Colonial architecture is a hybrid architectural style that arose as colonists combined architectural styles from their country of origin with design characteristics of the settled country. Colonists frequently built houses and buildings in a style that was familiar to them but with local characteristics more suited to their new climate. [1] Below are links to specific articles about colonial architecture, specifically the modern colonies:
Spanish colonial architecture is still found in the former colonies of the Spanish Empire in the Americas and in the Philippines. In Mexico, it is found in the Historic center of Mexico City, Puebla, Zacatecas, Querétaro, Guanajuato, and Morelia. Antigua Guatemala in Guatemala is also known for its well-preserved Spanish colonial style architecture. Other cities known for Spanish colonial heritage are Ciudad Colonial of Santo Domingo, the ports of Cartagena, Colombia, and Old San Juan in Puerto Rico.
Portuguese colonial architecture is most visible in Brazil, Madeira, North Africa and Sub-Saharan Africa, Macau, the Malaysian city of Malacca, city of Goa in India, and Moluccas and Java in Indonesia.
British colonial architecture are most visible in North America, the British West Indies, South Asia, Australia, New Zealand and South Africa.
French colonial architecture is most visible in North America and Indochina.
Dutch colonial architecture is most visible in Indonesia (especially Java and Sumatra), the United States, South Asia, and South Africa. In Indonesia, formerly Dutch East Indies, colonial architecture was studied academically and had developed into a new tropical architecture form which emphasizes on conforming to the tropical climate of the Indies and not completely imitating the architectural language of the Dutch colonists.
Eritrea was Italy's first African colony. Its first capital, Massawa, contains a large amount of early Italian colonial architecture, characterized by historicism and inspiration from Venetian Gothic and Italian Neoclassical architecture. The colonial architecture and orthogonal street grid of Asmara, the colony's second capital, was inscribed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2017. Much of the city's colonial architecture dates to the fascist era, during which Benito Mussolini encouraged architects and planners to transform the city into a "Little Rome". [2] [3]
Somalia also contains a wide range of Italian colonial architecture, dating back to its colonial era. In Mogadishu, the residence of most of the colony's eventual 50,000 Italian residents, colonial architects undertook large planning projects and erected monuments such as the still-extant triumphal arch dedicated to Umberto I, the largely destroyed Cathedral of Mogadiscio, and various government buildings. The Italian-built Villa Somalia remains Somalia's presidential residence. Unlike colonial schemes in Libya and Eritrea, Italian colonial authorities built within existing cities in Somalia, not building new villages or towns for settlers. [4]
Before the consolidation of Italian Cyrenaica and Italian Tripolitania, Libya's colonial masters undertook significant building projects in Italian styles, such as the construction of Tripoli's Cathedral, built in a Venetian Gothic style. Following the founding of Italian Libya, Italian Fascist architecture became the standard for the massive infrastructural and settlement-related projects that Mussolini's Italy undertook. In cities such as Tripoli and Benghazi, colonial architects and urban planners undertook large-scale urban projects, such as the construction of Benghazi's monumental Lungomare (sea-walk), new urban districts for Italian settlers, and Catholic religious buildings, including Benghazi's and Tripoli's cathedrals. The fascist government's constructions were usually characterized by use of the Italian Rationalist and Neoclassical styles. Starting in 1938, the colony's Public Works Department sponsored the building of 27 new villages meant for Italian settlement, mostly in Cyrenaica, which epitomized a Rationalism informed by local Arab architectural mores. Giovanni Pellegrini, one of the most prominent designers of these agrarian villages, attempted to synthesize Arab and Italian architecture to settlements best fitted to Cyrenaica's arid climate. [5] [6]
Italy's occupation of the Dodecanese bore a significant amount of modernist and art deco buildings throughout the archipelago. Colonial architects also constructed several new towns and villages, such as Portolago, now known as Lakki. Contrasting with much of the built remnants of Italian colonialism in Africa, Italian architecture in the Dodecanese often remains in good repair. [7]
Italy's brief colonial undertaking in Albania resulted in a prominent collection of Rationalist buildings, including the Bank of Albania, the Prime Minister's Office, and the National Theatre. [8]
Benghazi is the second-most-populous city in Libya as well as the largest city in Cyrenaica, with an estimated population of 1,207,250 in 2020. Located on the Gulf of Sidra in the Mediterranean, Benghazi is also a major seaport.
The Dutch colonial empire comprised the overseas territories and trading posts controlled and administered by Dutch chartered companies—mainly the Dutch East India Company and the Dutch West India Company—and subsequently by the Dutch Republic (1581–1795), and by the modern Kingdom of the Netherlands after 1815.
A colonial empire is a collective of territories, either contiguous with the imperial center or located overseas, settled by the population of a certain state and governed by that state.
The architecture of Indonesia reflects the diversity of cultural, historical, and geographic influences that have shaped Indonesia as a whole. Invaders, colonizers, missionaries, merchants, and traders brought cultural changes that had a profound effect on building styles and techniques.
Braga Street is a street in the center of Bandung, Indonesia, famous in 1920s colonial Indonesia as a promenade street. A European ambiance of chic cafes, boutiques, and restaurants along the street propelled Bandung to attain the Dutch nickname Parijs van Java.
Albert Frederik Aalbers is a Dutch architect who created elegant villas, hotels, and office buildings in Bandung, Indonesia, during Dutch colonial rule in the 1930s. Albert Aalbers worked in the Netherlands between 1924 and 1930 and then migrated to the Dutch East Indies, after which he returned to the Netherlands in 1942 due to World War II and political circumstances following Indonesian independence. During his stay in Bandung, in a period when the city was dubbed the city of architecture laboratory, a number of his buildings were considered architectural masterpieces. Aalbers' style was inspired by expressionist Frank Lloyd Wright and modernist Le Corbusier. In Bandung, the DENIS bank in Braga Street and the Savoy Homann Hotel in Asia-Afrika Street, still carry Aalber's ocean wave ornamentation.
Libya was a colony of Fascist Italy located in North Africa, in what is now modern Libya, between 1934 and 1943. It was formed from the unification of the colonies of Cyrenaica and Tripolitania, which had been Italian possessions since 1911.
Marcello Piacentini was an Italian urban theorist and one of the main proponents of Italian Fascist architecture.
Imperialism, colonialism and irredentism played an important role in the foreign policy of Fascist Italy. Among the regime's goals were the acquisition of territory considered historically Italian in France and Yugoslavia, the expansion of Italy's sphere of influence into the Balkans and the acquisition of more colonies in Africa. The pacification of Libya (1923–32), the invasion of Ethiopia (1935–36), the invasion of Albania (1939), the invasion of France (1940), the invasion of Greece (1940–41) and the invasion of Yugoslavia (1941) were all undertaken in part to add to Italy's national space. According to historian Patrick Bernhard, Fascist Italian imperialism under Benito Mussolini, particularly in Africa, served as a model for the much more famous expansionism of Nazi Germany in Eastern Europe.
Italian Cyrenaica was an Italian colony, located in present-day eastern Libya, that existed from 1911 to 1934. It was part of the territory conquered from the Ottoman Empire during the Italo-Turkish War of 1911, alongside Italian Tripolitania.
The Italian colonial empire, also known as the Italian Empire between 1936 and 1941, was founded in Africa in the 19th century. It comprised the colonies, protectorates, concessions and dependencies of the Kingdom of Italy. In Africa, the colonial empire included the territories of present-day Libya, Eritrea, Somalia and Ethiopia ; outside Africa, Italy possessed the Dodecanese Islands, Albania and also had some concessions in China.
Libyan railways are the Italian colonial railways in Italian Libya. They are related to the development of the railways in the Italian colonial empire. This history started with the opening in 1888 of a short section of line in Italian Eritrea, and ended in 1947 with the loss of Italian Libya after the Allied offensive in North Africa and the destruction of the railways around Italian Tripoli. The railways in the Italian colonial empire reached 1,561 km before World War II.
Dutch colonial architecture refers to the various style of Dutch architecture built across the Dutch Empire. Though most of the buildings were designed by Dutch architects and dictated by Western architectural styles, even the most ardent style-purists among architects could not escape the forces of context and culture. Dutch colonial architecture often is a result of climatological adaptations or the use of local building materials - and more importantly, the rich and diverse cultural contexts. In this hybridity lies the quality of these buildings. Architecture shows that the strict racial taxonomy of a colonial system could not be maintained.
Charles Prosper Wolff Schoemaker was a Dutch architect who designed several distinguished Art Deco buildings in Bandung, Indonesia, including the Villa Isola and Hotel Preanger. He has been described as "the Frank Lloyd Wright of Indonesia," and Wright had a considerable influence on Wolff Schoemaker's modernist designs. Although he was primarily known as an architect, he was also a painter and sculptor.
The colonial architecture of Indonesia refers to the buildings that were created across Indonesia during the Dutch colonial period, during that time, this region was known as the Dutch East Indies. These types of colonial era structures are more prevalent in Java and Sumatra, as those islands were considered more economically significant during the Dutch imperial period. As a result of this, there is a large number of well preserved colonial era buildings that are still densely concentrated within Indonesian cities in Java and Sumatra to this day.
Florestano Di Fausto was an Italian architect, engineer and politician who is best known for his building designs in the Italian overseas territories around the Mediterranean. He is considered the most important colonial architect of the Fascist age in Italy and has been described as the "architect of the Mediterranean". Uncontested protagonist of the architectural scene first in the Italian Islands of the Aegean and then in Italian Libya, he was gifted with a remarkable preparation combined with consummate skills, which allowed him to master and to use indifferently and in any geographical context the most diverse architectural styles, swinging between eclecticism and rationalism. His legacy, long neglected, has been highlighted since the 1990s.
Italian Benghazi was the name used during the Italian colonization of Libya for the port-city of Benghazi in Italian Cyrenaica.
New Indies Style is a modern architectural style used in the Dutch East Indies between the late 19th century through pre-World War II 20th century. New Indies Style is basically early modern (western) architecture, which applies local architectural elements such as wide eaves or prominent roof as an attempt to conform with the tropical climate of Indonesia.
world colonial architecture.
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