LOOK OF ARCHITECTURE

What is style in architecture? 'Style is like a feather in a woman's hat, nothing more', said Le Corbusier, expressing most modern architects' low regard for the subject. But Witold Rybczynski disagrees, and in 'The Look of Architecture', he makes a compelling case for the importance of style to the mother of the arts. This is a book brimming with sharp observations - that form does not follow function; that the best architecture is not timeless but precisely of its time; that details do not merely complement the architecture - details are the architecture. But the heart of the book illuminates the connection between architecture, interior decoration, and fashion. Style is one of the enduring - and endearing - aspects of architecture, Rybczynski concludes. Furthermore, an architecture that recognizes the importance of style would not be as introspective and self-referential as are so many contemporary buildings. It would be part of the world.