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Making modern Paris : Victor Baltard's Central Markets and the urban practice of architecture / Christopher Curtis Mead.

By: Mead, Christopher Curtis.
Contributor(s): Baltard, Victor, 1805-1874.
Material type: materialTypeLabelBookSeries: Buildings, landscapes, and societies ; 7.Publisher: University Park : Pennsylvania State University Press, 2012Description: xxii, 300 p. : ill. ; 27 cm.ISBN: 9780271050874.Subject(s): Baltard, Victor, 1805-1874 -- Criticism and interpretation | Halles centrales (Paris, France) | Architecture and society -- France -- Paris -- History -- 19th century | City planning -- France -- Paris -- History -- 19th century | Paris (France) -- Buildings, structures, etcDDC classification: 720.92
Contents:
Reconsidering Victor Baltard -- Classicism and the architect's education -- Representing Paris -- Decorated construction -- An urban history of the Central Markets -- Housing the city -- Epilogue on function and typology in Baltard's urban architecture -- Appendix. Career chronology of Victor Baltard.
Summary: Investigates how architecture, technology, politics, and urban planning came together in French architect Victor Baltard's creation of the Central Markets of Paris. Presents a case study of the historical process that produced modern Paris between 1840 and 1870--Provided by publisher.
Holdings
Item type Current library Call number Copy number Status Barcode
General lending MTU Cork School of Music Library Lending 720.92 (Browse shelf(Opens below)) 1 Available 00163472
Total holds: 0

Enhanced descriptions from Syndetics:

The name of the architect Victor Baltard is inseparable from the Halles Centrales of Paris, the complex of iron-and-glass pavilions built between 1854 and 1874 in the historic heart of the city. Making Modern Paris is the only comprehensive study to address systematically not only the role Baltard played in the markets' design and construction but also how the markets relate to the rest of Baltard's work and professional practice. Christopher Curtis Mead interprets the Central Markets as a cogent expression of Baltard's professional experience as he adjusted his academic training to new criteria of municipal administration, urban planning, and building technology. Considering his entire career over the three decades he worked for the Prefecture of the Seine, this investigation of how architectural and urban practice came together in Baltard's work offers a case study of the historical process that produced modern Paris between 1840 and 1870.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Reconsidering Victor Baltard -- Classicism and the architect's education -- Representing Paris -- Decorated construction -- An urban history of the Central Markets -- Housing the city -- Epilogue on function and typology in Baltard's urban architecture -- Appendix. Career chronology of Victor Baltard.

Investigates how architecture, technology, politics, and urban planning came together in French architect Victor Baltard's creation of the Central Markets of Paris. Presents a case study of the historical process that produced modern Paris between 1840 and 1870--Provided by publisher.

Table of contents provided by Syndetics

  • List of Illustrations
  • Acknowledgments
  • Chapter 1 Reconsidering Victor Baltard
  • Chapter 2 Classicism and the Architect's Education
  • Chapter 3 Representing Paris
  • Chapter 4 Decorated Construction
  • Chapter 5 An Urban History of the Central Markets
  • Chapter 6 Housing the City
  • Epilogue on Function and Typology in Baltard's Urban Architecture
  • Appendix: Career Chronology of Victor Baltard
  • Notes
  • Bibliography
  • Index

Reviews provided by Syndetics

CHOICE Review

In this outstanding work of scholarship, Mead (Univ. of New Mexico) subjects the career of Victor Baltard, architect of Les Halles, the Central Markets of Paris, to an examination that commences with a discussion of the skepticism that has hovered over Baltard's reputation since the 1870s. Caught between the rigors of Beaux-Arts classicism, the requirements for flexibility in the Central Markets, and the emerging constructional media of iron and glass, Baltard's most famous work required him to contravene important tenets of his classical training. In chapter 3, "Representing Paris," readers learn that skepticism about Baltard was further compounded by his extensive preoccupation with the administrative regulation and planning for the city. Chapter 4, "Decorated Construction," analyzes Baltard's own designs and his interventions in historic Parisian churches. Chapter 5 presents the full story--extensively illustrated with original drawings--of the Central Markets. Mead's epilogue traces the critical discussions of function and typology in Baltard's work from Sigfried Giedeon and Walter Benjamin in the 1920s-30s to Aldo Rossi and Anthony Vidler in the 1980s-90s, and concludes with remarks on the vacuity of the park that replaced the "stomach of Paris." Summing Up: Highly recommended. Upper-level undergraduates through researchers/faculty. J. Quinan University at Buffalo, SUNY

Author notes provided by Syndetics

Christopher Curtis Mead is Regents' Professor of Architecture and Professor of Art History at the University of New Mexico.