Jeffery Howe

This is a chronologically-organized survey of churches, synagogues, temples, and houses of worship of all kinds, including contemporary buildings. The book includes capable definitions of a wide variety of styles and has many plans, schematics, and other line drawings. There are images of recycled buildings and mobile houses of worship, but the book is particularly strong in its representation of the modern period. Although there is ample explanation of various architectural styles, there is insufficient attempt to trace influences, or even to identify particularly influential designs. That is perhaps a niggling point for most readers, but an important one for those fascinated by the development of American architecture.
The photographs are almost all in full color, although there are some old black-and-white photos. Most of the images were taken with a 35mm camera, as they exhibit the standard parallax/converging verticals problem endemic to that format. Lots and lots of very nice images, in any case. The book includes a glossary, a decent bibliography, and a nice section on leading architects. As usual, New Jersey is under-represented—I think I counted only 2 or 3 churches from our state in the book—but that seems to be the general consensus regarding the merit of our religious architecture.… (más)