What is Vernacular Architecture?

Gabriel Arboleda
Broadly defined, vernacular
architecture is an area of
architectural theory that
studies the structures made
by empirical builders without
the intervention of
An early 1900s vernacular landscape in Papua New Guinea. professional architects. There
exist many areas of non-
professional architectural practice, from primitive shelter in distant communities to urban
adaptations of building types that are imported from one country to another (fig. 1).
Because of that, vernacular architecture is a very open, comprehensive concept. It is in
fact used as a shortcut and a synonymous for several different practices, and theoretical
stands on those practices. These include primitive or aboriginal architecture; indigenous
architecture; ancestral or traditional architecture; folk, popular, or rural architecture;
ethnic architecture or ethno-architecture; informal architecture; the so-called
"anonymous architecture" or "architecture without architects;" and even “non-pedigree”
architecture.

Notice how most of these practices and/or ideas make the vernacular seem exclusive to
the realm of the exotic and the distant. Yet, in light of the truth, this type of architecture
not only is the most widespread way to build, but indeed most of us were likely raised in
vernacular homes, given that at least 90 percent of the world’s architecture is
vernacular. In this estimate several sources coincide, among them the Centre for
Vernacular Architecture Studies (established by famed folklorist Paul Oliver), which
says that only ten percent of the world's building stock has been
designed by architects.[1] Another source, environmental behaviorist
Amos Rapoport, cites an even more conservative five percent
estimate made in 1964 by Konstantinos Doxiadis.[2]

Fig. 1. Kouta'uya,
Fig. 2. An
Fig. 3. English Being such a widespread way to build, the denomination vernacular
aAmerican
chief andvernacular:
a vernacular:
Victorian
Gothic
vernacular
architecture.
builder.
revival. thus does not apply exclusively to the architecture from the past or
from non-western or rural societies. There is, in fact, a major field of
study called "American vernacular," which documents and classifies
the rural, suburban and urban dwellings of the United States (fig. 2).

Fig. 4. The
Fig.poetic
5. AFig.
popular
6. Energy
vernacular.
stereotype.
efficiency in
vernacular types.
Also in the United Kingdom there is a longstanding tradition of vernacular architecture
theory, which started in the early 1800s, in the context of a search for a national
architectural language. In that search pointed-arch, Gothic architecture was proposed
as the vernacular architecture of England in preference to Romanesque architecture,
which was not vernacular because it was of Norman origin (i.e. it had been developed
outside of the country, in continental Europe) (fig. 3).[3]

The History of the Concept

That there existed theories about vernacular architecture already in the 1800s means
that, as a concept, vernacular architecture is not as new as it might sound. In fact,
although the interest in the vernacular has just grown in relatively recent times, it has
been latent for a long while. The idea of vernacularism in relation to building was hinted
at in the English language since the 1600s, whereas the term "vernacular architecture"
has been explicitly in use since as early as 1818.

During the 1800s, the vernacular was a subject of exploration from different disciplines,
and with different biases. First, and as it was already mentioned, it was a critical
element in the search of national architectural languages. Second, vernacular buildings
in the Southern hemisphere were seen as objects of curiosity: In European magazines
and books, travelers narrated stories about the exotic places they visited, and these
stories often included descriptions of the typical buildings of each place (fig. 4). Third,
the vernacular was used as an element to advance the colonial agenda: Some social
scientists by the end of the 19th century tried to prove that indigenous vernacular
buildings were actually the material evidence of the intellectual inferiority of their
builders (fig. 5).

Architects became interested in bringing the vernacular to the theory of high

architecture by the first quarter of the twentieth century. The praise of the vernacular by
Adolf Loos, Frank Lloyd Wright, and Le Corbusier is well known. However, the decisive
moment for the insertion of the vernacular in high design theory was Architecture
Without Architects, a 1964, very influential exhibition of commented photographs of
vernacular structures at the New York Museum of Modern Art (MOMA). The exhibition
was organized by Bernard Rudofsky and had the ultimate goal of elevating vernacular
buildings worldwide to the category of beaux-arts.
However, by the end of the 1960s, and with works such as Paul Oliver's Shelter and
Society (1969) and Amos Rapoport's House Form and Culture (1969) studies began to
emphasize less the beauty of the vernacular types and more the environmental,
technological, and social contexts in which they were built. In 1976, the International
Council on Monuments and Sites (ICOMOS) formed a special committee to promote
international co-operation in identifying, studying and protecting vernacular architecture.
The growing interest in the vernacular reached a milestone in 1997, with the publication
(under the leadership of the already mentioned British folklorist Paul Oliver and after ten
years of editing work) of the most important reference work edited so far on the topic,
the Encyclopedia of Vernacular Architecture of the World, which has entries by more
than 750 specialists, writing from more than 80 countries.[4]

Oliver's encyclopedia has become an important framework for the discussion on

vernacular architecture. Having now an important portion of the vernacular building
landscape documented in an easy-to-use reference work as the Encyclopedia is, many
scholars have in recent years changed their research focus, from pure documentation of
vernacular types, to focusing instead on the analysis of broad issues affecting the
theory and practice of vernacular architecture. Some of the most important among the
issues explored are identity, ethnicity, heritage and tourism, the end and reinvention of
traditions, power and dominance, and sustainability. A first step in this critical direction
was Dwellings, Settlements and Tradition, edited by Nezar AlSayyad and Paul Bourdier
and published in 1989. This book was the outcome[5] of the first meeting of a now very
influential conference, that of IASTE,[6] which has since then met every two years in
heritage-rich places around the world.

Vernacular Architecture Today

Despite having a long history that dates back to almost two centuries, only over the past
decade vernacular architecture studies have become established into mainstream
architectural discourse. In fact, between 2000 and 2010 literally hundreds of
architectural books and journal articles that touch on the topic have been published in
the English language only.

Why has this happened? The most important reason is the cultural and economic
globalization phenomenon, manifested in at least three ways: global communication
technologies, the global environmental crisis, and global politics. Each of these
 phenomena has decisively increased the general interest in the world's vernacular
architectures.

- Global Communication Technologies

Regarding the first of these three phenomena, a more globally interconnected world
thanks to communication technologies (especially the World Wide Web, the cell phone
and the combination between the two), as well as cheaper transportation (compared to
half a century ago) has raised the interest from new generations of architects and other
professionals in the building of other peoples, in countries other than their own.
Granted, there has been great interest in these architectures since at least the 1960s,
but there is now faster, easier and more extensive access to information on traditional
communities everywhere.

- Global Environmental Crisis

The second factor that motivates contemporary interest in the

vernacular is the environmental crisis, including issues of resource
depletion, global warming, and energy crises. The wake up call for
Fig. 7. Learning
Fig. 8. An
Fig.
with
Upper
9. Traditional
vernacular
Amazon Maloca in urban architects came in the 1990s, when they realized that the building
builders.
structure
settlement. industry (construction and operation) consumes a major part of the
energy produced in the world, while at the same time contributing in
a major way to the world's greenhouse gas emissions. Having
become aware that they are among the key actors behind the
environmental crisis, architectural designers are now exploring ways
to improve their interventions through "green" design. In their
Fig. 10. Fig.
A re-11. Fig.
A popular
12. ... And its
engineered
buildingproblems.
type... exploration, they list vernacular techniques, materials and forms
vernacular. among the most viable alternatives to address the serious
environmental problems in connection to the industry (fig. 6). The
argument is that for hundreds of years common builders managed to build using only a
small percentage of the available energy resources, without negatively affecting the
surrounding environment, and generally speaking in a sustainable manner. Because of
that, the argument continues, these builders' practices should inform the conventional
architectural practices that are highly accountable for today’s environmental crisis.
However, the environmental advantages of vernacular architecture have been highly
idealized. Whether or not it is true that in a distant past most rural vernacular buildings
did offer such advantages, this is not the case today. Global economic, environmental
and political change are deeply impacting and changing traditional building practices all
around the world (fig. 7). In fact, many vernacular architecture types that were (and
keep being) celebrated in books are not built anymore due to environmental, economic,
political, social and cultural change. Resource depletion, as well as economic and
political change have made it very difficult and unaffordable for traditional communities
to build classical vernacular structures such the majestic rainforest malocas (fig. 8). But
also, traditional communities in the developing world have been rapidly changing at a
social and cultural level, becoming for instance less community-oriented and more
individualistic. Therefore, in some cases the traditional structures have become also
functionally obsolete, since more modern structures just do better in solving the
contemporary problems that traditional communities now face.

- Global Politics

The environmental issue connects to the third factor that motivates interest in the
vernacular today, which is that of geo-political concerns. This is a critical issue that
unfortunately vernacular architectural theory has barely touched upon. As some social
scientists have noted,[7] since the late 1980s the nature of international conflict has
changed, from wars between sovereign states to interstate ethnic conflict between a
predominant group and a resisting subordinate one, the conflict often indirectly involving
other states. Such has been the case of the Yugoslav Wars, the Rwanda Genocide and
the Darfur War, just to mention a few recent ethnically driven conflicts.

These well known conflicts demonstrate the critical role that ethnic identity plays today
in global geopolitics. And vernacular architecture has become extremely relevant
because it happens to be a valuable tool in ethnopolitics. This happens at all levels of
ethnopolitical activity, from something as simple as populism politics, when an office
candidate invokes the vernacular to connect with electors (as in "when I was little I was
raised in a humble country house, so now as a politician I understand how is it like to be
poor"), to more elaborate uses of the vernacular, for example in the context of rights
claims and development practice.
Regarding rights claims, it is very common to see today that in changing indigenous
communities—for example urban ones living in regular "modern" houses—the
community manages to still keep a model of a traditional building, even if they normally
do not build that type of structure anymore, and even if they do not use the model (i.e., it
stays empty, only as a display object). Keeping a model of the traditional building helps
these changing communities to support certain rights claims (political, land, educational,
funding…), on the basis that they still maintain their cultural identity (fig. 9).

As for development practice, vernacular architecture is key in ethnically sensitive

government development programs. Through ethnosensitive programs, governments
address the specific necessities of very-low income ethnic minorities, by producing
housing and public infrastructure that uses the communities' traditional architectural
elements (materials, technologies, forms), yet modernizing, re-engineering these
structures as modern vernaculars or neo-vernaculars (fig. 10). These modern
vernaculars are considered to be socially and environmentally more efficient than the
conventional, purely Le Corbusian, modern buildings in simple shapes and built with
concrete and asbestos roofs (figs. 11, 12). Through this ethnically sensitive approach,
local building traditions are given new life, and with that, and ideally, local social, cultural
and economic practices are also renewed. This idea (which is not free of problems)
made Egyptian architect Hassan Fathy famous in the 1940s, and has lately experienced
a revival in the form of "culturally appropriate building," a sensitive approach to
development now championed by governments and multi-lateral organizations including
the United Nations.

In the midst of great technological, environmental and political change over the past
decades, the vernacular has become highly relevant, either as a motive of intellectual
curiosity, as a technological example, or as a politically strategic element. Given that
architecture is inevitably connected to technological developments, environmental
issues and political change, vernacular architecture has thus become a central concept
in architectural theory and practice today.