There were not many facets of American life that emerged from the 1960s resembling what they looked like going in – music, art, motion pictures, journalism. All were transformed during the turbulent decade. So, too was architecture. By the time John Kennedy took office modern architecture was producing one glass and steel box indistinguishable from the next. The “rules” of the game made any sort of ornamentation verboten. While architects towed the line to Mies can der Rohe’s dictate that “less is more,” Philadelphia’s Robert Venturi began to say, “less is a bore.”
Modern architecture had never been organic, never taken much stock in the surrounding culture and architectural traditions that came before. “Here I am,” a boxy International Style building seemed to say. “Deal with it.” Designers began to conclude that architecture should be more responsive and a bit less arrogant. Gradually a postmodern sensibility creeped into the profession.
There was certainly no dramatic renunciation of the International Style. Philip Johnson was continuing to churn out serious-minded modern towers through the 1970s when he suddenly delivered the At&T Building in New York City with a crown that resembled a piece of vintage furniture. Then his complex of glass towers for the Pittsburgh Plate Glass Company was built with 231 Neo-Gothic spires. So in the 1980s decorative elements for nothing more than decoration’s sake were back. So was color. So too were patterns and textures and symbolism. Horizontal and vertical lines became endangered species. Whereas “form followed function” in modern architecture in a postmodern world form was whatever the designer felt like expressing. If that expression happened to be humor, bring on the funny stuff. Postmodernism introduced whimsy in a way that hadn’t been seen in American buildings since the days of sculptural mimetic roadside architecture in the Golden Age of Motoring. Visual boredom was no longer on the menu.
Postmodern architecture dominated the latter years of the 20th century and continues to influence design. The movement grew from an attempt to “correct” the perceived limitations of its immediate predecessor, modern architecture. Such a fate will befall postmodernism one day for as Newton’s third law teaches us: for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction.