Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #23212 in Books
• Published on: 1994-12-01
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 320 pages

Synopsis
Describes the effect of the overcrowding of Manhattan on the development of New York's architecture, and of the latter on the culture of the city, and argues that they are the results of a deliberate, if unexpressed, program.

Customer Reviews

Fun and original
Rem Koolhas is surely one of the funniest architectural commentators alive and this highly readable book does a great job of explaining (a) Manhattan for us. Skipping across a series of repressions (high culture lambasts the glee of fantastic technology on coney island only to adopt and raze its origins to flat grasslands) and fantasies (architects insistance on congestion increasing road widenings as pragmatic moves to decongestion disguises venetian fantasies of archipelagic towerstates) the author paints a vivid picture of the metropolis, plausible.

Compelling History of Manhattan
A romp through New York's sometimes jaded history with a view to uncover the roots of the modern metropolis and the singular element devised by architects to inspire (amuse?) the masses - the Skyscraper. The book looks at Coney Island as the testing ground of the Skyscaper, Manhatten as further exploration of the Skyscaper which is trialed in the name of symbols of a propserous future, economic rationale and pushing the envelope to its limits and finishes with Office of Metropolitian Architecture's own experimental projects in New York. A very compelling history of a complex city.