OMA announces the release of "architect, verb" by Reinier de Graaf, a book tracing the history of the terms dominating architecture discourse today.
If De Graaf’s debut book Four Walls and a Roof was about debunking myths within the architecture profession, "architect, verb" aims to debunk myths projected onto architecture by the outside world – a rebuttal of doctrines which have been applied to architecture over the last twenty years. The incorporation of extraneous terms such as “livability”, “innovation” or “well-being” into the glossary of architecture is part of an ongoing trend in which the language to debate architecture is less and less architects' own, and more and more that of outside forces imposing outside expectations. Once a profession known for its manifestos, architecture finds itself increasingly forced to adopt ever-more extreme postures of virtue, held accountable by the world of finance, the social sciences or the medical sector.
The book includes a satirical dictionary of ‘Profspeak’, the corporate language of consultants, developers and planners, from “active listening” to “zoom readiness”.
Architect, verb is published by Verso and will be launched in London at the Design Museum on February 28, and at the AA Bookshop on March 1st.
Reinier de Graaf is a Dutch architect and writer. He joined Office for Metropolitan Architecture (OMA) in 1996 and was co-founder of its think tank AMO. He is the author of Four Walls and a Roof: The Complex Nature of a Simple Profession, the Hospital of the Future Film, the novel The Masterplan, and Architect, verb: The New Language of Building.
If De Graaf’s debut book Four Walls and a Roof was about debunking myths within the architecture profession, "architect, verb" aims to debunk myths projected onto architecture by the outside world – a rebuttal of doctrines which have been applied to architecture over the last twenty years. The incorporation of extraneous terms such as “livability”, “innovation” or “well-being” into the glossary of architecture is part of an ongoing trend in which the language to debate architecture is less and less architects' own, and more and more that of outside forces imposing outside expectations. Once a profession known for its manifestos, architecture finds itself increasingly forced to adopt ever-more extreme postures of virtue, held accountable by the world of finance, the social sciences or the medical sector.
The book includes a satirical dictionary of ‘Profspeak’, the corporate language of consultants, developers and planners, from “active listening” to “zoom readiness”.
Architect, verb is published by Verso and will be launched in London at the Design Museum on February 28, and at the AA Bookshop on March 1st.
Reinier de Graaf is a Dutch architect and writer. He joined Office for Metropolitan Architecture (OMA) in 1996 and was co-founder of its think tank AMO. He is the author of Four Walls and a Roof: The Complex Nature of a Simple Profession, the Hospital of the Future Film, the novel The Masterplan, and Architect, verb: The New Language of Building.
