Adhocism, expanded and updated edition

<b>The triumphant return of a book that gave us permission to throw out the rulebook, in activities ranging from play to architecture to revolution.</b><p>When this book first appeared in 1972, it was part of the spirit that would define a new architecture and design era—a new way of thinking ready to move beyond the purist doctrines and formal models of modernism. Charles Jencks and Nathan Silver's book was a manifesto for a generation that took pleasure in doing things ad hoc, using materials at hand to solve real-world problems. The implications were subversive. Turned-off citizens of the 1970s immediately adopted the book as a DIY guide. The word “adhocism” entered the vocabulary, the concept of adhocism became part of the designer's toolkit, and <i>Adhocism</i> became a cult classic. Now <i>Adhocism</i> is available again, with new texts by Jencks and Silver reflecting on the past forty years of adhocism and new illustrations demonstrating adhocism's continuing relevance.</p><p>Adhocism has always been around. (Think Robinson Crusoe, making a raft and then a shelter from the wreck of his ship.) As a design principle, adhocism starts with everyday improvisations: a bottle as a candleholder, a dictionary as a doorstop, a tractor seat on wheels as a dining room chair. But it is also an undeveloped force within the way we approach almost every activity, from play to architecture to city planning to political revolution.</p><p>Engagingly written, filled with pictures and examples from areas as diverse as auto mechanics and biology, <i>Adhocism</i> urges us to pay less attention to the rulebook and more to the real principle of how we actually do things. It declares that problems are not necessarily solved in a genius's “eureka!” moment but by trial and error, adjustment and readjustment.</p>