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This blog contains interesting current (and not so current) debates about women in architecture. We invite you to take a look, comment, and share any material that could be relevant to this discussion.

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Women and the Changing World of Architecture

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Women and the Changing World of Architecture

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This discussion might need a bit of updating, but I think it highlights some interesting current debates.

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"Women and the Changing World of Architecture" Cathleen McGuigan LF'93

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Women-led Architecture Firms and Collectives

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Women-led Architecture Firms and Collectives

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Femma Planning
Rebel Architette
Vapaa Collective
Collectiu Punt 6

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Women in Design: Denise Scott Brown in Discussion

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Women in Design: Denise Scott Brown in Discussion

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Part of ongoing debate about the discrimination on the basis of sex in architecture, Robert Venturi receiving, individually, the Pritzker Prize in 1991 , regardless of the deeply collaborative work between him and his wife, Denise Scott. Brown.
Part 1
Part 2

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Room at the Top? Sexism and the Star System in Architecture

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Room at the Top? Sexism and the Star System in Architecture

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An essay by Denise Scott Brown.

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Essay by Denise Scott Brown
Most professional women can recount horror stories about discrimination they have suffered during their careers. Mine include social trivia as well as grand trauma. But some less common forms of discrimination came my way when, in mid-career, I married a colleague and we joined our professional lives just as fame (though not fortune) hit him. I watched as he was manufactured into an architectural guru before my eyes and, to some extent, on the basis of our joint work and the work of our firm.

When Bob and I married, in 1967, I was an associate professor. I had taught at the universities of Pennsylvania and Berkeley, and had initiated the first program in the new school of architecture at UCLA. I had tenure. My publication record was respectable; my students, enthusiastic. My colleagues, mostly older than me, accorded me the same respect they showed each other, and I had walked the same corridors of power they had (or thought I had).

The first indication of my new status came when an architect whose work I had reviewed said, "We at the office think it was Bob writing, using your name." By the time we wrote Learning from Las Vegas, our growing experience with incorrect attributions prompted Bob to include a note at the beginning of the book asking that the work and ideas not be attributed to him alone and describing the nature of our collaboration and the roles played by individuals in our firm. His request was almost totally ignored. A body of theory and design in architecture apparently must be associated by architecture critics with an individual; the more emotional their criticism, the stronger is its focus on one person.

To avoid misattributions, our office provides an information sheet describing our preferred forms of attribution-the work to our firm, the writing to the person who signed the article or the nook. The result is that some critics now make a pro forma attribution in an inconspicuous place; then, in the body of the text, the design of the work and the ideas in the writing are attributed to Robert Venturi.

In the Japanese journal Architecture and Urbanism, for example, Hideki Shimizu wrote:

"A review of his plan for the Crosstown Community suggests that Venturi is not so much affording his theory new development as giving the source of his architectural approach clear form in a fundamental attitude toward city planning ...

Venturi's position in relation to city planning is the thing that enables him to develop his basic posture in relation to architecture. The Crosstown Community reveals a profound mood of affectionate emotion."

This would be fine except that the Crosstown Community was my work and was attributed as such in our book; I doubt whether, over a period of two years, Bob spent two afternoons on it.

When Praeger published a series of interviews with architects, my name was omitted from the dust jacket. We complained and Praeger added my name, although objecting that this would spoil the cover design. On the inside flap, however, "eight architects" and "the men behind" modern architecture were mentioned. As nine were listed in the front, I gather I am still left out.

There have been exceptions. Ada Louise Huxtable has never put a foot wrong with me. She also works hard at reporting our ideas correctly. A few critics have changed their methods of attribution in response to our requests, but at least one, in 1971, was on the warpath in the opposite direction, out to prove that Great Art can only be made by one man, and that Robert Venturi (read Howard Roark) is led astray when "he joins his wife Denise Scott Brown in praising certain suburban practices." And the consort and collaborator of a famous architect wrote to me that, although she sees herself in his work, the work owes its quality to his individual talents and not to her collaboration. When real architects collaborate, she claimed, their separate identities remain; she gave as an example the lieder of Schubert and Goethe. We countered with the Beatles.

The social trivia (what Africans call petty apartheid) continue too: "wives' dinners" ("we'll just let the architects meet together, my dear"); job interviews where the presence of "the architect's wife" distressed the board; dinners I must not attend because an influential member of the client group wants "the architect" as her date; Italian journalists who ignore Bob's request that they address me because I understand more Italian than he does; the tunnel vision of students toward Bob; the "so you're the architect!" to Bob, and the well-meant "so you're an architect too?" to me. The head of a New York architecture school once reached me on the telephone because Bob was unavailable: "Denise, I'm embarrassed to be speaking to you because we're giving a party for QP and we're asking Bob but not you. You see, you are a friend of QP and you are an architect, but you're also a wife, and we're not asking wives."

These experiences have caused me to fight, suffer doubt and confusion, and expend too much energy. "I would be pleased if my work were attributed to my husband," says the designer wife of an architect. And a colleague asks, "Why do you worry about these things? We know you're good. You know your real role in the office and in teaching. Isn't that enough?" I doubt whether it would be enough for my male colleagues. What would Peter Eisenman do if his latest article were attributed to his co-editor, Kenneth Frampton? Or Vincent Scully, if the book on Newport houses were attributed to his co-author, Antoinette Downing-with perhaps a parenthesis to the effect that this was not intended to slight the contribution of others?

So I complain to the editor who refers to "Venturi's ducks," informing him that I invented the "duck." (He prints my letter under the title "Less is a Bore," a quotation from my husband). But my complaints make critics angry, and some have formed lasting hostilities against both of us on this score. Architects cannot afford hostile critics. And anyway I begin to dislike my own hostile persona.

That is when self-doubt and confusion arise. "My husband is a better designer than I am. And I'm a pretty dull thinker." The first is true, the second probably not. I try to counter with further questions: "How come, then, we work so well together capping each other's ideas in both design and theory? If my ideas are no good, why are they praised by the critics (even though attributed to Bob)?

We ourselves cannot tease our contributions apart. Since 1960 we have collaborated in the development of ideas and since 1967 we have collaborated in architectural practice. As chief designer, Bob takes final design responsibility. On some projects, I am closely involved and see many of my ideas in the final design; on others, hardly at all. In a few, the basic idea (what Louis Khan called the what) was mine. All of our firm's urban planning work, and the urban design related to it, is my responsibility; Bob is virtually not involved with it, although other architects in the firm are.

As in all firms, our ideas are translated and added by our co-workers, particularly our long-standing associates. Principals and assistants may alternate in the roles of creator and critic. The star system, which sees the firm as a pyramid with a designer on top, has little to do with today's complex relations in architecture and construction. But, as sexism defines me as a scribe, typist, and photographer to my husband, so the star system defines our associates as "second bananas" and our staff as pencils.

Short of sitting under our drawing board, there is no way for the critics to separate us out. Those who do hurt me in particular but also others in the firm, and by ignoring as unimportant those aspects of our work where Bob has interfaced with others, they narrow his span to meet the limits of their perception.

Although I had been convinced with my role as a woman years before the rebirth of the movement, it was my experience as an architect's wife that finally compelled me to act. In 1973 I gave a talk on sexism and the star system to the Alliance of Women in Architecture in New York City. I requested that the meeting be open to women only, probably incorrectly, but for the same emotional reasons (including hurt pride) that make national movements initially stress separatism. Nevertheless, about six men came. They hid in the back and sides of the audience. The hundred or so women identified strongly with my experience; "Me too!" "My God, you too?" echoed everywhere. We were soon high on our shared woe and on the support we felt for and from each other. Later, it struck me that the males had grown glummer as we grew more enthusiastic. They seemed unable to understand what was exercising us.

Since then I have spoken at several conferences on women in architecture. I now receive inquiries of interest for deanships and department chairs several times a year. I find myself on committees where I am the only woman and there is one black man. We two tokens greet each other wryly. I am frequently invited to lecture at architecture schools, "to be a role model for our girls." I am happy to do this for their young women but I would rather be asked purely because my work is interesting.

Finally, I essayed my own interpretation of sexism and the star system in architecture. Budd Schulberg defines "Star Quality" as a "mysterious amalgam of self-love, vivacity, style, and sexual promise." Though this definition catches the spirit of architectural stardom, it omits the fact that stardom is something done to a star by others. Stars cannot create themselves. Why do architects need to create stars? Because, I think, architecture deals with unmeasurables. Although architecture is both science and art, architects stand or fall in their own estimation and in that of their peers by whether they are "good designers," and the criteria for this are ill-defined and undefinable.

Faced with unmeasurables, people steer their way by magic. Before the invention of navigational instruments, a beautiful lady was carved on the prow of the boat to help sailors cross the ocean; and architects, grappling with the intangibles of design, select a guru whose work gives them personal help in areas where there are few rules to follow. The guru, as architectural father-figure, is subject to intense hate and love; either way, the relationship is personal, and necessarily one-to-one. This accounts for the intensely ad hominem stance of some of "Venturi's" critics. If the attribution were correct the tone would be more even, as one cannot easily wax emotional over several people. I suspect, too, that for male architects the guru must be male. There can be no mom and pop gurus in architecture. The architectural prima donnas are all male.

Next, a colleague having her own difficulties in an American Studies program brought the work of Lionel Tiger to my attention. In Men in Groups, he writes that men run in male packs and ambitious women must understand this. I recalled, as well, the exclamation of the French architect Ionel Schein, writing in Le Carré Bleu in the 1950s: "The so-called studio spirit is merely the spirit of a caste." This brings to mind the upper-class origins of the American architecture profession, the differences between upper-class and middle-class attitudes to women, and the strong similarities that still exist today between the architecture profession and a men's club.

American architectural education was modeled on the turn-of-the-century École des Beaux-Arts. It was a rip-roaring place and loads of fun, but its organization was strongly authoritarian, especially in its system for judging student work. The authoritarian personalities and the we-happy-few culture engendered by the Beaux-Arts stayed on in modern architecture long after the Beaux-Arts architectural philosophy had been abandoned; the architecture club still excludes women.

The heroically original modern architectural revolutionary with his avant-garde technology, out to save the masses through mass production, is a macho image if ever there was one. It sits strangely on the middle-aged reactionaries who bear its mantle today. A more conserving and nurturing (female?) outlook is being recommended to the profession by urban planners and ecologists, in the name of social justice and to save the planet. Women may yet ride in on this trend.

The critic in architecture is often the scribe, historian, and kingmaker for a particular group. These activities entitle him to join the "few," even though he pokes them a little. His other satisfaction comes from making history in his and their image. The kingmaker-critic is, of course, male; though he may write of the group as a group, he would be a poor fool in his eyes and theirs if he tried to crown the whole group king. There is even less psychic reward in crowning a female king.

In these deductions, my thinking parallels that of Cynthia F. Epstein, who writes that elevation within the professions is denied to women for reasons that include "the colleague system," which she describes as a men's club, and "the sponsor-protégé relationship, which determines access to the highest levels of most professions." Epstein suggests that the high-level sponsor would, like the king-maker-critic, look foolish if he sponsored a female and, in any case, his wife would object.

You would think that the last element of Schulberg's definition of a star, "sexual promise," would have nothing to do with architecture. But I wondered why there was a familiar ring to the tone-hostile, lugubriously self-righteous, yet somehow envious-of letters to the editor that follow anything our firm publishes, until I recognized it as the tone middle America employs in letters to the editor on pornography. Architects who write angry letters about our work apparently feel we are architectural panderers, or at least we permit ourselves liberties they would not take, but possibly envy. Here is one, by an English architecture instructor: "Venturi has a niche, all right, but it's down there with the flagellant, the rubber-fetishist, and the Blagdon Nude Amateur Rapist." These are written by men, and they are written to or of Bob alone.

I have suggested that the star system, which is unfair to many architects, is doubly hard on women in a sexist environment, and that, at the upper levels of the profession, the female architect who works with her husband will be submerged in his reputation. My interpretations are speculative. We have no sociology of architecture. Architects are unaccustomed to social analysis and mistrust it; sociologists have fatter fish to fry. But I do get support for my thesis from women architects, from some members of my firm and from my husband.

Should there be a star system? It is unavoidable, I think, owing to the prestige we give design in architecture. But the schools can and should reduce the importance of the star system by broadening the student's view of the profession to show value in its other aspects. Heaven knows, skills other than design are important to the survival of architecture firms. The schools should also combat the student's sense of inadequacy about design, rather than, as now, augmenting it through wrongly authoritarian and judgmental educational techniques. With these changes, architects would feel less need for gurus, and those they would need would be different-more responsible and humane than gurus are asked to be today.

To the extent that gurus are unavoidable and sexism is rampant in the architecture profession, my personal problem of submersion through the star system is insoluble. I could improve my chances for recognition as an individual if I retuned to teaching or abandoned collaboration with my husband. The latter has happened to some extent as our office has grown and our individual responsibilities within it take more of our time. We certainly spend less time at the drawing board together and, in general, less time writing. But this is a pity, as or joint work feeds us both.

On the larger scene, all is not lost. Not all architects belong to the men's club; more architects than before are women; some critics are learning; the American Institute of Architects (AIA) actively wants to help; and most architects, in theory at least, would rather not practice discrimination if someone will prove to them that they have been and will show them how to stop.

The foregoing is an abridgement of an article I wrote in 1975. I decided not to publish it at the time, because I judged that strong sentiments on feminism in the world of architecture would ensure my ideas a hostile reception, which could hurt my career and the prospects of my firm. However, I did share the manuscript with friends and, in samizdat, it achieved a following of sorts. Over the years I have received letters asking for copies.

In 1975, I recounted my first experience of the new surge of women in architecture. The ratio of men to women is now 1:1 in many schools. The talent and enthusiasm of these young women has burst creatively into the profession. At conferences today I find many women participants; some have ten years or more in the field.

Architecture, too, has changed since I first wrote this essay. However, my hope that architects would heed the social planners' dicta did not pan out, and women did not ride in on that trend. Postmodernism did change the views of architects but not in the way I had hoped. Instead, the cult of personality increased. Architects lost their social concern and the architect as macho revolutionary was succeeded by the architect as dernier cri of the art world. This made things worse for women because, in architecture, the dernier cri is as male as the prima donna.

The rise in female admissions and the move to the right in architecture appear to be trends in opposite directions, but they are, in fact, unrelated because they occur at either end of the seniority spectrum. The women entrants are young; the cult of personality occurs at the top. The two trends have yet to meet. When they do, it will be fascinating to see what happens. Meanwhile, affirmative action programs have helped small female-owned firms get started but may have hindered the absorption of women into the mainstream of the profession, because women who integrate large existing practices gain no affirmative action standing unless they own 51 percent of the firm.

During the 1980s there has been a gradual increase of women architects in academe (I suspect that the growth has been slower than in other professions). I now receive fewer offers of deanships, probably because there are more female candidates than before and because word is out that I am too busy to accept. I have little time to lecture. As our office has grown, Bob and I have found more, rather than less, opportunity to work together, since some of our responsibilities have been delegated to the senior associates and project directors who form the core of our firm.

During this period we have ceased to be regarded as young turks and have seen a greater acceptance of our ideas than we would have dreamed possible. Ironically, a citation honoring Bob for his "discovery of the everyday American environment" was written in 1979 by the same critic who, in 1971, judged Bob lacking for sharing my interest in everyday landscape.

For me, things are much the same at the top as they were. The discrimination continues at the rate of about one incident a day. Journalists who approach our firm seem to feel that they will not be worth their salt if they do not "deliver Venturi." The battle for turf and the race for status among critics still require the beating-off of women. In the last twenty years, I can not recall one major article by a high-priest critic about a woman architect. Young women critics, as they enter the fray, become as macho as the men and for the same reasons-to survive and win in the competitive world of critics.

For a few years, writers on architecture were interested in sexism and the feminist movement and they wanted to discuss them with me. In a joint interview, they would ask Bob about work and question me about my "woman's problem." "Write about my work!" I would plead, but they seldom did.

Some young women in architecture question the need for the feminist movement, claiming to have experienced no discrimination. My concern is that, although school is not free of discrimination, it is probably the least discriminatory environment they will encounter in their careers. By the same token, the early years in practice bring little differentiation between men and women. It is as they advance that difficulties arise, when firms and clients shy away from entrusting high-level responsibility to women. On seeing their male colleagues draw out in front of them, women who lack a feminist awareness are likely to feel that their failure to achieve is their own fault.

Over the years, it has slowly dawned on me that the people who cause my painful experiences are ignorant and crude. They are the critics who have not read enough and the clients who do not know why they have come to us. I have been helped to realize this by noticing that the scholars whose work we most respect, the clients whose projects intrigue us, and the patrons whose friendship inspires us, have no problem understanding my role. They are the sophisticates. Partly through them I gain heart and realize that, over the last twenty years, I have managed to do my work and, despite some sliding, to achieve my own self-respect.
Endnote
3. The architects originally listed were Philip Johnson, Kevin Roche, Paul Rudolph, Bertrand Goldberg, Morris Lapidus, Louis Kahn, Charles Moore, and Robert Venturi. Also omitted from the dust jacket was the architect Alan Lapidus, interviewed with his father, Morris. Alan did not complain; at least he's up there with those men behind the architecture. ↵
Acknowledgements
Essay republished with permission from the Architectural Association from Denise Scott Brown's AA Words Four: Having Words (London: Architectural Association Publications, 2009), 79-89. Originally published as "Room at the Top? Sexism and the Star System in Architecture," in Architecture: A Place for Women, ed. Ellen Perry Berkeley and Matilda McQuaid (Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1989), 237-46.

Denise Scott Brown is an architect, planner, urban designer, theorist, writer, and educator whose projects and ideas have influenced designers and thinkers worldwide. Working in collaboration with Robert Venturi over the last half century, she has guided the course of Venturi, Scott Brown and Associates by serving on the broad range of the firm's projects in architecture and as Principal-in-Charge of urban planning, urban design, and campus planning. Her experience in interdisciplinary work, teaching, and research has contributed to VSBA's breadth and depth in architectural design.
www.venturiscottbrown.org | @VSBAllc

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Room at the Top? Sexism and the Star System in Architecture

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Essay by Denise Scott Brown Most professional women can recount horror stories about discrimination they have suffered during their careers. Mine include social trivia as well as grand trauma. But some less common forms of discrimination came my way when, in mid-career, I married a colleague and we joined our professional lives just as fame (though not fortune) hit him.

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A great discussion about the Pritzker Prize, its discriminatory selection process, and the (architectural) values it continues to promote.

A discussion between Hilde Heynen and Martha Throne, chaired by Doina Petrescu.

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In conversation Hilde Heynen, the Belgian historian, and Martha Thorne, Executive Director of the Pritzker Prize, address and attempt to unravel the star system in architecture in which â€˜starchitectsâ€™ tend to be male. The discussion will range from issues of authorship and language to gendered concepts of genius and architectsâ€™ traditional role models, which are unfailingly male. The conversation presents and interrogates the positive benefits of the award, its recent encounter with sexual politics and the argument that the star system is exemplified by the Pritzker Prize. This conversation is part of the AA XX lecture series.

Leading up to the centenary of women at the Architectural Association in 2017, over the next three years, a series of lectures, organised by AA XX 100, will draw different generations, disciplines and voices into the AA conversation. Through presentations, dialogue and debate, the series will highlight and challenge the concerns and values of the profession from a theorised gendered perspective which recognises the inclusive and collaborative nature of architecture, while serving as a catalyst for bigger ideas and a wider discussion of women in architecture. The series will feature prominent practitioners from contemporary global architecture and urbanism, as well as articulate the substantial contribution that AA women have made in the last 100 years, creating engaging conversations between past and present, men and women, staff and students.

Martha Thorne is currently the Executive Director of the Pritzker Architecture Prize a position she has occupied since 2005. She also holds the position of Associate Dean of IE School of Architecture & Design, Madrid/Segovia, an institution with an international focus and devoted to quality, innovative architectural studies. From 1996 to 2005, she worked as a curator at the Department of Architecture at The Art Institute of Chicago. She is the editor and author of several books on contemporary architecture, and author of numerous articles for architectural journals and encyclopedias. Ms. Thorne received a Master of City Planning degree from the University of Pennsylvania and a Bachelor of Arts degree in Urban Affairs from the State University of New York at Buffalo. She undertook additional studies at the London School of Economics. She currently sits on the Board of Advisors for IE Higher Education and on the jury for the ArchVision Women in Architecture Prize.

Hilde Heynen is Professor of Architectural Theory at the KU Leuven, Belgium where she specialises in cultural theory and the history of architecture in the modern period. Her books include Architecture and Modernity. A Critique (1999) and The Sage Handbook of Architectural Theory (2012, co-edited with Greig Crysler and Stephen Cairns). She publishes in journals such as Home Cultures and The Journal of Architecture. Among her many books and other publications is "Gender, genius and architecture: The star system as exemplified in the Pritzker Prize" (Architectural Theory Review, 2012).

Doina Petrescu is a Professor of Architecture and Design Activism at the University of Sheffield and Visiting Professor at Harvard GSD. She is also co-founder of atelier dâ€™architecture autogeÌreÌe. Her research focuses on gender and space in contemporary society, co-design and participation. Her approach broadens the scope of architectural discourse by bringing cultural, social, and political issues to inform the design and thinking processes in architecture. Her research methodology combines approaches from architectural theory and design, social sciences, political ecology, and feminist theory. She is the editor of The Social (Re)Production of Architecture (2015), Altering Practices: Feminist Politics and Poetics of Space (2007) and co-editor of Architecture and Participation (2005), Urban Act (2007), Agency: Working with Uncertain Architectures (2009), and Trans-Local-Act: Cultural Practices Within and Across (2010).

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In conversation Hilde Heynen, the Belgian historian, and Martha Thorne, Executive Director of the Pritzker Prize, address and attempt to unravel the star system in architecture in which â€˜starchitectsâ€™ tend to be male. The discussion will range from issues of authorship and language to gendered concepts of genius and architectsâ€™ traditional role models, which are unfailingly male.

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The Feminist City / resources on spatial feminism

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The #1 must-read feminist city text.
READ IT HERE
"Long before Betty Friedan wrote about "the problem that had no name" in The Feminine Mystique, a group of American feminists whose leaders included Melusina Fay Peirce, Mary Livermore, and Charlotte Perkins Gilman campaigned against women's isolation in the home and confinement to domestic life as the basic cause of their unequal position in society.

The Grand Domestic Revolution reveals the innovative plans and visionary strategies of these persistent women, who developed the theory and practice of what Hayden calls "material feminism" in pursuit of economic independence and social equality. The material feminists' ambitious goals of socialized housework and child care meant revolutionizing the American home and creating community services. They raised fundamental questions about the relationship of men, women, and children in industrial society. Hayden analyzes the utopian and pragmatic sources of the feminists' programs for domestic reorganization and the conflicts over class, race, and gender they encountered.

This history of a little-known intellectual tradition challenging patriarchal notions of "women's place" and "women's work" offers a new interpretation of the history of American feminism and a new interpretation of the history of American housing and urban design. Hayden shows how the material feminists' political ideology led them to design physical space to create housewives' cooperatives, kitchenless houses, day-care centers, public kitchens, and community dining halls. In their insistence that women be paid for domestic labor, the material feminists won the support of many suffragists and of novelists such as Edward Bellamy and William Dean Howells, who helped popularize their cause. Ebenezer Howard, Rudolph Schindler, and Lewis Mumford were among the many progressive architects and planners who promoted the reorganization of housing and neighborhoods around the needs of employed women.

In reevaluating these early feminist plans for the environmental and economic transformation of American society and in recording the vigorous and many-sided arguments that evolved around the issues they raised, Hayden brings to light basic economic and spacial contradictions which outdated forms of housing and inadequate community services still create for American women and for their families."

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The #1 must-read feminist city text. READ IT HERE "Long before Betty Friedan wrote about "the problem that had no name" in The Feminine Mystique, a group of American feminists whose leaders included Melusina Fay Peirce, Mary Livermore, and Charlotte Perkins Gilman campaigned against women's isolation in the home and confinement to domestic life as the basic cause of their unequal position in society.

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The career cost of COVID-19 to female researchers, and how science should respond

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The career cost of COVID-19 to female researchers, and how science should respond

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Subscribe to Journal

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The career cost of COVID-19 to female researchers, and how science should respond

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Some funders and journals are trying to support female researchers and others whose publications and positions are at risk. Some funders and journals are trying to support female researchers and others whose publications and positions are at risk.

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Rethinking Architectural Education: Patriarchal Conventions and Alternative Visions from the Perspective of Women Faculty

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Rethinking Architectural Education: Patriarchal Conventions and Alternative Visions from the Perspective of Women Faculty

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Article from 1992. Has anything changed?

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Based on statements from a survey of women faculty in North American architectural departments, we contend that architecture as a gendered discipline frustrates women's participation and voices in the discipline. Three characteristics of the discipline contribute to this sexism and subsequent frustration: the dominance of the star system and the gendering of genius; a hidden curriculum of educational rituals which support power, competition, and hierarchy; and the isolating atmosphere of architectural departments which results from a myopic vision of the architectural act. Based on these concents, we advocate educational practices and a metaphor of architecture that expands the discipline's potential for women and for the culture as a whole.

Journal Information

The Journal of Architectural and Planning Research is the major international interdisciplinary resource for professionals and scholars in architecture, design, and planning. Reporting internationally both recent research findings and innovative new practices, JAPR provides a link between theory and practice for researchers and practicing professionals.

Publisher Information

The Journal of Architectural and Planning Research is unique in the fields of architecture and urban planning. Reporting both recent research findings and innovative new practices, it provides a link between theory and practice for researchers and practicing professionals. Articles come from authors on every continent, providing truly international coverage of research developments.

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RETHINKING ARCHITECTURAL EDUCATION: PATRIARCHAL CONVENTIONS & ALTERNATIVE VISIONS FROM THE PERSPECTIVES OF WOMEN FACULTY on JSTOR

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Based on statements from a survey of women faculty in North American architectural departments, we contend that architecture as a gendered discipline frustrates women's participation and voices in the discipline.

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Architecta perustettiin vaikeina aikoina sotavuonna 1942. Tavoitteiksi asetettiin tuolloin naisarkkitehtien kokoaminen, ammatillinen tukeminen ja kehittäminen, jäsenten etujen valvominen ja virkistäminen sekä kerhon tulojen, menojen ja omaisuuden hoito. Keskeiset tavoitteet ovat edelleen samat: jäsenten yhteen kokoaminen ja virkistäminen, ammatillinen kehittäminen ja naisarkkitehtien koti- ja ulkomaisen yhteistoiminnan edistäminen.

Architecta järjestää jäsenilleen kotimaan ja ulkomaan excursioita ajankohtaisiin ja mielenkiintoisiin kohteisiin. Yhteisissä illanvietoissa kuullaan haatatteluja ja esityksiä sekä keskustellaan. Merkkivuosia juhlitaan juhlaillallisin. Kahdesti vuodessa pidetään sääntömääräinen jäsenkokous. Myös Naisjärjestöjen keskusliiton kautta Architecta osallistuu seminaareihin ja näyttelyihin.
Jäsenistölle tiedotetaan tapahtumista jäsenkirjeillä, joita lähetetään neljästi vuoden aikana.

Jäsenten lukumäärä on noin 220 henkeä. Jäsenten ikäjakauma on laaja ja tehtävät, joissa arkkitehteina toimimme tai olemme toimineet ovat erilaisia, mutta kiinnostuksen kohteet ovat yhteiset ja yhdessäolo on antoisaa ja virkistävää.

Yhdistyksen jäseneksi voi liittyä jokainen suomalainen tai Suomessa asuva naisarkkitehti, joka on suorittanut arkkitehtitutkinnon suomalaisessa teknillisessä korkeakoulussa tai yliopistossa tai vastaavassa korkeakoulussa ulkomailla. Nuoreksi jäseneksi voi liittyä arkkitehdiksi opiskeleva suomalainen naisopiskelija. Yhdistyksellä on myös kunniajäseniä. Yhdistys perii jäseniltään pientä jäsenmaksua.

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Architecta perustettiin vaikeina aikoina sotavuonna 1942. Tavoitteiksi asetettiin tuolloin naisarkkitehtien kokoaminen, ammatillinen tukeminen ja kehittäminen, jäsenten etujen valvominen ja virkistäminen sekä kerhon tulojen, menojen ja omaisuuden hoito. Keskeiset tavoitteet ovat edelleen samat: jäsenten yhteen kokoaminen ja virkistäminen, ammatillinen kehittäminen ja naisarkkitehtien koti- ja ulkomaisen yhteistoiminnan edistäminen.

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Suomi on ollut edelläkävijä arkkitehtuurikoulutuksen mahdollistamisessa myös naisille, sillä jo 1800-luvun lopussa valmistui ensimmäinen suomalainen naisarkkitehti. Architectan puheenjohtaja Pirkko-Liisa Schulman kertoo yhdistyksen synnystä ja naisverkoston toiminnasta. Artikkeli on julkaistu Arkkitehti-lehdessä 2/2017.
Architecta järjestää 75-vuotisjuhlaseminaarin 7.10.2017 Info- ja näyttlytila Laiturissa, linkki tapahtuman tietoihin tässä.

Suomalainen Signe Hornborg (1862-1916) oli tiettävästi ensimmäinen nainen, joka valmistui arkkitehdiksi Euroopassa. Hän opiskeli erivapaudella Polyteknillisessä opistossa Helsingissä ja valmistui vuonna 1890. Hornborgia seurasivat Inez Holming, Signe Lagerborg, Bertha Enwald, Wivi Lönn ja Albertina Östman. Opiston muuttuessa Teknilliseksi korkeakouluksi vuonna 1908 jo kahdeksantoista naista oli valmistunut arkkitehdiksi. Muutamilta opinnot jäivät kesken avioliiton takia. Vuonna 1930 lähes kolmannes Suomen Arkkitehtiliiton jäsenistä oli jo naisia, mikä oli kansainvälisesti hyvin poikkeuksellista.

Architecta perustetaan

Wivi Lönn (1872-1966) oli ensimmäinen oman arkkitehtitoimiston perustanut nainen Suomessa. Hän oli tuottelias ja innovatiivinen arkkitehti, joka suunnitteli merkittäviä julkisia rakennuksia, erityisesti kouluja. Tampereen tyttölyseon (1902) suunnittelun hän sai tehtäväkseen ainoastaan kaksi vuotta valmistumisensa jälkeen. Lönn menestyi jo nuorena arkkitehtuurikilpailuissa ja suunnitteli Tampereelle muun muassa Aleksanterin koulun (1904), talouskoulun (1905) ja keskuspaloaseman (1908). Ammatissaan menestyneestä Lönnistä tuli nuorempien arkkitehtinaisten esikuva.

Jatkosodan aikana toukokuussa 1942 naisarkkitehdit kokoontuivat Lönnin 70-vuotispäiville taiteilijakoti Lallukkaan, Elsi Borgin taiteilijamiehen Anton Lindforssin ateljeehen. Tuolloin arkkitehdiksi oli valmistunut jo sata naista. Architecta päätettiin virallisesti perustaa - siitä tuli maailman ensimmäinen naisarkkitehtien yhdistys. Aino Aalto piti puheen, joka oli niin loistava, että arveltiin Alvarin auttaneen sen laadinnassa.

Lönnin syntymäpäiväjuhlan jälkeen ryhdyttiin toimeen. Perustava kokous pidettiin 3.11.1942 Helsingin Seurahuoneella, jonka ikkunat oli pommitusten takia peitetty hiekkasäkeillä ja suojattu laudoilla. Jo parin viikon kuluttua tehtiin ensimmäinen ekskursio. Aaltojen kodissa vuonna 1944 pidetty kevätkokous oli erityinen, sillä siellä oli puhujina professori J. S. Sirén, arkkitehti Olli Pöyry ja tietysti talon isäntä Alvar Aalto. Hän kertoi kovaäänisesti vieressään istuvalle Wivi Lönnille, ettei koskaan valinnut eroottisiin seikkailuihinsa muita kuin naisarkkitehteja. Lönn ei häkeltynyt vaan kohotti hitaasti lasinsa ja lausui: " Det skålar vi för ".

Naisarkkitehtien kerhon tarpeellisuudesta ja sen suhteesta Arkkitehtiliittoon käytiin vilkasta keskustelua. Monet miesarkkitehdit eivät ymmärtäneet, mihin yhdistystä tarvittiin. "Vaikeata käsittää, mistä syystä tällainen naisyhdistys halutaan perustaa. Onko asioita, jotka eivät siedä mieskorvia?" kysyi arkkitehti Esko Suhonen.

Jo ennen Architectaa, vuosina 1919-24, oli toiminut "arkkitehtityttöjen" Tumstocken-Tumstokki-kerho. Ryhmän päiväkirjaan kerätyt tekstit ja piirustukset kertovat elävästi opiskelijoiden arjesta ja ihanteista sekä arkkitehtuurista nuorten naisten silmin. Esimerkiksi vuonna 1923, päiväkirjan mukaan, Salme Setälä "esiintyi tuumastukeille ensi kertaa polkkatukkaisena. Kokouksen yksimielinen päätös oli, että se sekä nuorensi että puki häntä erinomaisesti. Lausuttiin ehdotus, että kaikki jäsenet leikkaisivat..."

Työelämä laajenee

Sota-aikana ruotsalaiset kollegat avustivat Architectan jäseniä muun muassa kahvilähetyksin. Lähes kolmannes naisarkkitehdeista lähti 1940-luvulla töihin Ruotsiin. Osa lähti turvallisuussyistä lapsineen jo sodan aikana, toiset välirauhan jälkeen. Monet lähtivät yksin "hankkimaan lapsille ruokaa ja vaatteita", kuten eräs architecta muisteli vaikeaa päätöstään jättää lapset Suomeen.

Suurin osa suomalaisista naisarkkitehdeista oli töissä osuuskunnallisilla HSB:llä (Hyresgästernas sparkasse- och byggnadsförening) ja KF:llä (Kooperativa Förbundet). He saivat vaativia suunnittelutehtäviä, kuten asuintaloja, kouluja ja sairaaloita, mikä kasvatti ammattitaitoa ja itseluottamusta. Naiset tunsivat, että heitä kohdeltiin oikeina arkkitehteina sukupuolesta riippumatta. Palatessaan Suomeen he toivat uusia ideoita mukanaan. Ruotsissa luotujen kontaktien ansiosta Architecta sai myöhemminkin vieraita ulkomailta ja järjesti avoimia luento- ja koulutustilaisuuksia.

Perheen ja työn yhteensovittaminen oli naisten suurimpia ongelmia. Architectan vanhemmat jäsenet ovat kuvanneet tunteitaan, kun haluttiin säilyttää ammattitaito eikä aikaa ollut tarpeeksi lapsille. "Äidintunteet, jos niikseen, on vaimennettava, jottei oma kehitys liukuisi vallan alas", eräs heistä tunnusti.

Naisarkkitehdit hakeutuivat usein julkisiin virkoihin, jolloin työajat oli helpompi sovittaa kodin- ja lastenhoitoon. Jo 1920- ja -30-luvuilla puolustusministeriön rakennustoimistossa työskenteli useita naisia, kuten Elsi Borg, Märtha Lilius-Tallroth ja Martta Martikainen-Ypyä. Työ oli kuitenkin vähemmän arvostettua ja palkat huonompia kuin yksityisissä arkkitehtitoimistoissa.

Maailma avautuu

Ekskursiot ovat olleet alusta saakka yksi Architectan tärkeimpiä toimintamuotoja. Aluksi ne suuntautuivat käytännön syistä kotimaahan, mutta jo vuonna 1950 matkustettiin Ranskaan saakka. Rohkeat ja kielitaitoiset architectat tekivät pitkiä kaukomatkoja ja osallistuivat kansainvälisiin tapahtumiin, kuten CIAM:in ja kansainvälisen arkkitehtiliiton UIA:n konferensseihin. Vuonna 1963 osallistuttiin kansainvälisen naisarkkitehtiliiton perustavaan kokoukseen Pariisissa, ja vuonna 1976 peräti yksitoista architectaa matkusti Iraniin järjestön loisteliaaseen konferenssiin, jota shaahitar Farah emännöi.

Architectan järjestämät esitelmät, keskustelutilaisuudet, näyttelyvierailut ja ekskursiot ovat toimineet sekä jatkokoulutuksena että jäseniä yhdistävinä tapahtumina. Vuonna 1978 Architecta osallistui Pariisin Pompidou-keskuksessa järjestettyyn kansainväliseen Les femmes architectes exposent -näyttelyyn. Architectan 40-vuotisjuhlaa varten vuonna 1982 Helsingin Taidehalliin toteutettiin varhaisimpia naisarkkitehtejä esitellyt näyttely, joka kiersi useissa kaupungeissa. Rakennustaiteen museo teki aineiston pohjalta näyttelyn Profiles. Pioneering Women Architects from Finland (1984), joka kiersi lukuisissa kaupungeissa Euroopassa ja USA:ssa.

Architecta järjestää edelleen ekskursioita ja luentoja. 1980-luvulta lähtien yhdistys on jakanut joka toinen vuosi stipendin valmistuneelle naisarkkitehdille ansiokkaasta diplomityöstä. Nykyisin jo yli puolet arkkitehtiopiskelijoista on naisia ja naisarkkitehdit menestyvät sekä toimiston pitäjinä että uusien arkkitehtien kasvattajina, professoreina. Architectan verkosto on edelleen tärkeä.

teksti: Pirkko-Liisa Schulman

Lähteet

Marja Helenius (toim.): Arkkitehteja. Architectan 40-vuotisnäyttely. Architecta 1982.

Ilmi Haapio: Architecta 1942-1952. Architecta1982.

Profiles. Pioneering Women Architects from Finland. Museum of Finnish Architecture 1983.

Renja Suominen-Kokkonen: "Arkkitehtinaiset - koulutus, ammatti ja naisen paikka". teoksessa Arkkitehdin työ. Suomen Arkkitehtiliitto 1892-1992. Suomen Arkkitehtiliitto 1992.

Renja Suominen-Kokkonen: The Fringe of the Profession. Women as Architects in Finland from the 1890s to the 1950s. Suomen muinaismuistoyhdistys 1992.

Architectan arkisto, Kansallisarkisto.

Lainaukset ovat peräisin Tumstocken-Tumstokki-ryhmän päiväkirjasta ja Architectan vuosikertomuksista.

Artikkeli on julkaistu Arkkitehti-lehdessä 2/2017.

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Suomen naisarkkitehtien yhdistys Architecta täyttää 75 vuotta

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Suomi on ollut edelläkävijä arkkitehtuurikoulutuksen mahdollistamisessa myös naisille, sillä jo 1800-luvun lopussa valmistui ensimmäinen suomalainen naisarkkitehti. Architectan puheenjohtaja Pirkko-Liisa Schulman kertoo yhdistyksen synnystä ja naisverkoston toiminnasta. Artikkeli on julkaistu Arkkitehti-lehdessä 2/2017. Architecta järjestää 75-vuotisjuhlaseminaarin 7.10.2017 Info- ja näyttlytila Laiturissa, linkki tapahtuman tietoihin tässä. Suomalainen Signe Hornborg (1862-1916) oli tiettävästi ensimmäinen nainen, joka valmistui arkkitehdiksi Euroopassa.

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Arkkitehti-lehden uusin numero kertoo uudistuvasta koulusta ja kouluarkkitehtuurista. Lisäksi lehdessä keskustellaan arkkitehdin ammatista naisten näkökulmasta ja nostetaan esiin Suomen vahva perinne arkkitehtikoulutuksen tasa-arvoisuudessa.
Koulut kehittyvät jatkuvasti, ja uusien koulujen arkkitehtuuri on korkeatasoista ja elinvoimaista. - usein tämä myönteinen kehitys kuitenkin jää paljon julkisuutta - ja syystä - saaneen homekouluongelman varjoon. Peruskoulu on yksi suomalaisen hyvinvointiyhteiskunnan menestystekijöistä. Nykyisessä sirpaloituvassa ja monikulttuuriseksi muuttuvassa yhteiskunnassa peruskoulu luo myönteistä sivistyksellistä yhteisyyttä.

Uusien opetusihanteiden ja -menetelmien vaikuttaessa suunnitteluun kouluarkkitehtuuriin syntyy luonnollista uusiutumisen painetta. Koulurakentamisen nykyisenä kehityssuuntana näyttää olevan keskittäminen ja entistä suuremmat yksiköt. Tutkimusten mukaan oppimistulokset ovat suurissa kouluissa parempia kuin pienissä. Koulujen kokoa on kasvattanut myös niihin usein yhdistettävät muut kunnalliset palvelut, kuten päiväkoti, kirjasto, urheiluhalli ja neuvola. "Monitoimikeskuksena" koulu on alueellaan entistä merkittävämpi julkinen rakennus, joka palvelee ihmisten arkea.

Lehti esittelee kaksi uutta koulua, jotka edustavat tällä hetkellä suosittua "tähtimallia", ja perusteellisesti korjatun 1960-luvun betonikoulun. Lehdessä on myös katsaus kouluarkkitehtuurin muutoksiin itsenäisyyden ajalla.

Nykyisin tytöt pärjäävät peruskoulussa huomattavasti poikia paremmin. Myös suurin osa arkkitehtiopiskelijoista on tällä hetkellä naisia. Arkkitehtitoimistojen johtajina naisia on kuitenkin edelleen vähän. "Tyttöjä ei kannusteta kasvatuksessa epäonnistumaan tai ottamaan riskejä. Tunnollisuuden vaatimus asetetaan tytöille jo varhain," sanoo Jenni Reuter, joka keskustelee arkkitehdin työstä kolmen muun yrittäjänä toimivan naisen, Kirsti Sivénin, Pia Ilosen ja Miia-Liina Tommilan kanssa. Suomessa naiset ovat toimineet arkkitehteina 1900-luvun alusta lähtien. Lehti esittelee 1940-luvulla perustetun naisverkosto Architectan vaiheita.

Esitellyt toteutukset:

Auroran koulu, Espoo / Auer & Sandås arkkitehdit

Nikkilän Sydän, Sipoo / Ark-house arkkitehdit

Roihuvuoren koulun korjaus, Helsinki / Jeskanen-Repo-Teränne Arkkitehdit

Maunula-talo, Helsinki / Arkkitehtitoimisto K2S

Lisää Arkkitehti-lehdestä osoitteessa www.ark.fi.

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Arkkitehti-lehden uusin numero kertoo uudistuvasta koulusta ja kouluarkkitehtuurista. Lisäksi lehdessä keskustellaan arkkitehdin ammatista naisten näkökulmasta ja nostetaan esiin Suomen vahva perinne arkkitehtikoulutuksen tasa-arvoisuudessa. Koulut kehittyvät jatkuvasti, ja uusien koulujen arkkitehtuuri on korkeatasoista ja elinvoimaista. - usein tämä myönteinen kehitys kuitenkin jää paljon julkisuutta - ja syystä - saaneen homekouluongelman varjoon.