This article was originally published in Domus 979 / April 2014

Criticism may seem somewhat irrelevant to any talk about building now that “starchitecture” is at its acme. After all, the business of a critic is to discriminate the better from the worse, or – if you like – the more beautiful from the uglier, the more valuable from the less. The word implies it. In ancient Greek, it pertains to winnowing or sieving; separating the wheat from the chaff. But starchitecture doesn’t make such distinctions. It is content just to be, and rises above the carping of discriminators.

Criticising celebrity  architects may therefore be like making disparaging comments at a pop concert. Unlike flamboyant architecture, pop music seems to have bred a culture of shrewd, articulate critics, but their words, however sharp, cannot pierce even the most inflated bubbles of reputation. What is true of pop music and star buildings is also true of more muted high-rises.

What can be said in terms of architecture criticism of their sheer walls of standard glassand- steel elements, enclosing floors of almost identical plans? Perhaps some comment on the foyer or on the finial of the skyscraper may count as such. But for the most part, any talk about such buildings is limited to deferential commendations.

''The critic must take stock of what appear to be the banal features of overwhelming buildings''

Criticism is even less relevant regarding those buildings whose extravagant bulk now litters architectural publications – especially the advertising pages. Vastly inflated sails, giant coffeepots or yet gherkins and hedgehogs seem to present the critic with formal entities that challenge him or her to disentangle hopelessly matted strands. Exteriorised plumbing, cross-bracing and huge structural joints look as if they were designed to reduce the approaching visitor or inhabitant to insignificance before the wonders of the machine....Continue Reading