Four (+1) Studios

Given the fact that over the past two decades intellection and technology have conspired to subject the architectural design studio to so profound a sea change, one would imagine that the discipline's discourse would roil with debate on the transformations of the studio and their consequences. Yet where one expects a tumult, one instead finds a casual indifference . . . Few writings consider the effects of that sea change on the fundamental assumptions, means and methods of the studio itself, even though it is those machinations above all that endow architecture with its place in the world. In her collection of essays, Four Studios, Ann Pendleton-Jullian takes a decisive step toward correcting such indefensible nonchalance. Smart, provocative, and personal, her considered argument portrays the architecture studio as an agile event space that has evolved rapidly over time and speculates on how it might better adapt to the new and strange world it finds itself in today. Jeff Kipnis