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Striving to adapt the progressive ideas of the pre-war modern movement to the specific human needs of post-war reconstruction, Alison and Peter Smithson were among the most influential and controversial architects of the latter half of the 20th century. As younger members of CIAM (Congrs Internationaux d'Architecture Moderne) and as founding members of Team 10 they were at the heart of the debate on the future course of Modern Architecture. The uncompromising modernity of their Hunstanton Secondary Modern School (1949-1954) heralded the Smithsons' role as the leading exponents of the New Brutalism. As members of the Independent Group, among others with the artists Eduardo Paolozzi and Richard Hamilton, the critic Reyner Banham and the photographer Nigel Henderson, they are often credited with having laid the foundations for the 1960s Pop Art movement. Alison and Peter Smithsons' reputation for controversy rather overshadowed the work at the heart of their architectural philosophy and practice: their designs for houses and preoccupation with the 'dwelling'. Although great admirers of Le Corbusier, they rejected his idea of the dwelling as a 'machine for living'. To the Smithsons a house was a particular place, which should be suited to its location, able to meet the ordinary requirements of life and to accommodate its inhabitants' individual patterns of use. This book examines the evolution of their approach to the everyday 'art of inhabitation'. It does so by extensively documenting most of their housing designs, especially their optimistic House of the Future of 1956 and the series of renovations of and additions to the fairy-tale like 'Hexenhaus' in Germany from the late 1980s onward. Also included are essays by Beatriz Colomina, Dirk van den Heuvel and Max Risselada, plus a selection of texts by Alison and Peter Smithson.

This book accompanies the exhibition:
Alison and Peter Smithson. Concepts for the dwelling.
Now travelling from the Design Museum, London to Witte de With, Rotterdam
April 4th to June 13th 2004