Seminal texts by renowned Italian architect Giancarlo De Carlo on architecture, education, and anarchy.
Giancarlo De Carlo’s academic and professional career combined two seemingly opposed terms in a single vocation: architecture and anarchy. But this was a vocation that avoided the utopian fantasies of the 1960s and 1970s and instead strove for rigor. In the essays collected in this book, De Carlo shows how the idea of participatory architecture can open the way to a realistic, fully realizable utopia—in theory, but also in practice: in his urban planning of the city center of Rimini and in his architectural plan for the village of Matteotti in Terni.
“Architecture is too important to be left to architects,” De Carlo claims, and one of the fundamental questions this collection poses is: What is the role of the architect? Included here are De Carlo’s writings on the crisis of the university in the wake of student protests that not only anticipated the uprising of May 1968 but continue to speak to the crisis in the educational system today. His analysis of the “overturned pyramid” structure of the university still has resonance today, where everything is supported by the very thin tip of the academic body that relies not on the tensions, suggestions, and demands that come from below, but by the principle of authority—a structure that emphasizes the institutionalization and professionalization of education and scholarship rather than on alternative processes of learning.
Also included are De Carlo’s celebrated essays “Why/How to Construct School Buildings” and “Architecture’s Public,” which address the potential of architecture to translate and realize the issues that arise from the act of protest.
ENDORSEMENTS
“Giancarlo De Carlo’s image of the ‘overturned pyramid’ is a powerful metaphor for rethinking the hierarchies that shape both architecture and education. This carefully curated anthology, introduced and contextualized by Luisa Lorenza Corna, brings together De Carlo’s most incisive reflections on how universities—and architecture itself—might be reformed through genuine participation rather than mere reformist gestures. It is an illuminating and timely volume that restores the urgency of De Carlo’s radical vision.” —Mark Crinson, Emeritus Professor of Architectural History, Birkbeck, University of London
“Giancarlo De Carlo occupies a unique place among his Team X collaborators. His interests ranged from the consideration of the historic city to rethinking housing, from the role and structure of academic institutions to his editorship of the influential magazine Spazio et Società. His projects were always engaged with political realities and the specific circumstances of architectural and spatial production. The Architecture of Participation provides a timely reminder of his thinking and the importance of his ideas now.” —Mohsen Mostafavi, Alexander and Victoria Wiley Professor of Design and Distinguished Service Professor, Harvard University
Giancarlo De Carlo (1919–2005) was an architect and planner, educator and editor, writer and speaker, thinker and innovator. He was well known in his native Italy and abroad as a founder of Team X and as a pioneer in participatory architecture.
Seminal texts by renowned Italian architect Giancarlo De Carlo on architecture, education, and anarchy.
Giancarlo De Carlo’s academic and professional career combined two seemingly opposed terms in a single vocation: architecture and anarchy. But this was a vocation that avoided the utopian fantasies of the 1960s and 1970s and instead strove for rigor. In the essays collected in this book, De Carlo shows how the idea of participatory architecture can open the way to a realistic, fully realizable utopia—in theory, but also in practice: in his urban planning of the city center of Rimini and in his architectural plan for the village of Matteotti in Terni.
“Architecture is too important to be left to architects,” De Carlo claims, and one of the fundamental questions this collection poses is: What is the role of the architect? Included here are De Carlo’s writings on the crisis of the university in the wake of student protests that not only anticipated the uprising of May 1968 but continue to speak to the crisis in the educational system today. His analysis of the “overturned pyramid” structure of the university still has resonance today, where everything is supported by the very thin tip of the academic body that relies not on the tensions, suggestions, and demands that come from below, but by the principle of authority—a structure that emphasizes the institutionalization and professionalization of education and scholarship rather than on alternative processes of learning.
Also included are De Carlo’s celebrated essays “Why/How to Construct School Buildings” and “Architecture’s Public,” which address the potential of architecture to translate and realize the issues that arise from the act of protest.
Reviews
ENDORSEMENTS
“Giancarlo De Carlo’s image of the ‘overturned pyramid’ is a powerful metaphor for rethinking the hierarchies that shape both architecture and education. This carefully curated anthology, introduced and contextualized by Luisa Lorenza Corna, brings together De Carlo’s most incisive reflections on how universities—and architecture itself—might be reformed through genuine participation rather than mere reformist gestures. It is an illuminating and timely volume that restores the urgency of De Carlo’s radical vision.” —Mark Crinson, Emeritus Professor of Architectural History, Birkbeck, University of London
“Giancarlo De Carlo occupies a unique place among his Team X collaborators. His interests ranged from the consideration of the historic city to rethinking housing, from the role and structure of academic institutions to his editorship of the influential magazine Spazio et Società. His projects were always engaged with political realities and the specific circumstances of architectural and spatial production. The Architecture of Participation provides a timely reminder of his thinking and the importance of his ideas now.” —Mohsen Mostafavi, Alexander and Victoria Wiley Professor of Design and Distinguished Service Professor, Harvard University
Author
Giancarlo De Carlo (1919–2005) was an architect and planner, educator and editor, writer and speaker, thinker and innovator. He was well known in his native Italy and abroad as a founder of Team X and as a pioneer in participatory architecture.
