- Benedikt, Michael. For an Architecture of Reality. New York: Lumen Books (1987). Seeking a vocabulary for material presence.
- Blaser, Werner. “Buildings of Stone: Statics As Aesthetics.” Perspecta, vol. 17 (1980): 26–35. A paean to craft.
- Culvahouse, Tim. “Figuration and Continuity in the Work of H. H. Richardson.” Perspecta, no. 24 (1988): 24–39. How to make a brick surface taut. This entire issue of Perspecta is on Materiality.
- Eisenman, Peter. “Real and English.” Oppositions, no. 4 (1975): 5–31. Glass and brick exchange roles in James Stirling’s Leicester Engineering Building.
- Frampton, Kenneth. “Towards a Critical Regionalism: Six Points for an Architecture of Resistance,” and “Rappel à l’Ordre: the Case for the Tectonic.” In Labour, Work and Architecture: Collected Essays on Architecture and Design. London: Phaidon Press Limited, 2002.
- Frascari, Marco. “The Tell-the-Tale Detail.” In Kate Nesbitt, ed. Theorizing a New Agenda for Architecture: an Anthology of Architectural Theory, 1965–95. New York: Princeton Architectural Press (1996). Originally published in VIA, no. 7 (1984): 23–37. The tangible experience of a building through the plotting of its details, with Scarpa as an example.
- Ruskin, John. “The Lamp of Sacrifice” and “The Lamp of Truth.” In The Seven Lamps of Architecture. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1979. On the moral implications of material craft.
- Scott, Geoffrey. “The Mechanical Fallacy” and “The Ethical Fallacy.” In The Architecture of Humanism. Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1954. The counter-argument to Ruskin.
- Sullivan, Louis Henri. “The Key.” In Kindergarten Chats. New York: Wittenborn, Schultz, Inc., 1947.
- Tanazaki, Jun’ichiro. In Praise of Shadows. Translated by Thomas Harper. New Haven: Leete’s Island Books, 1977. Materials in light and darkness.
- Wright, Frank Lloyd. “The Meaning of Materials.” Architectural Record, vols. 63 & 64, April (“Stone”), May (“Wood”), and June (“The Kiln”), July (“Glass”), August (“Concrete”), and October (“Sheet Metal”), 1928.
Originally published 4th quarter 2002, in arcCA 02.4, “New Material.”
