Naked Architecture

Naked Architecture by Valerio Paolo Mosco provides an account of one of the most interesting phenomena of contemporary architecture: the return to the structure and methods with which contemporary constructions are realised.

Over the last ten years, architecture seems to have rediscovered engineering. With the Postmodern period, where the structure of buildings was camouflaged by coverings of every kind, now behind us, architecture today appears to have undressed. It's almost as though it wishes to show how it is made, rendering this spectacle evident.

On the other hand, the rediscovery in recent years of plastic form has nurtured a closer relationship between architects and engineers. In the wake of the phenomenon inaugurated by the work of Santiago Calatrava, figures like engineer-architects Cecil Balmond, Sasaki, and Guy Nordenson have emerged. They have been able to give a strongly "engineering-oriented" guise to increasingly complex building sites.

Moreover, there is a rising of new issues, such as environmental engineering, which has transitioned from being a specifically technical domain to engaging with other realms of knowledge, including aesthetics. If there is a unifying phenomenon today within the various expressions of contemporary architecture, it is precisely this return to the structure and methods with which it is realised.