Kirjahaku

Strategically placed above a waterfall, Fallingwater's horizontal cantilevered floors and terraces soar free of any apparent support. The building dynamically illustrates Frank Lloyd Wright's fascinating attitudes towards integrating architecture and nature and the truly extraordinary ways in which these are expressed.Launched in 1991, the Architecture in Detail series attracted immediate acclaim and now comprises more than 60 titles. These books are highly collectable documents, each focusing in depth on a celebrated building. The series covers all sides of the vast spectrum of architecture from the past, present and future; the individual buildings are selected for their exceptional character, innovative design or technical virtuosity. Each volume contains a definitive text by a respected author; a sequence of color and black-and-white photographs; a series of technical drawings; and a set of essential working details. These titles are vital to every architectural library, appealing to the professional and student alike, or indeed anyone with an appreciation of buildings.

A timely overview of the pioneering work of the acclaimed Irish architectural practice Dublin-based Grafton Architects (founded by Yvonne Farrell and Shelley McNamara in 1978) has built up an impressive body of work over its 40-year history, ranging from houses in Ireland to public buildings in Italy, France, the UK, and Peru. In this long-overdue study, respected architectural writer and critic Robert McCarter presents 60 of Grafton's built and unbuilt projects and brings to light their principled and ethical approach, which is committed to making a profound difference to the lives of their buildings' users.

The life and architecture of Frank Lloyd Wright (1867-1959) have been much-studied, yet there is a consistent division between analyses of his architecture, which exclude any discussion of his daily life, and books that tell the often sensational tale of his life, with barely a passing reference to the buildings themselves. The result is that, despite the large number of volumes on Wright, the most essential part of his life - his life as an architect, working, as he said, 'in the cause of architecture' - remains virtually unexplored. "Frank Lloyd Wright" offers an account of Wright's life as an architect, the ideas, beliefs and relationships that shaped his life and work, and the manner in which these affected, and are reflected in, his architecture. During a tumultuous life and extensive career which includes such hugely defining buildings as the Guggenheim Museum, Fallingwater, Taliesin, Unity Temple, and the prolific Prairie Houses, Wright endeavoured to shape the emerging and evolving American democracy, its mode of dwelling, and its relation to the traditional conception of the city. Fusing ancient construction geometries with contemporary ideals of Transcendental philosophy, Wright sought to develop an appropriate architecture for the new world of the twentieth century. In doing so, he served as the primary inspiration for the emergence of Modern architecture around the world. Robert McCarter examines how Wright's architecture crystallized key conceptions of both private dwelling and public citizenship for American society, and relates how, through his work and writings, Wright developed relationships with key leaders of the arts, industry and society. He analyses how and why Wright maintained that architecture was the 'background or framework' for daily life, never the literal 'object' of our attention, as well as Wright's belief that architects have the most significant ethical responsibilities to improve the larger society and culture to which they belong. In exploring Wright's life, times and culture, Robert McCarter shows how Wright was an architect of astonishing ability, whose works continue to shape the world around us, fifty years after his death.