Critical Regionalism

Globalization has transformed our civilization today possibly more than any other civilization in history. With globalization comes many things. Some good. Some bad. One of the seemingly bad results of globalization is the consistency, regularity and similarity it brings. The field of Architecture is especially vulnerable to this side-affect. As more and more themes become popularized and globalized, “the possibility of creating significantly urban form has become extremely limited (Frampton, 16). As designers, I think it is our responsibility to combat the dullness of placeless architecture by embracing critical regionalism. Doing so requires preserving a “high level of critical self-consciousness” (Frampton, 21).

One way to do this effectively, in my opinion, is to concentrate on the local individual person. Local culture at a personal level will oppose globalization. Learning about the daily lives of individuals, their thoughts, their actions and their beliefs will result in a unique set of design criteria that will by its nature be contrary to globalism.

Another strategy for embracing critical regionalism is to embrace local materials and the local labor that possesses knowledge about these materials. Unfortunately, globalization often makes doing this more expensive than simply shipping in foreign products and labor. However, if a designer concentrates his design around utilizing local resources, it is often more achievable than one might originally think.