Lewis Mumford and American Modernism

Lewis Mumford and American Modernism examines the career and writings of America's leading critic of architecture. The author of numerous books on the history of architecture, Mumford focused on the roles that technology and urbanism have played in modern civilisation. One of the first to write appreciatively of the achievements of the Chicago school, he was also a fervent supporter of Frank Lloyd Wright, whose buildings embodied the organic, rather than technological, basis for modern architecture that Mumford strongly advocated. Indeed, his writings have proved to be prescient, forming the basis for architecture and urban planning at a time of transition and redefinition at the end of the twentieth century.