The Villa: From Ancient to Modern [Hardcover]

Joseph Rykwert (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: November 1, 2000

The essence of 18 spectacular villas, or large country homes, from all over Europe and the United States is captured in the lush photographs and drawings in this beautiful book. Examples range from Hadrian's Villa in ancient Rome to Versailles in France, Thomas Jefferson's Monticello in Virginia, and modern villas by Mies van der Rohe, Le Corbusier, and Frank Lloyd Wright, right through to contemporary houses by Gwathmey Siegel in East Hampton, New York, and by Richard Meier in Naples, Florida.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

If you're tired of those for-sale ads in your local newspaper hawking three-bedroom split-levels and "charming" fixer-uppers and want to feast your eyes on some real real estate, check out this sumptuously illustrated and eruditely narrated revue of perhaps the eighteen most dazzling crash pads of Western civilization. Architecture scholar Joseph Rykwert, who annotates each spread, defines villa rather broadly here to include not only the Renaissance-era Tuscan hideaways that the word evokes but also some of the most celebrated and innovative retreats of the 20th century.

The volume opens with Roberto Schezen's lovely photographs of the Villa of the Mysteries in Pompeii (built in first-century AD but not rediscovered until 1930); Hadrian's Villa in Tivoli, with both its Greek and Roman theater and library, plus the ruins of its baths; the 13th-century Alhambra, its interior walls so richly carved that they look like woven tapestries; and Palladio's archetypal and much-copied Villa Rotonda in Vicenza. It closes, however, with some latter-day jewels that would have knocked the socks off Louis XV and Thomas Jefferson (whose Petit Trianon at Versailles and Monticello in Charlottesville, Virginia, are also included here), such as Adolf Loos' fabulous early modernist villa at Montreux, Switzerland; Le Corbusier's celebrated 1929 Villa Savoye in Poussy, France; and the home that spurred Frank Lloyd Wright's mid-'30s career comeback, the gravity-defying Fallingwater in Mill Run, Pennsylvania--all of which were so astonishingly ahead of their time that they still look as though they must have been built at least a quarter-century after their actual construction dates. (It's still too early to say the same of the book's last two entries, Gwathmey Siegel's sleek 1979 Francois de Menil House in East Hampton, New York, and Richard Meier's 1998 Neugebauer House in Naples, Florida, which, its high-tech coolness notwithstanding, looks more like one of Meier's acclaimed public projects than a private residence.)

The one thing that unifies these homes of vastly different styles and eras is their sheer grandness and majesty of scale. Many may have been conceived as vacation or country homes, but if you're expecting anything like a twee Swiss chalet or a Nantucket clapboard cottage, forget about it. Passing the book around and debating which one you'd choose to spend the night in, however, makes for a great parlor game. This green-eyed reviewer, who probably won't ever own even a tree house, is still trying to decide. --Timothy Murphy

From Booklist

Expect no small debate among amateur architects about the author's choice of 18 villas, from the first century A.D. to 1998. Arguments will, no doubt, center on the definition of villa: truly a country house for summer vacations or a refuge of the rich and the famous? The answer remains in the eyes of the reader, yet it is hard to dispute the luxurious color photographs--interior and exterior--that depict, say, Frank Lloyd Wright's Fallingwater. Wisely, more space is given to the illustrations from the camera of Roberto Schezen; University of Pennsylvania professor emeritus Rykwert gives high-level details on the architect (if known), the owner, and the building's past and current conditions. For the inveterate wanderlust as well as the architect in us all. Barbara Jacobs
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Product Details

• Hardcover: 224 pages
• Publisher: Harry N. Abrams; 1St Edition edition (November 1, 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0810939444
• ISBN-13: 978-0810939448
• Product Dimensions: 11.3 x 9.9 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 3.8 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 2.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,214,748 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Nice, May 28, 2001

By 

"four4leaf" (australia) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Villa: From Ancient to Modern (Hardcover)

This book was of course very nice, but not excellent. The photographic printing seemed a bit dated and it somehow didn't give a real impression of what the villas were really like...a little impersonal. Only Frank Lloyd Wright's house at the end seemed to have enough photos that you got a real feel for it. That said, it is a nice book and I'm sure very interesting for some.

1 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars ONLY ancient and modern villas (no in-between), December 23, 2001

By 

Michael J. Kissimmee (Kissimmee, FL United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Villa: From Ancient to Modern (Hardcover)

Like the previous reviewer said, the villas depicted here seem empty...Probably cause they have no furniture!

I'll bet the authors just took a tour of Italian villas turned into museums to get their shots. Half the villas are in Italy and seem like they are ruins or 'open to the public'. They are more like palaces instead of homes. The modern villas are TOO modern. You know what I mean: box-like or angular stark structures that resemble commercial buildings rather than traditional houses. Fallingwater does have floorplans & is furnished so it was the only villa I liked.