The Architectural Theory of Viollet-le-Duc: Readings and Commentaries

About this book

Among architects and preservationists the writings of Viollet-le-Duc (1814-1879) have long been considered major resources. They inspired a generation of American architects including Frank Furness John Wellborn Root Louis Sullivan and Frank Lloyd Wright. In 1894 the critic Montgomery Schuyler observed that Viollet-le-Ducs books "have had the strongest influence on this generation of readers." But for the past century all but one of his works have been out of print in English. These readings carefully selected from the entire range of Viollet-le-Ducs work make available the historical insights and practical principles of one of the most imaginative and inspiring architectural theorists of the modern era. M.F. Hearn has culled from Viollet-le-Ducs books on architecture the passages in which his major ideas about the theory of architecture are most cogently expressed.Hearn has arranged and interplated the readings in a sequence of topics covering Viollet-le-Ducs views on the architecture of the past his convictions about the education of architects his philosophy of method principles of design and his guidelines for restoration. The selections are introduced by a biographical essay connected by interpretive commentaries and followed by a biographical note.