Is modern architecture a “hideous cultural atrocity”? Is insisting on classical buildings the hallmark of a dictatorship? Readers engage in an aesthetic and philosophical debate.

Feb. 11, 2020

Everyone can admire the historical legacy of classical architecture, but its time is past. It’s as absurd to insist that every building wear classical dress as it would be to require public officials to don knee breeches and wigs. America is a country that has long embraced progress and freedom; conformity and a single official style are the hallmarks of dictatorships.

Inventive, socially responsible architects flourished in Germany and the Soviet Union in the 1920s, enriching lives and creating buildings that are now acclaimed as classics. Hitler and Stalin suppressed modernism as an alien assault on traditional values and required that all but a handful of buildings follow traditional models. Talent was suffocated or driven into exile. //

I recall the comment of Prince Charles about the plans for the modernist addition to the National Gallery in London: “What is proposed is like a monstrous carbuncle on the face of a much loved and elegant friend.”

At the same time, I have been to enough Soviet-era “people’s palaces” to shudder at the prospect of official style. I agree wholeheartedly with those who are pushing back against any “official” architectural style, but at the same time I get that we can do better when designing our public buildings.

Enough of the starchitects? Form may follow function, but form also communicates a message. Buildings that resemble fortresses are not welcoming. Those that turn their backs to the street deaden the surrounding neighborhood. A courthouse designed to convey equal justice under the law and transparency might be preferred over one that looks Kafkaesque. //

There’s now hard science to support President Trump’s draft executive order. Today we know that modern architecture stresses the human brain. It’s actually harder for people to look at, take in or even make a memory of any modern building compared with a classical or traditional one. We also know that it is harder for people to walk down a modern street lined with glassy skyscrapers than a traditional one lined with four-story brownstones.