Rangoon (Yangon) has a complex history as Burma’s (Myanmar) largest city, its former capital, and most influential port city. The Port Trust Office (Myanma Port Authority building) was designed by Thomas Oliphant Foster and completed in 1928.[1] A powerful beacon in contemporary Yangon, the Port Trust Office represents British Imperial Power over its inhabitants, streetscapes, […]
The Japanese Imperial Mint is a British-colonial style brick factory that was the first of its kind in Japan, designed by Irish architect, Thomas Waters. Though the mint’s sole purpose was to produce coins, there were colonial undertones in its history. Even before its opening in 1871, much of its activities often fell under the […]
While once commonplace in the American landscape, mental asylums are often seen as obsolete relics of an antiquated form of psychiatry. The typology of a stately, manicured hospital for the “insane” emerged in the latter half of the nineteenth century as representations of a newfangled, “moral” and romanticized view of treating mental illness.1 This relatively […]
Julieta Alva The National Palace in Mexico City has served as the residence of the President of Mexico since 2018 and is located on the cities main square.[1] This is a historical site of importance, as it was the original location of the palace of the ruling class during the Aztec empire. Much of the […]
Historically known as Burma, present day Myanmar has gone through significant transformations in power structures and national identity. This struggle can be symbolically represented through the architectural presence left by imperialist superpowers, most commonly, Great Britain. The imposition of architectural styles is one method of establishing empire and declaring power over a nation. Its strong presence […]
The Meiji Restoration The Meiji period (1868–1912) was decisively an era of construction. It saw the military state of the Tokugawa shogunate replaced with a Westernized nation under a restored imperial authority. One of the most urgent tasks facing the Meiji leaders, who were largely drawn from the early samurai class of the Tokugawa Era […]
The convoluted emergence of the federal center of American democracy and how it reflects the colonial roots of a nation The location and architecture for the U.S federal government did not always exist as it does today. The immediate image that is conjured up of the white, neoclassical portico and columns in front of a […]
Introduction The Caribbean is a region historically notable for its legacy of colonization and slave labour. As early as the 16th century enslaved Africans were shipped to islands in the West Indies to work on plantations owned and operated by Europeans. In particular, France claimed a substantial amount of territory for its monarchy, and took […]
Forming a portion of the St. Lawrence Market façade in Toronto, its first official city hall is part of a legacy of facadism in Toronto architecture, where buildings are preserved to meet the goal of heritage conservation of facades. As we seek a decolonized society, it is important to question the role our preserved architecture […]
In the late nineteenth century, Bombay transformed from a city of warehouses to become one of Britain’s finest imperial cities. As trade, wealth, and the population flourished, the colonial government embarked on the long-contemplated project of demolishing the old fort walls, to make room for the envisioned metropolis1. As Preeti Chopra discusses in her book, […]