of recent times. In this book, akin to an architectural novella,  Christophe Van Gerrewey tells the variegated story of this piece of architecture—from many points of view, with some unexpected twists, and accompanied by unusual images. Through Higher Knowledge, the Rolex Learning Center emerges not only as a remarkable architectural achievement, but also as a building that contains knowledge, and that can speak to us in different ways.

Choosing Architecture traces the history of arguments about architecture in the West via analyses of key documents to show how vital a subject it is for anyone interested in our contemporary world.For as long as there have been buildings, architecture has been a major subject of public discussion, considered and argued about not just by architects or residents, but also by critics, theoreticians, historians, and writers. This book offers an overview of these discussions in the Western world by means of four thematic trajectories, focused on housing, society, history, and art. Each of these four chronological paths starts in the nineteenth century, traverses the twentieth century, and ends as closely as possible to the contemporary moment. The stepping stones that Christophe Van Gerreway uses are historical documents—texts, books, essays, and articles—that are analyzed, interpreted, criticized, and compared. The aim of the book is to show that architecture remains a vital subject matter for anyone interested in our contemporary world and its recent history. Reading, inquiring, and thinking are essential for making substantiated choices, and, Van Gerreway shows, architecture can be a useful starting point.