A History Of Influence

摘要

Perhaps the most striking feature of the economic downturn is that it is the first real recession of globalisation. This is not because it stems from a failure in the American economy-that has happened several times before-but because its impacts and potential solutions are now so evidently global in scale. It shows that the transformation of British architecture into part of a globalised network, as with Britain as a whole, has been the big story of recent decades. Architecture and the 'Special Relationship', which I wrote with Joe Kerr, analyses the first stage in the globalisation of British architecture by looking at the profound influence America has had on this country since the end of the Second World War. It starts with an account of the cultural interplay between Britain and America since the discovery of the New World, particularly with the growth of capitalist competition between the two nations in the 19th century -eventually leading to US supremacy. Ensuing chapters focus on the intensified transatlantic interchange which occurred after 1945. Rejecting crude and pejorative terms such as Americanisation, the book reveals different strands of influence in which the creation of cultural hybrids became a preoccupation of British architects. Crucial in spurring this process of hybridisation were buildings designed in Britain by leading US architects such as Eero Saarinen, Gordon Bunshaft and, later, Cesar Pelli and Venturi Scott Brown.