The Scandinavian countries, likewise, have long been utilitarian in outlook due to a long history of scarcity and relative isolation that favored durable, efficient construction and left little time or opportunity for excessive decoration. The Japanese also culturally have a national character that showcases the character of the materials they use, an approach that tends to favor the clean lines, sparse decoration, and simple colors that characterize minimalism today.

Both countries in their history have suffered harsh climates and a lack of raw materials, forcing builders to pay more attention to how their scarce materials are used. Japanese and Scandinavian traditional architecture have also heavily influenced the simple architecture and minimalist houses we see today. Chicago’s Crown Hall and New York’s Seagram Building, both designed by Van der Rohe, still look still look incredibly current despite both being inaugurated in the 1950’s. Van Der Rohe pioneered the use of modern grades of steel rather than cast iron, minimalist structural framework, open space, and glass plates to create buildings that still look fresh today. Of course, this product of the Internationalist movement in modern architecture did much more than that. If for nothing else, German Ludwig Mies van der Rohe may be considered a pioneer of modern architecture, simply for popularizing the idea that “less is more”. While you can’t necessarily call De Stijl itself to be an architecture movement or style, its influence is readily apparent even in minimalist structures and designs today. The De Stijl art movement was a huge influence on minimalist design in general, favoring the clean vertical and horizontal lines, and bold color blocks from a limited palette. Simple architecture as we know it today evolved from the modern design movement, and it really started getting some traction with the rise of the De Stijl art movement from the Netherlands, German architects like Van Der Rohe, and later on, the influences of traditional Japanese and Scandinavian design. Architects and soon-to-be homeowners will have to constantly ask themselves “do I really need this?” and “how do I simplify this further without giving up function?” at each stage of the design process. A focus on solving real issues with as few materials or physical effort as possible inevitably involves more planning and self-examination. While there are different philosophies behind simple or minimalist houses today, all of them focus on constructing houses in a way to efficiently solve underlying problems above all else, including superfluous decoration.ĭespite the name, however, “simple” architecture is anything but. Simple tents, lean-to, and even more complex simple wooden houses, including our indigenous Bahay kubo can arguably fall under the category of “simple architecture”.

While the modernist design movement has been instrumental in leading to a much wider acceptance of minimalist and simple architecture, simple architecture has existed in one form or another since the beginning of man’s efforts to build structures to live in. However, it would be a mistake to think that minimalist and modern architecture are one and the same. Structures that follow these types of architectural design have become more and more commonplace since around the rise of the modernist movement of the first part of the 20 th century. ‘Simple architecture’ is one of the many terms used to describe different types of minimalist architecture and design. Everything You Needed To Know About Simple Architecture

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