On Rhetoric

As ever a current debate, two interesting viewpoints on this matter gained media attention in the last seven days.

On Nov 13, Utopia Arkitekter’s CEO Emma Jonsteg debated on Swedish Television against the use of a new development in Växjö which is called a pastiche of a building from the turn of the century. Arguably, her opponent gave her a decent fight for the money. He was well prepared and kept to the topic, whereas Emma occasionally strayed from it and kept pushing her own agenda.

More from Arkitektupproret’s website:

http://www.arkitekturupproret.se/2017/12/23/en-julklapp-at-oss-som-vill-se-vackrare-arkitektur/

Arkitektupproret is a group of people strongly opposing the modern ‘boxes’ being built today.

In the UK yesterday, a similar point was brought up when the Housing Minister Kit Malthouse tweeted and argued against modernism and for classicism.

’The reason we have a housing crisis is that public authorities stopped commissioning housing.’

Visualisation from SVT Nyheter

The conclusion deriving from all this nonsense is that the key players in this debate are cleverly employing architecture to further their agendas. The debates themselves are not the main course for me, I appreciate the rhetorical exercise though I do find it rather harsh and populist and not necessarily what we need right now.