Reflections: Unit Summary

The Crystal Palace by Joseph Paxton employed the use of glass and steel and has influenced building techniques well past the 19th century

Reflecting on the many revolutions that led to great change in the architectural and design world, architecture seems to skip a generation and then is later revived by the next generation. Gothic and Renaissance revivals can be found around the world from Cathedrals to private residences in America. With political change brought new ideas and while many were still reviving the past, some were looking towards the future and the exotic. New trade routes were opened from the east and a flood of asian inspired creations made their way through Europe, the U.S., and across the globe.
Revolutions brought new design styles. A new America brought new architectural and furniture styles, which differed greatly from the British imperial style. Also the revolutionary war changed design in that people were trying to set themselves apart from the past. Colonial America went from being highly influenced by the British to completely separation and that can be seen through the furniture of the time.

Revolutions and new trades routes changed architecture and design worldwide, however nothing affected the design world more than new materials of the industrial age. Glass and steel were the ultimate materials developed that changed architecture drastically. Greenhouses and arcades employed the use glass and steel initially. Joseph Paxton was inspired by the glass and metal structures of greenhouses and utilized their techniques in the Crystal Palace. The Crystal Palace needed to be erected within months and still be beautiful and revolutionary in its design. The World’s Fair, an exhibition showcasing new machines and technologies around the world, would be the function for its erection and the building itself needed to reflect the new technologies of the time. Crystal Palace was erected in record time and paved the way for structures other than Greenhouses to employ the use of steel and glass.

While machines, technologies, and materials of the era inspired Joseph Paxton and other architects, Phillip Morris and many others followed the philosophy of the hand-made aesthetic. The Arts and Crafts movement, English-Free Architecture movement, and the Aesthetic movement all began in Great Britain. Phillip Morris rejected the machine and thought that well crafted, hand made furniture and design was the best way to approach design. Breathtakingly well-crafted woodwork and hand-made textiles were the direct result of these movements. Not all designers of these movements completely agreed with Morris’s strict handcrafted philosophy and they thought that machinery, if used wisely, could make a design better. These movements quickly took off in the U.S. especially in New York and Chicago, where the Arts and Crafts Movement would soon influence Frank Lloyd Wright and lead the arts and crafts style into the 20th century. These movements were very simplistic in design compared to the extravagant baroque and renaissance designs of the preceding era. These simplified designs eventually allowed for even more abstract ideas to occur in the early 20th century with the beginnings of modernism.

New materials, revolutions, design philosophies, and design movements from Great Britain define design of the 19th century. Architects were reflecting back on the past while moving forward with new technologies in building. The connection between the past and the present had not been severed and would not be severed until the modernist movement. Architects of all time periods continue to reflect on the past for inspiration. We try to find a balance between the past and the present and it will continue to be a struggle in many architects minds on whether to reject the past in order to move forward or to learn from the past in order to make better designs for the future.