Architecture Vietnam

Beautiful Modernist Architecture

As the leaders of America take the USA into the decadence of mandating the use of Greco-Roman classical architecture, we are thankful to celebrate the Vietnamese culture in their embracing of modernism. Our forthcoming book "Southern Vietnamese Modernist Architecture" celebrates the achievements of the Vietnamese in developing a modernist vernacular architecture that represents their identity and beautifies their world.

The classicists in the U.S. and the U.K. insist that only classical architecture is beautiful and that modernism is a "hideous cultural atrocity." It seems that half of Americans believe this, which is not surprising considering the practical nature of American culture.

The marker for judging the acceptance of an architecture is what people live in. Westerners have never much accepted modernist architecture for their houses, The houses of Americans are modern, but not modernist, and are usually of historicist period-revival styles such as Spanish-colonial.  Meanwhile, the southern Vietnamese actively embraced their version of modernist architecture in the mid-century and continue to do so today. There are few other cultures in the world that have done so to the degree the Vietnamese have. You can pick any southern Vietnamese neighborhood at random and walk down the streets and find that substantially over half of the houses are beautiful modernist.

How and why did the southern Vietnamese embrace modernism? Those are the questions answered in our forthcoming book. We look forward to announcing its publication soon.

Southern Vietnam is a center of modernism in the world

Modernist streetscape in Ho Chi Minh City

In our upcoming book on "Southern Vietnamese Modernist Architecture," we claim that southern Vietnam became a center of modernism in the world because the culture embraced modernism. The modernist architecture of Vietnam became the vernacular architecture of houses. If you pick any street or lane at random in the southern cities, you can walk down that street and find that over 70% of the houses will be overtly modernist, and the remainder will be a mix of utilitarian and neoclassical. This community is unusual in the world. Not many cultures have embraced modernism like this. Seventy years of modernist architecture in Vietnam has made it a center of modernism in the world.

 

This streetscape shows the typical modernist architecture along Hẻm 15, Đường Cầu Xéo in the Tân Phú District of Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam. Only the first house on the left is not modernist.

It is the steel or reinforced concrete structural frame that makes modernist buildings possible

A hotel in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam

The invention of the structural materials of steel and reinforced concrete in the nineteenth century allowed modernist architecture to develop in the twentieth century. Unlike classical age buildings that required massive load-bearing masonry walls, walls could be hung like curtains on the structural frame fabricated from those materials. This revolutionized architecture as modernist architects realized the freedom they now had to develop previously inconceivable forms. And the structural frame itself could be part of the design. This hotel in the neighborhood of the airport in Ho Chi MInh City is a clear expression of structure. The columns, intersecting beams, and floor slabs are the prime factor in the design, and simple screens and walls are added to the frame to accommodate the room functions. Add a bit of color and you have an interesting modernist composition.

Contemporary Vietnamese modernist architecture continues the principles of modernism developed in the golden age 1945-1975

Contemporary apartment house in Ho Chi Minh City

Our forthcoming book on Vietnamese Modernist Architecture focuses on the three decades of the golden age of Vietnamese modernism between 1945 and 1975. The principles and techniques of Vietnamese modernist architecture were developed in that period and made Vietnam an unrecognized center of architectural innovation in the world. Most importantly, the southern Vietnamese as a culture embraced modernism, and it is the vernacular architecture of the culture, especially for dwellings. This new house in the Tan Phu district of Ho Chi Minh City shows that the principles of the golden age continue today — a lightness of scale that breaks down the mass of the building, along with shading elements that respect the climate.

International Style vs. Vietnamese Modernism

National Treasury Building at 37 Nguyễn Huệ Boulevard, Ho Chi Minh City

You may think the building in the middle of this photograph is a global International Style modernist building. It is not. The taller building behind it, designed by an American architect, is. What is the difference? International Style buildings are almost always glass and metal boxes or tubes, have smooth skins, and express the floor levels with horizontality. The building in the middle does not — It has variation in its glass and metal skin because vertical components were added that give the skin depth and detail. The building expresses some of its functions, beyond just office space, with the insets that may represent more ceremonial spaces. The Vietnamese building is a more vibrant human-scaled building. This is an addition to the HCMC branch of the National Treasury, occupied in 2007. Vietnamese architects Nguyễn Trường Lưu and Ngô Đằng Vân designed this building, and it is a Vietnamese modernist building.