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Reflections of Prague is the story of how a Czech Jewish family become embroiled in the most tragic and tumultuous episodes of the twentieth century. Through their eyes we see the history of their beloved Prague, a unique European city, and the wider, political forces that tear their lives apart. Their moving story traces the major events, turmoil, oppression and triumphs of Europe through the last hundred years – from the Austro-Hungarian Empire to the First World War; from the vibrant artistic and intellectual life of Prague in the times of Kafka, the Capek Brothers and Masaryk to years of hunger in a Polish ghetto and the concentration camps of Hitler; from the tyrannous rule of Stalin ...
Models of design excellence, Tatras were highly influential in shaping modern car design concepts and the development of the Volkswagen. This book places Ledwinka in his well-deserved place amongst the great car designers.
This book applauds the union of architecture and engineering both today and throughout the history of building and construction. The relationship between the two fields is multifaceted. Some architects may have had an engineering background, and some engineers have experience of architecture. Some unacknowledged engineers have stood modestly behind great architects, and a number of architects have been encouraged and supported by their engineer-collaborators in designing structures that appear to defy gravity. Architects + Engineers = Structures focuses on the ideal: on a cohesive building design team where the members contribute equally, resulting in unique and exceptional designs. These ar...
Drawings are an architect's essential tools of expression: a way of communicating, of formulating ideas, of connecting the hand, the mind and the eye to the sheet of paper. Jan Kaplický (1937-2009) was a visionary architect with a passion for drawing. It was his way of discovering, describing and constructing; and through drawing he presented beguiling architectural imagery of the highest order. Many of his sketches, cutaway drawings and photomontages are brought together and celebrated in Jan Kaplický Drawings. These drawings date from the early years of his independent practice, Future Systems, in the 1970s, to his final ink drawings, executed in the mid-1990s. Featured projects range from design studies for the International Space Station, undertaken with NASA, to the Media Centre at Lord's Cricket Ground in London, winner of the 1999 Stirling Prize. Kaplický was one of the world's last great architect-poet-draughtsmen, upholding a heritage that has its roots in the early Renaissance and has since all but vanished with the advent of computer-aided design. If this book has one central message for architects, it is that drawing as an art and a discipline must not be forgotten.
It may seem extraordinary that architects - designers of stationary objects - should concern themselves with automobile design; but the automobile has long touched architects' imaginations, appearing to them as a house on wheels, as mobile accommodation. When the motor-driven vehicle was invented, architects recognised that its image, form and function would affect the quality of people's lives and their surroundings, and that to propose an automobile was a way to perfect the synthesis of art, design and the latest technology. A number of well-known architects liked to pair the architecture of their houses with their favourite automobiles in order to illustrate the close functional and aesth...
A classic account of life under Nazism and Stalinism that will appeal to fans of Alone in Berlin and Stasiland.
The oral history of a renowned Czech writer, whose optimism and faith in people survived grueling experiences under authoritarian regimes.
This rediscovered masterpiece captures a chilling moment in the stifling early days of Communist Czechoslovakia. 1950s Prague is a city of numerous daily terrors, of political tyranny, corruption and surveillance. There is no way of knowing whether one’s neighbor is spying for the government, or what one’s supposed friend will say to a State Security agent under pressure. A loyal Party member might be imprisoned or executed as quickly as a traitor; innocence means nothing for a person caught in a government trap. When a little boy is murdered at the cinema, the ensuing investigation sheds a little too much light on the personal lives of the cinema’s female ushers, each of whom is hiding a dark secret of her own.
Tatra - The Legacy of Hans Ledwinka is the story of the Tatra company, which originated in the Central European country of Czechoslovakia. It is a tale of great innovation and avant-garde design in automobile engineering. It is also the story of one man - Hans Ledwinka - and his visionary concepts which have become highly influential, although often undervalued, contributions to the development of car technology. Until now, Hans Ledwinka's talent has hardly been recognised; in retrospect, he can be judged equal to car designers such as Benz, Daimler and Porsche, whose endeavours have been fully recorded many times over. With his revolutionary Tatra cars Ledwinka consistently pushed back the ...
The title Archigram came from the notion of a more simple and urgent item than a Journal, like a telegram or aerogramme - hence, "archi(tecture)-gram."".