ABSTRACT
Architecture has been given considerably less attention in philosophical writing than, for example, either painting or music. There is an obvious reason for this: it is very easy to reduce its significance by treating it as merely one of the applied arts, and so more like furniture-making or music that serves some particular purpose such as military marches or dance music. Ironically, much of twentieth-century architectural theory in effect endorsed such a view with its repeated refrain that form should follow function, a slogan first coined by the American architect, Louis Sullivan (1856-1924); in other words, that practical purpose should wholly determine building style. How far actual practice ever conformed is a moot point, since in so much modern architecture the desire for simple forms was often allowed to override practical functions (Graham 2000); hence the reason why so much modern housing was eventually abandoned. But there were in any case two basic faults with the slogan. The first is that function cannot in fact be so easily divorced from wider human concerns. Thus housing, for example, is unlikely to satisfy unless a much wider raft of interests are taken into account besides adequate space for eating, sleeping and relaxing. Also relevant would be environmental setting (including questions such as view, garden or ambient noise) and ease of access (both directly and in terms of neighboring facilities such as shopping and entertainment). Similarly, shops need to take into account not just the ability to display the relevant wares but also such things as security of setting, and even confidence generated in the business by the sense of the building as one that is here to stay.
