Postmodernism: When Architecture Started Joking
Serious architecture got the joke.
Not everyone laughed.
Enjoy the era when architecture rediscovered colour, memory and mischief — and learn why its playful rebellion against good taste still divides critics today.
Architecture’s inside jokes will finally land for you.
- Get the joke — understand what these winking buildings are actually saying
- Know the rebellion — grasp why architects turned on modernism's strict rules
- Read the references — spot the history quoted, twisted and paraded on facades
- Recognise the icons — identify the landmark buildings that made critics furious
- Form your verdict — decide where you stand with arguments you can defend
- Loosen your judgement — let playfulness back into how you think about design
Built by one of the most-read architecture platforms in the world.
RTF | Rethinking The Future has spent over a decade publishing the ideas, projects and voices shaping architecture — and now brings that depth to learning. Every course is researched, written and produced by the RTF team.
Taste is a debate. Bring an opinion.
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A few hours from now, you could already see differently.
Postmodernism confused me because nobody could tell me if it was serious. Learning the theory behind the jokes, the critique of modernist orthodoxy and the return of symbol gave the period coherence. I now get the humour and the argument underneath it, which makes recent architecture far easier to read.
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Was Postmodernism a mistake we should skip past?
Skipping it means missing why Modernism cracked and what architects do when certainty collapses — lessons very alive in today's pluralist scene.
Will this help me form my own position on ornament and reference?
That's the aim. Postmodernism forces the question of what architecture is allowed to say, and you'll leave with your own answer.
Do I need any prior experience?
No. Every course starts from where you are and builds up step by step, in plain language.
Is this software training?
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- 5 Sections
- 25 Lessons
- 4 Hours
- 1. The World That Made It5
- 2. What They Built5
- 3. How They Built It5
- 4. The Language5
- 5. What Survived and What It Changed5
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Postmodernism confused me because nobody could tell me if it was serious. Learning the theory behind the jokes, the critique of modernist orthodoxy and the return of symbol gave the period coherence. I now get the humour and the argument underneath it, which makes recent architecture far easier to read.
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