By André Tavares

The Anatomy of the Architectural Book examines approaches to structuring, constructing and designing architectural books and traces how they have changed over time. The discipline has been exposed to debates, just as building construction has been exposed to the charms of book making. Examining the crossovers between book culture and building culture makes the axes visible along which architectural knowledge circulates through books into buildings and back – from the celebration of specific architectural practices to the production of unique books, using pages and print to convey architectural ideas. Dissecting a wealth of books through five conceptual tools – texture, surface, rhythm, structure and scale – André Tavares analyses the material qualities of books in order to assess their crossovers with architectural knowledge. Richly illustrated with samples from the library of the Canadian Centre for Architecture, the volume discusses a wide range of authors, including Vitruvius, William Morris, Gottfried Semper, El Lissitzky and Le Corbusier.