Show Notes
Stan Allen and Michael Meredith discuss the text Complexity and Contradiction in Architecture by Robert Venturi, published in 1966. They talk about architecture education, writing, and pragmatism, among other topics. While Stan first encountered the book as a freshman at Brown University in 1975, the text made perhaps a more pronounced return to Stan’s practice in the recent decade.
Stan Allen is an architect, writer, educator, and former dean of Princeton University School of Architecture.
Michael Meredith teaches and runs a small practice with Hilary Sample.
Guest: Stan Allen
Host: Michael Meredith
Editor: Michael Meredith, Bruce Hongming Liang
These conversations were recorded in parallel to the exhibition Building with Writing at Princeton University School of Architecture in Spring 2025, on the work of Stan Allen.
More from Building with Writing
Stan Allen and Michael Meredith talk about the formation of Building with Writing and the role of architecture exhibitions in the discipline.
Stan Allen and Michael Meredith talk about the role of teaching in relation to writing and practicing and how they mutually form each other.
Michael Meredith talks to Mónica Ponce de León about her experience as a managing editor at Assemblage, interests in typology and surface, as well as Stan Allen's contribution both to the discipline and to the Princeton University School of Architecture.
Michael Meredith talks to Hilary Sample about her experience with Stan Allen as his first thesis student at Princeton Univeristy, and architectural education at the turn of the century.
Stan Allen and Michael Meredith talk about one of Stan Allen’s most well-known texts, From Object to Field: Field Conditions in Architecture and Urbanism, and how the ideas explored in the piece translate into different scales across object, urban, and landscape.