Paul Johnson
What To See In Nuuk
The Phaidon Atlas of Contemporary World Architecture
By Phaidon(ed)
Phaidon 824pp £100
This formidable volume makes the enormous Laurence King Atlas of World Art, published earlier this year, seem puny by comparison. It comes in a special perspex travelling case and must weigh over a stone. It is a superb book in which to browse for anyone with the smallest interest in architecture as practiced today (as well, of course, as for professional architects, of whom there are 30,000 in this country alone). But for such browsing a proper architect's drawing table, with accompanying high stool, is necessary. I have just such an item of furniture in my painting studio at the end of my garden, but in my library this behemoth poses problems.
No editor is credited with general supervision of the project, so I do not know whom to congratulate on its completion. It consists of photographs (mostly good) and live plans of over 1,000 buildings, nominated by a panel of 150 experts as the leading works of architecture built since 1998.
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