Book Of The Month / December: Architecture of The City by Aldo Rossi

The last #BookOfTheMonth in 2022 is a brilliant book on urban design theory by Italian architect Aldo Rossi published in 1966 - The Architecture of the City (Italian: L'architettura della città). 

The book represents a shift from modernist urban ideologies and leads to a rediscovery of the classic European city.

In the book, Aldo Rossi criticizes modern architectural practice for its lack of awareness of the city in this book. He contends that a city must be examined and cherished as something built over time, with special emphasis on urban artifacts that outlast the passage of time. Rossi believed that the city recalls its past and that we utilize this memory through monuments giving shape to the city. His work was an important reference for the restoration of Berlin after the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1990. 

The book covers four chapters in it: 

1.     The structure of urban artifacts

2.     Primary elements and the concept of Area 

3.     The individuality of urban artifacts; Architecture

4.     The evolution of urban artifacts

As the author stated, this book is a cornerstone of urban studies rather than a perfect theory, and it will be gradually completed by supplements of new considerations related to the city.  However, Rossi's "The Architecture of the City" is exceptional as it provides a superb framework for the study of cities, and this is the reason it has become enormously famous among architects and urban designers.

Here you can purchase this book.