Cycle of Design: Design Manifesto

“Architecture, being art, is supposed to have movements. In the customary sequence, a movement starts in relevance, loses it but prospers anyway for many years, then succumbs to the next cycle.” – Stewart Brand

This quote comes from a book by Stewart Brand, How Buildings Learn: What Happens After They’re Built. This quote is a beautiful explanation of the design cycle. There are so many different styles of architecture and design that have taken place throughout history. Brand is basically saying that these styles start out popular and then loose their popularity for a some time. Eventually, society cannot resist bringing that style back. It all comes around full circle. This relates to historic preservation. Old buildings will go out of style and be disliked. But instead of tearing them down, I think it is important to preserve them and bring them up to tempo with current times. By doing this, it provides the opportunity for the building to become popular again and complete the circle. If all the buildings from, say, the art deco period get torn down, what happens when that movement comes back? Or even just pieces from that movement come back. We will have to recreate architecture that was already once there. It is important to respect past architectural movements because as Brand states, these movements “…succumb[s] to the next cycle”.