Professor David Watkin of Cambridge University sees the history of architecture as a history of regeneration and renaissance. The past is not a graveyard of successive architectural styles. On the contrary, architectural history is a testament to the longevity, beauty and vitality of the classic architectural language. Watkin focuses on the aesthetic continuum in which antiquity and baroque, Palladio and Dudok, Gothic, Art Nouveau and the modernists all played a part in the realisation of beauty. Watkin’s history of Western architecture is a manual used widely by institutions of learning and a reference work for anyone interested in the subject.

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‘Watkin’s compelling descriptions and carefully chosen visual material make De westerse architectuur one of the most readable and enthralling histories of architecture published in decades.’ Caroline van Eck in Trouw.

Dutch edition
This book is only published in Dutch. Click on 'Nederlands' in the left corner of this page, to read the Dutch summary.