Understanding Architecture: Its Elements, History, and Meaning

This book was purchased for a college Art class. This was one of the rare times where I looked forward to the assigned reading. Roth writes in an engaging way, and the photos/illustrations of buildings are key to understanding the vocabulary. I enjoyed learning about how we define architecture vs. "mere buildings." It was also neat to be taken on a journey through time, starting from the oldest man-made buildings found at Terra Amata, through today. Roth is an excellent guide as he hits on all the major points, as well as including some subtler examples throughout. I liked how he points out that the architect must be more than a designer of buildings. Since building requires the labor of many people, the project can come to symbolize the values of the society who built it.

This was NOT a rental. It was a purchase, ant it was in bad condition, and I should not have had to pay for it to begin with.

I loved this book. I bought it for my architecture class and it has a lot of detail and information on various topics which is very helpful.

Served its purpose :)

Arrived in a timely manner and does the job but my rental book is literally hanging on by a seam. This book is about to split in half if I turn a page too quickly.

This book will not make it through a week of going back and forth to campus let alone a whole semester!

I didn’t end up using the book for the class but it’s thicc af

Book was as expected