Classical Architecture: What is it all about?

Classical architecture is very exciting the more I've learned about it during my life. It is also alive and well, with a plethora of contemporary classical Architects designing and constructing new classical buildings.  However, some have misconceptions that classicism is a superficial style or it is just about columns and ornamented pediments. Let me clear up the confusion as I've come to understand it. 

A detail of a classical arcade and groin-vaulted ceiling. Photograph of the interior of the neoclassical Philadelphia Mint building. 

Classical architecture is not just about columns and sculpture. It is not about the superficial at all. Classical buildings can be made without those elements and still be classical. 

My illustration of one of the most famous classical complexes: the temples of the Acropolis in Athens Greece. Imagine climbing up the Acropolis and walking through the sequence of spaces and how those moments would set the mood for seeing one of Ancient Athens most sacred temples - the Parthenon  - for the first time. 

Classical architecture is all about the thing signified and the thing which gives it significance. It is motivated by the ideal that architecture's primary goal is a beneficial effect on the user of the space: by elevating that person's mental health, pleasure, and empowerment. This stems from the governing concept of democracy and rule by the empowered population instead of the elite. 

Two different interpretations of classical design. 

Above, my own facade design for a temple to democracy using proportions based on Palladio's descriptions in his Four Books on Architecture. 

Below, my light study model using those same principles. 

Classicism gives you the tools to achieve these goals in design, such as with proportions and the relation of voids and masses. Everything else, all the decorations, is frosting on the cake that simply amplifies that original guiding concept. 

If you want to learn more, the ICAA offers a bunch of great free classes online that you can use to get familiar with classical architecture and traditional building in general, as well as intensive workshops during the year. In addition to classic books like Vitruvius and Palladio, Perrault also offers useful descriptions of Architecture. His diagrams of the five orders, for example, became staples for architecture education for 300 years. Additionally, a variety of schools in the US and abroad offer programs that specialize in classical design and traditional building for you to explore. 

Architectural Concensus: What is Acceptable Design?

Recently,  someone asked what the general consensus in architecture is about style.

Here are my thoughts:

First, there is no general consensus nor should there be one: who has the right to say what can and can not be designed? The design police? 

 Architecture is first and foremost about sculpting our experience of space, on the verge between light and silence. Style is an added layer of refinement. Could a modern day architect successfully build a breathtaking and genuine architecture and use the classical style? Absolutely! Could a modern day architect do the same in a post modernist style? Absolutely. The choice exists and that diversity in architectural expression ought to be celebrated. 

The problem is when these things become imitations and not emulations, decorated sheds instead genuine architectural experiences.

Case in point: Comparing a real courtyard with a building branded as "courtyard."

 And this is a problem that afflicts the whole spectrum of design. I've seen designs trying to be brutalist but they end up with "brutalist light," trying to be Wright but end up "Wrightish," trying to be international modern but ending up "moderny." 

To answer your question, the McMansion problem is really a problem of a meme/cartoon of a building type, instead of a genuine design, trying to pass as architecture. It has nothing to do with the style in which the building gets built. That is a separate issue entirely.