Archigram: The Magazine collects all ten issues of the most consequential underground architectural publication of the twentieth century in authorised facsimile — an object whose individual issues now sell for upward of $600 on the rare-book market.
About This Book
Begun in 1961 by the London-based collective Warren Chalk, Peter Cook, Dennis Crompton, Ron Herron, David Greene, and Michael Webb, Archigram the magazine was the primary vehicle through which the group's visionary propositions — Walking City, Plug-In City, Instant City — entered architectural discourse. Lo-fi in production but radical in content, the magazine drew on comic-book culture, Pop art, psychedelia, and the space race to reimagine architecture as a responsive, mobile, and technologically engaged practice. This authorised publication reproduces all ten issues with full fidelity to the originals: flyers, pockets, gatefolds, a pop-up centrefold, posters, and an electronic resistor are all intact. A richly illustrated reader's guide accompanies the facsimiles, with essays, tributes, archival imagery, and biographies contextualising the collection's lasting influence on avant-garde architecture and urbanism.
Key Features
- 288 pages of fully illustrated reader's guide alongside facsimile reproductions of all 10 original issues
- Essays by Peter Cook, David Grahame Shane, and Reyner Banham; tributes from Tadao Ando, Kenneth Frampton, Norman Foster, Bernard Tschumi, Patrik Schumacher, Bjarke Ingels, Toyo Ito, and many others
- Facsimile issues span number 1 (1961) through to final issue 9½ (1974), including all original inserts and material surprises
- Published by De Gruyter, ISBN 9781933045856
What You'll Discover
- How Archigram connected a genuinely international avant-garde network — from the Japanese Metabolists to Frei Otto, Utopie, Haus-Rucker-Co, and Buckminster Fuller — through a self-published magazine
- The direct lineage from Archigram's ideas to the Centre Pompidou and the subsequent generation of technology-embracing practices including Diller Scofidio + Renfro, Future Systems, and Foreign Office Architects
- The material ingenuity of the original issues: pop-up centrefolds, seed packets, electronic resistors, and gatefolds that turned a magazine into an architectural event in itself
- Archigram's reframing of architecture away from static form and toward mobility, flexibility, and responsiveness — concepts that retain currency in contemporary practice and pedagogy
About the Author
Peter Cook was a founding member of Archigram and remains one of the most influential figures in experimental architectural thinking of the past six decades. Thomas Evans and Steve Kroeter are co-authors of this publication, which also draws on contributions from an extensive roster of architects, critics, and historians.
Specifications
- Format: Clamshell box set
- Pages: 288
- Dimensions: 38.1 x 31.8 cm
- Language: English
- ISBN: 9781933045856
- Publisher: De Gruyter
- Publication Date: [Details available upon request]
Perfect For: Architects, architectural historians, and serious collectors with an interest in postwar avant-garde movements, utopian urbanism, and the history of experimental design publishing.