Iconic Building
Charles Jencks, . . Rizzoli, $35 (224pp) ISBN 978-0-8478-2756-5
The cover of Jencks's snappy survey of the post-Bilbao boom in flamboyant public building has a Photoshopped image of Norman Foster's Swiss Re headquarters in London launching itself like the rocket ship it resembles, complete with flaming thrusters and billowing smoke. The cover's combination of satire, affection and awe sets the tone for the book. Neither a pious jeremiad nor a jargon-ridden manifesto, Jencks's volume is more interested in outsize buildings and personalities than in prescriptions and complaints. And a couple of the architects Jencks (
Reviewed on: 09/19/2005
Genre: Nonfiction
Hardcover - 223 pages - 978-0-7112-2426-1