The areas you will cover in this course are:
1. Introduction and a starting point: Classical Architecture - Principles and Foundations
- Getting started: the classical tradition
- The classical orders
- The origins of the orders
- Roman developments
- The legacy of classicism
- Classicism and meaning
- After classicism: early Christian and Romanesque
2. Gothic Architecture: Styles and Interpretations
- The elements of Gothic architecture
- Sutton on Gothic architecture
- The 'phases' of English Gothic
- A Gothic 'case study': York Minster
3. Renaissance, Mannerism and Baroque
- The early Italian Renaissance
- The prestige of antiquity
- Alberti
- The High Renaissance: Palladio
- Michelangelo: the transition to mannerism
- The 'distortions' of mannerism
- Mannerism to Baroque
- Sutton on the Baroque
- Rococo - architecture or ornament?
4. Case Study (1): The English Baroque
- The English Baroque
- Wren and the Baroque
- Hawksmoor
- Vanbrugh
- Gibbs
- The 'English Baroque' - a retrospective
5. The Classical Revival: an overview of the rise of neo-Classicism
- Sutton on neo-classicism
- Neo-classical theory
- Neo-classicism in action: Robert Adam
- 'Official' neo-classicism
6. Case Study (2): English neo-Classicism
- Classicism anticipated: the work of Inigo Jones
- Jones's early career
- The Banqueting House
- Jones and Palladio
- Classicism triumphant: the English Palladians
- The 'Palladian moment'
- Palladianism in action
- Palladianism and ornament
7. Nineteenth Century Eclecticism
- Sutton on architectural eclecticism
- The Gothic revival
- The Gothic revival in action: Barry and Pugin
- Styles and values: the search for meaning in architecture
8. Case Study (3): the Victorian City
- The architecture of the industrial city
- Victorian eclecticism
- Architecture and society: the experience of the Victorian city
- Paxton and the advent of iron
- Ruskin, architecture, beauty and morality
- Ruskin and truth to materials
- The Oxford University Museum: a Ruskinian building
- Ebenezer Howard and the garden city movement
9. The Modern Movement
- Sutton on modernism
- Iron as a building material
- Modernism and historicism
- 'The doctrine of modernism'
- Architecture versus 'ornament'
10. Today and Tomorrow: The Contemporary Built Environment
- Sutton on style
- Norman Foster: 'machines for living'
- Richard Rogers: the aesthetics of technology
- Daniel Libeskind: 'beyond the wall'
We strongly recommend that you try to find a little time each week to engage in the online conversations (at times that are convenient to you) as the forums are an integral, and very rewarding, part of the course and the online learning experience.