Essay on Zaha Hadid: Making Utopia a Reality in Architecture

A utopia is a place of ideal perfection. However, according to the Merriam-Webster, it is also an impractical scheme for social improvement. Though dating back to the earliest days of U.S. history, utopian communities became a part of American thought by the 1840s. Various groups that were struggling because of urbanization and industrialization, challenged the traditional norms of American society with a desire to create a world without capitalism, immigration, and the tension between communities. However, these attempts failed due to individualism, materialism, the lack of growth, and little balance.

The word utopia originates from Sir Thomas More’s novel of the same name, Utopia. Sir Thomas More created the term as an intentional homophone of the word “eutopia”, which is a Greek word meaning “good place”. (Sterling, 2015) “Utopia”, on the other hand, means “no place”, which implies either an impossibility of existence or the results of attempting to bring about such existence. The reasons why a utopia is so destructive to societies are that each person has their own vision of perfection and it is impossible to make everyone agree; if everyone made their own utopias there would be conflict between their objectives. Also, human nature is flawed and cannot accommodate perfection.

In Gehry’s house, he used big openings, unique wall surfaces and light conditions in a large room or visible framework, they all showing the postmodern style and making relationships between architecture and its origin. Gehry tried to “make a very tough sculptural

According to Merriam-Webster, Utopia is an imaginary place where laws and social positions are perfect. William Golding’s novel, Lord of the Flies, was published in 1954 and shows that anyone who decides to be a leader must be fair or their society will fail. Through the novel, it is shown that a true Utopian society can not exist because names are forgotten, corruption occurs after creation, and you can get lost in thoughts and dreams.

An impractical scheme for social improvement. This is the third definition of the word utopia in the Mirriam-Webster dictionary. Anatole France says it best with this quote regarding utopian societies, „Without the Utopias of other times, men would still live in caves, miserable and naked. It was Utopians that traced the lines of the first city· Out of generous dreams come beneficial realities. Utopia is the principle of all progress, and the essay into a better future.„ The world has been constantly changing over time, new ideas pave paths that lead to better living. Most of the ideas are expressed through science fiction stories written by authors looking to change the world in some way or another. Authors begin with an idea, and then move towards placement of thought and scheme into somewhat of a reasonable reality. Authors such as Charlotte Perkins Gilman and Octavia Butler use the stories they write as ways to express their problems that they have with the present world. Advances in the present day world can only be reached through dreams and desires. These dreams and desires come to life as authors present their ideas on paper.

Question 1. Choose an architect or practice whose work is covered by or relevant to this course and discuss critically one or more of their design projects or drawings or urban proposals as precedent case-studies. Selectively situate this work in relation to their body of work, and against the practices and concerns of the period. Focus on the architectural qualities of a specific key aspect of the design of the projects. Selectively consider how they might relate to the historical situation, cultural values, theoretical concerns and design practices of the time. This may involve a selective analysis of compositional design practices, material fabrication production and the experiential reception of built outcomes of the projects.

The concept of utopia is one which has many differing connotations and is therefore also one which cannot be confined to one interpretation alone. The term is commonly used to represent a community or society that, in theory, possesses highly desirable or near-‘perfect’ qualities; however, these encompassing ideals, which arguably place emphasis on egalitarian principles of equality, are implemented in a number of ways and are subsequently based on varying ideologies, thus insisting on varying views of morality. The word itself, which was first coined by Sir Thomas More in the early sixteenth century and used to describe a fictional island society in the Atlantic Ocean, was taken from the Greek οὐ (‘not’) and τόπος (‘place’), literally translating

Each person has their own vision of utopia. Utopia means an ideal state, a paradise, a land of enchantment. It has been a central part of the history of ideas in Western Civilization. Philosophers and writers continue to imagine and conceive plans for an ideal state even today. They use models of ideal government to express their ideas on contemporary issues and political conditions. Man has never of comparing the real and ideal, actuality and dream, and the stark facts of human condition and hypothetical versions of optimum life and government.

Utopia is any state, condition, or place of ideal perfection. In Ursula LeGuin's short story "The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas" the city of Omelas is described as a utopia. "The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas" presents a challenge of conscience for anyone who chooses to live in Omelas.

On his book on Modern Architecture, Curtis writes that modern architecture was faulted for it’s “supposed lack of ‘recognizable imagery’” towards the end of the 1970s. This statement supports the idea of Jencks’ double coding where architects must now make

Mies van der Rohe is one of the most prominent figures in modernist architectural history, the man who popularised some of the most influential phrases of the era, e.g. “less is more”, and strove to push his ideas and philosophies, not just on what he thought a building should be, but of what he thought architecture itself was. He changed the cityscape of America, showing the world a style that was simple and elegant, with such a controlled palette of expressions that shone through in its geometric beauty.

Gropius traces the growth of the New Architecture and the work of the now well-known Bauhaus, with accuracy, calls for a new artist and architect educated to new materials and approaches as well as meeting the requirements of the age. It is also mentioned in The New Architecture and the Bauhaus that the intention of the Bauhaus was not to reproduce any “style”, system or belief, but simply to exert a revitalizing impact on design. Even though the outward forms of the New Architecture differ primarily in an organic sense from the old, it is the inevitable logical product of the intellectual, social and technical conditions of our age. A gap has been made with the past, allowing us to face a new aspect of architecture corresponding to the technical civilization of the age we live in. The analysis of the dead styles has been destroyed. Furthermore, the new building throws open the walls like curtains to allow an abundance of fresh air, daylight and sunshine. Instead of securing the building ponderously into the ground, it poises them lightly, yet firmly at the same

Utopia is a brilliant novel written by Thomas More. The idea of a utopia seems impossible, how can anyone live in a perfect place when perfection is in the eyes of the beholder? The Utopia in this novel is nothing more than abundant of already established ideas therefore it can’t not truly be a Utopia.

Different architects have different styles because they are trying to get at different things. Architecture is not just about making something beautiful anymore, it is about trying to get across a set of ideas about how we inhabit space. Two of the most famous architects of the twentieth century, one from each side, the early part and the later part up until today each designed a museum with money donated by the Guggenheim foundation. One of these is in New York City, it was designed by Frank Lloyd Wright. The other is in bilbao, Spain, and it was designed by Frank Geary. My purpose of this paper is to interrogate each of these buildings, glorious for different reasons, to show how each architect was expressing their own style.

The book consists of twelve chapters that propose this idea that designers should explore the nature of our senses’ response to the spatial built forms that people invest their time in. It tries to cover a specific topic in each chapter that in order to deconstruct the book, it is necessary to cover each chapter individually.