Stephen Kite – författare

Adrian Stokes: An Architectonic Eye

This book proposes that architecture can function as a true embodiment of generosity and examines how generosity in architecture operates within, and questions, current and historical socio-economic and political systems. As such, it interrogates ways in which architecture aspires for something more, whether within economic austerities or within historic contexts of a discipline that has often been preoccupied with cost and quantitative measurement.The texts presented in this book critically examine the theme of generosity and architecture from a variety of perspectives, addressing the theoretical, the historical, and the everyday processes of architectural practice, procurement, and policy in a global context. The book is a richly collaborative text which explores how architecture – in its processes of ordering and shaping space – can represent and embody generosity in all its multi-faceted potential.

This book proposes that architecture can function as a true embodiment of generosity and examines how generosity in architecture operates within, and questions, current and historical socio-economic and political systems. As such, it interrogates ways in which architecture aspires for something more, whether within economic austerities or within historic contexts of a discipline that has often been preoccupied with cost and quantitative measurement.The texts presented in this book critically examine the theme of generosity and architecture from a variety of perspectives, addressing the theoretical, the historical, and the everyday processes of architectural practice, procurement, and policy in a global context. The book is a richly collaborative text which explores how architecture – in its processes of ordering and shaping space – can represent and embody generosity in all its multi-faceted potential.

Economy and Architecture addresses a timely, critical, and much-debated topic in both its historical and contemporary dimensions. From the Apple Store in New York City, to the street markets of the Pan American Highway; from commercial Dubai to the public schools of Australia, this book takes a critical look at contemporary architecture from across the globe, whilst extending its range back in history as far as the Homeric epics of ancient Greece. The book addresses the challenges of practicing architecture within the strictures of contemporary economies, grounded on the fundamental definition of ‘economy’ as the well managed household – derived from the Greek oikonomia – oikos (house) and nemein (manage). The diverse enquiries of the study are structured around the following key questions: How do we define our economies? How are the values of architecture negotiated among the various actors involved? How do we manage the production of a good architecture within any particular system? How does political economy frame and influence architecture? The majority of examples are taken from current or recent architectural practice; historical examples, which include John Evelyn’s villa, Blenheim Palace, John Ruskin’s Venice, and early twentieth century Paris, place the debates within an extended critical perspective.

Economy and Architecture addresses a timely, critical, and much-debated topic in both its historical and contemporary dimensions. From the Apple Store in New York City, to the street markets of the Pan American Highway; from commercial Dubai to the public schools of Australia, this book takes a critical look at contemporary architecture from across the globe, whilst extending its range back in history as far as the Homeric epics of ancient Greece. The book addresses the challenges of practicing architecture within the strictures of contemporary economies, grounded on the fundamental definition of ‘economy’ as the well managed household – derived from the Greek oikonomia – oikos (house) and nemein (manage). The diverse enquiries of the study are structured around the following key questions: How do we define our economies? How are the values of architecture negotiated among the various actors involved? How do we manage the production of a good architecture within any particular system? How does political economy frame and influence architecture? The majority of examples are taken from current or recent architectural practice; historical examples, which include John Evelyn’s villa, Blenheim Palace, John Ruskin’s Venice, and early twentieth century Paris, place the debates within an extended critical perspective.

Based on extensive fieldwork, and research into John Ruskin's still little-interpreted archival material, notebooks and drawings (in the Ruskin Library, Lancaster University, UK and elsewhere), Stephen Kite offers an unprecedented account of the evolution of Ruskin's architectural thinking and observation in the context of Italy where his watching of building achieved its greatest intensity. Venice naturally figures large in a work that also examines other key sites including Verona, Lucca, Pisa, Florence, Milan and Monza; here, the fabrics are vividly read in their contexts against the rich evidence of Ruskin's diaries, his pocket-book sketches, architectural worksheets, drawings, and daguerrotypes (the early form of photography), and the drafts and published editions of the texts. Kite presents the complex story of Ruskin's visual thinking in architecture as a narrative of deepening interpretation and representation, focusing on the humbler monuments of Italy. He shows how Ruskin's early picturesque naturalism was transformed by the realisation that to understand the built realities confronting him in Italy demanded a closer engagement with the substance of the stones themselves; reflecting Ruskin's sense of his task as a near-archaeological gleaning and gathering of remains 'hidden in many a grass grown court, and silent pathway, and lightless canal'.

First published in 2005, An Architecture of invitation: Colin St John Wilson is a distinctive study of the life and architectural career of one of the most significant makers, theorists and teachers of architecture to have emerged in England in the second half of the twentieth century. Exceptionally in an architectural study, this book interweaves biography, critical analysis of the projects, and theory, in its aims of explicating the richness of Wilson’s body of work, thought and teaching. Drawing on the specialisms of its authors, it also examines the creative and psychological impulses that have informed the making of the work – an oeuvre whose experiential depth is recognised by both users and critics.

First published in 2005, An Architecture of invitation: Colin St John Wilson is a distinctive study of the life and architectural career of one of the most significant makers, theorists and teachers of architecture to have emerged in England in the second half of the twentieth century. Exceptionally in an architectural study, this book interweaves biography, critical analysis of the projects, and theory, in its aims of explicating the richness of Wilson’s body of work, thought and teaching. Drawing on the specialisms of its authors, it also examines the creative and psychological impulses that have informed the making of the work – an oeuvre whose experiential depth is recognised by both users and critics.

Shaping the Surface explores the history of modern British architecture through the lens of surface, materiality and decoration.Picking up on a trait that art historian Nikolaus Pevsner first identified as a ‘national mania for beautiful surface quality’, this book makes a new contribution to architectural history and visual culture in its detailed examination of the surfaces of British architecture from the middle of the 19th century up to the turn of the 21st century. Tracing this continuing sensibility to surface all the way through to the modern era, it explores how and why surface and materiality have featured so heavily in recent architectural tradition, examining the history of British architecture through a selection of key cultural moments and movements from Romanticism and the Arts and Crafts, to Brutalism, High-Tech, Post-Modernism, Neo-Vernacular, and the New Materiality. Embedded within the narrative is the question of whether such national characters can exist in architecture at all – and indeed the extent to which it is possible to identify a British architectural consciousness in an architectural tradition characterised by its continuous importation of theories, ideas, materials and people from around the globe.Shaping the Surface provides a deep critique and meditation on the importance of surface and materiality for architects, designers, and historians everywhere - in Britain and beyond - while it also serves as a thematic introduction to modern British architectural history, with in-depth readings of the works of many key British architects, artists, and critics from Ruskin and William Morris to Alison and Peter Smithson, Eduardo Paolozzi, Richard Rogers and Caruso St John.

Shaping the Surface explores the history of modern British architecture through the lens of surface, materiality and decoration.Picking up on a trait that art historian Nikolaus Pevsner first identified as a ‘national mania for beautiful surface quality’, this book makes a new contribution to architectural history and visual culture in its detailed examination of the surfaces of British architecture from the middle of the 19th century up to the turn of the 21st century. Tracing this continuing sensibility to surface all the way through to the modern era, it explores how and why surface and materiality have featured so heavily in recent architectural tradition, examining the history of British architecture through a selection of key cultural moments and movements from Romanticism and the Arts and Crafts, to Brutalism, High-Tech, Post-Modernism, Neo-Vernacular, and the New Materiality. Embedded within the narrative is the question of whether such national characters can exist in architecture at all – and indeed the extent to which it is possible to identify a British architectural consciousness in an architectural tradition characterised by its continuous importation of theories, ideas, materials and people from around the globe.Shaping the Surface provides a deep critique and meditation on the importance of surface and materiality for architects, designers, and historians everywhere - in Britain and beyond - while it also serves as a thematic introduction to modern British architectural history, with in-depth readings of the works of many key British architects, artists, and critics from Ruskin and William Morris to Alison and Peter Smithson, Eduardo Paolozzi, Richard Rogers and Caruso St John.

Based on extensive fieldwork, and research into John Ruskin's still little-interpreted archival material, notebooks and drawings (in the Ruskin Library, Lancaster University, UK and elsewhere), Stephen Kite offers an unprecedented account of the evolution of Ruskin's architectural thinking and observation in the context of Italy where his watching of building achieved its greatest intensity. Venice naturally figures large in a work that also examines other key sites including Verona, Lucca, Pisa, Florence, Milan and Monza; here, the fabrics are vividly read in their contexts against the rich evidence of Ruskin's diaries, his pocket-book sketches, architectural worksheets, drawings, and daguerrotypes (the early form of photography), and the drafts and published editions of the texts. Kite presents the complex story of Ruskin's visual thinking in architecture as a narrative of deepening interpretation and representation, focusing on the humbler monuments of Italy. He shows how Ruskin's early picturesque naturalism was transformed by the realisation that to understand the built realities confronting him in Italy demanded a closer engagement with the substance of the stones themselves; reflecting Ruskin's sense of his task as a near-archaeological gleaning and gathering of remains 'hidden in many a grass grown court, and silent pathway, and lightless canal'.